Make Quadruped (Rig)

Creates a rig based on the selected quadruped guide. To first load a quadruped guid, choose Create Character Quadruped Guide from the Animate toolbar.

To display: Select a quadruped guide and choose Create Character Rig from Quadruped Guide from the Animate toolbar.

For more information, see Creating Quadruped Rigs [Character Animation].

NoteMany of the rig controls use scripted operators to control their movement. As a result, you should not use the Remove Animation

from All Parameters, Any Animation Type or any of the Remove Animation

from Transforms commands from the Animation panel when deleting animation from the controls because these commands also remove the scripted operators on the controls' parameters.

A	Ears: curves are chains driven by springs. Cubes control ears' rotation. See Spring Operator Property Editor for more information.
B	Chest (large cube): controls rotation and translation of the chest/spine.
C	Front Leg up-vectors (pyramids): control resolution plane of front legs for IK.
D	Toe (cube at tip): controls offset from the foot in rotation.
E	Foot roll (inner cube): controls rotation angle for step and heel roll. See Quadruped Controls for more information.
F	Extension (middle cube): controls controls distribution of rotation among the 3 bones of the hind leg. See Quadruped Controls for more information.
G	Foot (outer cube): controls rotation and translation of foot.
H	Belly: box controls rotation and translation of the belly area. The curves connecting the box to the rig are chains driven by springs. See Spring Operator Property Editor for more information.
I	Lower body (outer cube): controls rotation and translation of the hips.
J	Hips (inner cube): a secondary offset animation layer for the hips.
K	Hind Leg up-vectors (pyramids): control resolution plane of hind legs for IK.
L	Tail: curve is a chain driven by springs. Cubes control tail's rotation and translation. See Spring Operator Property Editor for more information.

Chest

These options let you select the way you want the torso, spine, and control icons to be set up. If you create a quaternion spine of Fixed Length, you can extend it only using the Scale slider in the Quadruped Controls.

These options are the same as found in Chest.

Belly

These options let you create a belly area control created below the base of the rig's spine and hips to animate a large tummy. You can then control how the weight of the belly is distributed around the body. These options are the same as found in the Belly.

Head

These options let you set up the head, neck, and ears. If you create a quaternion neck (head spine) of Fixed Length, you can extend it only using the Scale slider in the Quadruped Controls.

These options are the same as found in Head.

Tail

These options let you create a tail control.

Tip

To modify the tail's spring, see Spring Operators for Tail, Ear, and Belly Rig Controls [Character Animation].
You can also create a separate tail element. You can then use this tail with any other rig that you create. See Creating a Tail [Character Animation] for more information.

No Tail

You ain't gettin' any!

Make Tail

Creates a tail that is a chain where each bone is controlled by a spring that reacts to the rig's animation (secondary animation). You can also animate the cube controls on the curve in FK to give precise control and posing when required.

Divisions

Number of bones in the tail. The more divisions, the more chain elements that will trace the inner curve of the tail. The outer cage driven by the spring stays the same.

If you need greater control over the tail where it is in a specific pose, like a curl, you can set the FK/IK Blend on this chain and control it in FK, ignoring the outer cage.

Roll Division

These options allow you to choose how you want the quadruped skeleton's envelope to be weighted at a more refined level when the bone is rotated (rolled). These quaternion-based options create a set of nulls, based on the number of subdivisions that you specify, to distribute the weighting along the bone.

Humerus (upper front leg bone) Roll Division

Divides the rotation along the length of the humerus so that the nulls allow more rotation at the top of the bone than at the end.

For example, the top of the humerus is joined at the shoulder (and "armpit"), which requires more rotation than the leg joint (equivalent to an elbow). This allows for more refined envelope weighting for these difficult areas.

Active	Toggles the activeness of this type of roll division.
Number	Number of nulls created along the humerus and femur bones.

Femur (upper hind leg bone) Roll Division

Divides the rotation in the opposite way as the humerus because more rotation is required at the "wrist" instead of the elbow. This is done with built-in IK/FK blending.

In this case, the rotation starts at the end of the second bone where it joins the paw. This helps solve the problem when there's animation on the last bone of the leg, paw effector, paw root, or paw bone.

Active	Toggles the activeness of this type of roll division.
Number	Number of nulls created along the ulna and tibia bones.

Tip

Although it's unlikely that you will rotate paws beyond the -180 to 180 degree range that the roll provides, you can extend this range. For example, certain setups may require that you adjust exactly where the center of the seam line is. To do so:

Select a paw bone and open it in the explorer.
Double-click the Roll_Compensation parameter and tweak the roll_offset slider to get the range you need.

Shadow Rigs

These options create a shadow rig constrained to the regular rig. Shadow rigs are simpler rigs that are constrained to the main rig that is more complicated and used for animating.

For more information in general, see Creating Shadow Rigs [Character Animation].

Constrain Shadow Character

None	No shadow rig is created.
SI\|3D Skeleton	SOFTIMAGE\|3D-style skeleton hierarchy with the effectors as children of the last bone.
XSI Skeleton	XSI-style skeleton hierarchy with the effectors as children of the chain's root.
Null Hierarchy	Hierarchy of nulls with a null at the root of each chain.
Box Hierarchy	Hierarchy made of boxes.
Box with IK Arms/Legs	Hierarchy made of boxes but with arms and/or legs that are IK chains. This is often useful for creating animation that is exported to games engines.