antCGi Rigging Tool in 2024
I am thrilled to announce that starting next month, the highly popular biped rigging tool, or BipRig as I have rebranded it, will also be available on the antCGi store. This means that everyone who buys it will have full access to a restriction-free version, allowing for a comprehensive and unhindered rigging experience.
For those who have been utilizing the restricted version provided to YouTube members and Ko-Fi donators, this transition marks a significant leap forward in functionality and accessibility. With the unrestricted version, users will have enhanced flexibility at their fingertips, paving the way for even more seamless rigging processes.
Keep an eye out for the official launch at the antCGi store, and get ready to take your biped rigging capabilities to the next level. Stay tuned for further updates and prepare to elevate your animation projects with this powerful tool!
But what is the Biped Rigging Tool?
BipRig is a tool which simply allows you to rig a biped character in minutes rather than weeks. It has also been developed by a rigging artist and animator with over thirty years of experience in the industry, so everything has been approached from an animators point of view meaning there are no overly complicated options.
Although its foundations are planted in game development with the base skeletons tailored to work in either Unreal Engine or Unity, it can also give animators a leg up in providing a quick rig for them to advance their animation skills.
Rigging is reduced to a three step process -
Move the base locators to key joint positions that match your model.
Generate the skeleton.
Generate the rig.
You also have the option to add additional locators to create extra joints or joint chains if your character has accessories, clothing or extra body parts which need to be animatable.
If the joint positions need adjusting, you can simply reposition the locators and then regenerate the rig, without having to unpick a series of complicated controls.
The final rig features -
A full, joint based facial rig.
Squash and Stretch
Soft IK (Reduces knee and elbow pop)
IK and FK spine and limbs.
Bicep, wrist and thigh twist and roll joints.
Customizable foot roll and bank controls.
A full set of customizable face and hand poses.
This Maya tool has been in development for the past few years and over the last twelve months has been undergoing BETA testing, where YouTube members have had access to it and offered help and feedback on its creation.
I am now at the stage where it will soon be ready to move out of testing and my hopes are that moving it to the antCGi store will offer me the time and funding to continue to develop it further whilst also working on version 2, which will be a fully modular rigging system which also comes with a suite of animation tools.
When will it be available?
I am currently ironing out a few bugs, plus I want to create a full video manual showing how to use the tool and also demonstrate the rigs features, but I hope to go live in early February 2024 and this is when a new version will also be available to subscribers.
What about the free version YouTube members currently use?
Unfortunately, to help aid development of this tool I have had to adjust the YouTube membership levels. So now to get monthly access, or continue with your current access, you will need to subscribe to the new Tools Support & Access level.
This will however also open up access to version two once I start development later this year, plus any other tools I develop over time.
