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Create Character

The document provides guidelines for creating animated humanoid characters from scratch in 3D modeling software, including modelling the character mesh with proper topology and scale, rigging the character with a sensible bone structure, skinning to attach the mesh to the skeleton, splitting single animations into multiple clips, adding animations to non-Mecanim models, and setting up an avatar to map animations to a character's skeleton in Unity. It also discusses how 2D top-down environments provide a more stable view than 3D environments, making navigation easier.

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Raffaele Iavazzo
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131 views5 pages

Create Character

The document provides guidelines for creating animated humanoid characters from scratch in 3D modeling software, including modelling the character mesh with proper topology and scale, rigging the character with a sensible bone structure, skinning to attach the mesh to the skeleton, splitting single animations into multiple clips, adding animations to non-Mecanim models, and setting up an avatar to map animations to a character's skeleton in Unity. It also discusses how 2D top-down environments provide a more stable view than 3D environments, making navigation easier.

Uploaded by

Raffaele Iavazzo
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Create your own hero for games

Preparing your own character


There are three main steps in creating an animated humanoid character from
scratch: modelling, rigging and skinning.

Modelling
This is the process of creating your own humanoid mesh in a 3D modelling package - 3DSMax,
Maya, Blender, etc. Although this is a whole subject in its own right, there are a few guidelines
you can follow to ensure a model works well with animation in a Unity project.

Observe a sensible topology. The exact nature of a "sensible" structure for your mesh is rather
subtle but generally, you should bear in mind how the vertices and triangles of the model will
be distorted as it is animated. A poor topology will not allow the model to move without
unsightly distortion of the mesh. A lot can be learned by studying existing 3D character meshes
to see how the topology is arranged and why.
Be mindful of the scale of your mesh. Do a test import and compare the size of your imported
model with a "meter cube" (the standard Unity cube primitive has a side length of one unit, so
it can be taken as a 1m cube for most purposes). Check the units your 3D package is using and
adjust the export settings so that the size of the model is in correct proportion to the cube.
Unless you are careful, it is easy to create models
without any notion of their scale and consequently end
up with a set of objects that are disproportionate in size
when they are imported into Unity.
Arrange the mesh so that the character's feet are
standing on the local origin or "anchor point" of the
model. Since a character typically walks upright on a
floor, it is much easier to handle if its anchor point (ie, its
transform position) is directly on that floor.
Model in a T-pose if you can. This will help allow space
to refine polygon detail where you need it (e.g.
underarms). This will also make it easier to position your
rig inside the mesh.
Clean up your model. Where possible, cap holes, weld
verts and remove hidden faces, this will help with
skinning, especially automated skinning processes.

Rigging
This is the process of creating a skeleton of joints to control the movements of your model.3D
packages provide a number of ways to create joints for your humanoid rig. These range from
ready-made biped skeletons that you can scale to fit your mesh, right through to tools for
individual bone creation and parenting to create your own bone structure. Although the details
are outside the scope of Unity, here are some general
guidelines:

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o
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Study existing humanoid skeletons hierarchies (eg,


bipeds) and where possible use or mimic the bone
structure.
Make sure the hips are the parent bone for your skeleton
hierarchy.
A minimum of fifteen bones are required in the skeleton.
The joint/bone hierachy should follow a natural structure
for the character you are creating. Given that arms and
legs come in pairs, you should use a consistent
convention for naming them (eg, "arm_L" for the left
arm, "arm_R" for the right arm, etc). Possible hierarchies
include:
HIPS - spine - chest - shoulders - arm - forearm - hand
HIPS - spine - chest - neck head
HIPS - UpLeg - Leg - foot - toe - toe_end

Skinning
This is the process of attaching the mesh to the skeleton
Skinning involves binding vertices in your mesh to bones,
either directly (rigid bind) or with blended influence to a
number of bones (soft bind). Different software
packages use different methods, eg, assigning individual
vertices and painting the weighting of influence per
bone onto the mesh. The initial setup is typically
automated, say by finding the nearest influence or using
"heatmaps". Skinning usually requires a fair amount of
work and testing with animations in order to ensure
satisfactory results for the skin deformation. Some
general guidelines for this process include:

Using an automated process initially to set up some of the skinning (see relevant tutorials on
3DMax, Maya, etc.)
Creating a simple animation for your rig or importing some animation data to act as a test for
the skinning. This should give you a quick way to evaluate whether or not the skinning looks
good in motion.
Incrementally editing and refining your skinning solution.
Sticking to a maximum of four influences when using a soft bind, since this is the maximum
number that Unity will handle. If more than four influences affect part of the mesh then at least
some information will be lost when playing the animation in Unity.

Splitting Animations
An animated character typically has a number of different movements that are activated in the
game in different circumstances. These movements are called Animation Clips. For example,
we might have separate animation clips for walking, running, jumping, throwing, dying, etc.
Depending on the way the model was animated, these separate movements might be imported
as distinct animation clips or as one single clip where each movement simply follows on from
the previous one. In cases where there is only a single clip, the clip must be split into its
component animation clips within Unity, which will involve some extra steps in your workflow.

Adding animations to models that do not contain them


You can add animation clips to an Animation component even for models without muscle
definitions (ie, non-Mecanim). You need to specify the default animation clip in
theAnimation property, and the available animation clips in the Animations property. The
animation clips you add to such a non-Mecanim model should also be setup in a non-Mecanim
way (ie, the Muscle Definition property should be set to None)
For models that have muscle definitions (Mecanim), the process is different:

Create a New Animator Controller


Open the Animator Controller Window
Drag the desired animation clip into the Animator Controller Window
Drag the model asset into the Hierarchy.
Add the animator controller to the Animator component of the asset.

Working with humanoid animations


The Mecanim Animation System is particularly well suited for working with animations for
humanoid skeletons. Since humanoid skeletons are a very common special case and are used
extensively in games, Unity provides a specialized workflow, and an extended tool set for
humanoid animations.
Because of the similarity in bone structure, it is possible to map animations from one humanoid
skeleton to another, allowing retargeting and inverse kinematics.
With rare exceptions, humanoid models can be expected to have the same basic structure,
representing the major articulate parts of the body, head and limbs. The Mecanim system
makes good use of this idea to simplify the rigging and control of animations. A fundamental
step in creating a animation is to set up a mapping between the simplified humanoid bone
structure understood by Mecanim and the actual bones present in the skeleton; in Mecanim
terminology, this mapping is called an Avatar. The pages in this section explain how to create
an Avatar for your model.
Authors and filmmakers who wish to evoke particular emotions in their audience often rely on
the audience's ability to empathize with the characters portrayed in the narrative, and
especially with the protagonist. The author sets up situations in which characters experience
particular emotions in the hope that the audience will themselves have similar feelings, or at
least understand why the characters feel the way they do. The author is in control of the
characters' emotions, while the audience's emotions derive from sharing in those characters'
feelings and experiences.
Game designers who wish to evoke particular emotions have it somewhat more difficult. Unlike
books and movies, where the author is in full control of the protagonist, it is the audience itself
that is largely in control of a game's principal character or characters. Although designers can
script particular emotions into a game's protagonist by taking control away from the player or
reducing the number of available choices, this can feel like cheating to a player who feels his or
her character should be feeling something different; An author like Shakespeare can write
Romeo such that he wishes to die upon seeing an apparently dead Juliet lying in front of him,
but a game designer cannot force the player to wish the same for his character.

Moving Around in 2 and 3 Dimensions


Here are some differences between ground-level 3D and top-down 2D environments, and their
implications for ease of navigation:
1.
The way the shapes of objects change as the player moves around the game
environment. In 2D environments, rigid objects retain their projected shape as they
change position and orientation due to player motion, while in 3D environments their
apparent shape can change significantly.
2.
The way the angles between objects change as the player orbits around a
particular point or travels along a path1, as measured from the camera's perspective. In
3D environments the apparent angles between objects are significantly affected as the
player moves around, but remain fixed in 2D views.
For these reasons, a 2D view is generally more stable than a 3D view, as it doesn't change quite
as radically as the 3D view when the player moves around the game world. Furthermore, since
the view in top-down 2D games doesn't usually rotate as it does in 3D, a typical 2D view is
remarkably stable compared to a 3D perspective. A stable view provides a more recognizable
context than a more dynamic view, which makes it easier to tell where you are and which way
to go.

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