So much to learn. For Charlie Bear Brown I used the Skin modifier as opposed to the Physique modifier I used on my first game character. There are some major differences in how you manipulate the influence of the bones on the mesh with Skin.

Below you can see that each bone has envelopes that can be re-sized to affect the mesh around it. Using Skin was very handy. Although, it took me a lot of trial and error to figure out how it works. Here again you can save custom files called ".env". These files allowed me to tweak and save my progress. I kept multiple copies as I refined my envelopes.

Afterwards I spent some time moving the bones around and watching Charlie's mesh deform. I eventually went back to the bones and saved progressive changes as ".fig" files until I was happy with the figure. Then re-applied the Skin modifier and loaded my latest .env file.

Such happiness when things work out.

Using Skin (opposed to Physique) kicked ass and I learned about 2 new file types in Max to help me save time and my sanity.

Labels: 3d, CharlieBear