Character Rigging and Advanced Animation: Bring Your Character to Life Using Autodesk 3ds Max

Gain a thorough understanding of animation and character rigging using Autodesk 3ds Max to create realistic character animations. This book is split into three modules that are subsequently divided into chapters. The first module is the foundation module: in this module you’ll cover, among other topics, the 12 cardinal principles of animation with reference to classic real-world examples and famous movies/animation shots. Using these, the further chapters explore using key frames and graph editors to obtain fluid motion in your animations. Practical examples are used to better explain which feature suits a particular scenario.

The second module, called the backbone module, introduces you to deformation tools and their use for character animation. Further chapters cover driven animations, constraints posed by bones, bipeds, and the CAT tools available in 3ds Max 2019.

The final module, the lifeline module, encourages you to bring your character to life by applying principles learnt in the previous modules. Here you will be guided on how to retarget animations from one character to other characters or rigs.

On completing Character Rigging and Advance Animation, you will be able to create character rigs for bipeds and quadrupeds with ease, animating them with life-like motion.

What You Will Learn

• Understand the 12 principles of animation
• Set up an animation-ready character rig from scratch
• Master the deformation tools available for animation

Who This Book Is For

Readers who are familiar with 3ds Max at a basic level and are looking at getting into character rigging and animation.

About the Author

Purushothaman Raju has over 17 years of experience in multiple domains comprising online gaming and academic coaching. During his tenure as academic faculty, he has trained and mentored more than 800 students on diverse projects in the field of multimedia. He holds an advanced professional diploma in multimedia. Currently, he works as associate senior faculty teaching 3D, multimedia and post production at NICC International College of Design, Bangalore.