Rig Test - Checking and Fixing Joint Topology

Some notes on this next step, following my research:

When quick rigging, the default embed method (Imperfect Mesh) may not be the best option for me, as it's designed to work around more standard character meshes with more facial details that include interior geometry (i.e. eye sockets, mouths, nostrils, ear holes). The model I've created doesn't have any of these details. I'm not sure if it will be necessary/beneficial to use the more simple embed methods or if the Imperfect Mesh method will still work fine. Will experiment with this.

When following the two tutorials by Maya Learning Channel, I believe can pause my progress on the first part before I get to the skinning step, create and link the joints for the hands and feet, then skin everything. This avoids me having to reskin things.

I'll probably have most of the model be highly skin weighted since it's low poly. The rigidity would look better and too much skin movement would probably look really disturbing.

I've numbered the last research post as Maya Rigging Research 1 because I'm expecting to need to learn more when adding hair and clothes (although likely not as much).

Finally Rigging...

28/11/25

I set up and skinned the quick rig. I found that I had to skin it first before I could attach finger joints because I couldn't unlock the HIK without it putting the rig into a t pose. 

With the model rigged, I'm able to check the proportions and make sure the joint placements are correct. 

Already I can see by bending the knees that the thighs are too long compared to the calves, and overall I think the legs could be a bit longer. At the moment the legs are at a reasonably anatomically correct length, but longer legs would probably look cooler. The knees could also be a bit blockier - this might just be a case of adding more structure to them. 

knee mesh closeup

The elbow bends are also quite flawed. This could also be something that could be solved by increasing the skin weights so that there's less distortion (?). Either way, the forearms are a bit off because they're too triangular

Messing Around with Skin Weights

1/12/25

With full knee skin weights, there's too much clipping and there's the same issue around the hip-thigh joints as well. The arms are not much better with more solid weighting either. 

I'll have to adjust the model to give it longer legs, and better edgeflow in the knees, elbows, and hips.

Model Adjustments - Mostly Joints

It looks like many models use overlapping curves in their knees and elbows like such:

My model doesn't have enough edgeloops to do this. A solution could be to increase the poly count while keeping the same form in order to create smoother bends while still keeping the low-poly look. 

Ivan Constanta has fairly high poly models while keeping a basic form although his style uses tubes for the arms and legs meaning that his joints don't need to be so complicated. The higher poly count just makes the curves and bends smoother. My style having such solid forms makes it a lot more complicated.

A lot of low poly styles use a generous number of triangles, just generally, and also in joints. 

I'll try to avoid this if possible but this might be a good (and seemingly common) solution in keeping my style low poly while having solid joints.

This is also helpful.

body_adjustment.015.002

Here is a comparison of the model before and after lengthening its legs and adjusting the leg joints. I think it's looking a bit better.

body_adjustment.015.002 & body_adjustment.015.003

I'll try rigging it with these two knee joints to see if they perform better.

Left vers.

This isn't much of an improvement and actually I think the knees fall too high up (should be more front facing). The back of the knee gets a very sharp corner. The knee also still distorts to be too small. The hip joints might need to be lower as well so I'll do this when checking the right vers.

With some weight adjustments, I could make it more knobbly which I'm not sure about. I think the back of the knee still goes too far in. 

Also small note to self: I think the crotch edge needs to be a little higher up. I think also the thighs should still be thicker. I wan't to keep them thinner for a more dynamic style but it looks quite bad when bent.

Right vers.

This also looks about the same. It still goes in too far at the back. I've just realised that I can adjust the mesh while the model is in this pose and so I can pull those back faces out and see how that looks in a standing pose

This looks a bit better already but I'll clean it up properly. I think this version is better just because it doesn't have that sharp corner. 

The elbows bend quite well with this joint. I think the joint topology is pretty decent now and the rest can be adjusted with skin weighting (adjusting the knobbliness)

Next Steps

Next I'll be finishing up the rig, creating and attaching the finger joints and then messing around with skin weighting. I think the skin weighting will take me some time - maybe a week (or two if I'm busy with other projects). 

Rigging the hands might highlight some issues in the hand mesh and so this might need to be fixed as well.