Skinned Modeling

• Modeling

  • Try to build models at the same scale that they will be used at in game (1 unit = 1 meter).

    • This may not be practical for models animated by bones in Soft since bones are a fixed size.
    • Models can be rescaled when they are loaded in the meshviewer to produce a god file.

     

  • In Soft the skin mesh should be the root of the bone hierarchy. 

    • This isn't possible in Max.  In Max the bone hierarchy should be free floating, the exporter will attach it to the mesh.

     

  • Any Soft control nodes should be in their own separate hierarchy.

  •  The root's origin should coincide with the modeling package's global origin.

    • Directly below the center of the model at ground level.

     

  • Mixings skins and sub objects should be avoided if possible.

    • If absolutely necessary, sub objects should be slotted into the joint hierarchy.

     

  • Keep the number of bones to a minimum and give them descriptive names.

    • i.e.  spine0, spine1, shoulderR, upperarmR, lowerarmR, handR, etc.

     

  • The bones act like the sub objects of a hierarchy, so the same naming convention rules apply.

    • CP- for control points, HP- for hard points
    • i.e. add '_chunk' to the name of a joint that should be the root of an automatically created chunk.