Rubber Hose Style

[Hassan]

What is your approach to make rubber hose style for arms or legs. I tried Flexi-Binding and sketch bone but I did not get the result that I want. I know that Víctor made a topic about it but the video is not available anymore.

this guy got a good result but he didn't explain how he did it.

[Greenlaw]

If you're going to use Sketch Bones, the 'smoothness' has a lot to do with where you place your points. I get nice bends when the points are aligned with each joint. You also want an equal number of points on either side. Bone Strength can also affect how smoothly the limb bends--the more they overlap, the smoother it gets. Up to a point anyways--go too far and you get mush.

Also, don't trust the OpenGL preview. Moho will sometimes simplify curves for better interactivity and performance. You need to render it to see the actual smoothness quality.

There are other ways to do 'bendy' limbs. Victor came up with an excellent technique using only two major bones. There are some limitations with the technique (you won't use this for 's' wiggles, it's more for 'c' bends,) but it can work really well for some characters.

BTW, using another technique by Victor, you can have both types of limbs in a character, and switch between them as needed. At my workplace, I've done this for several characters and it works great!

Victor's bendy limb tutorial is here:

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=20410&hilit=rubber+hose

His sub-rig switching technique is described here:

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=30445&hilit=rig+switch

[Greenlaw]

Whoops, I just noticed that the video download link for Victor's Rubber Hose technique no longer works. Hopefully, Victor can upload it to YouTube.

[Greenlaw]

Oh, I just remembered another trick. You can use Follow Path to simulate a spline deformer. Basically, you bind the art to the curve using the Alt-key, and animate the curve instead of the artwork. I use this method sometimes when I want very 'wavy' animations.

Of the three methods, I probably use the Sketch Bones method the most but it depends on the character design and style of animation that's called for.

[DK]

An easier way to make a hose so it will bend like a tentacle is to create a line made of three points. The point in the middle should be set to bendy not sharp (This can be adjusted with bezier curves too). Then select the whole line with the fill tool and give the it a thickness of about 10. Colour this line the colour you want to make the outline of the hose. Then select the line copy it to clipboard. select the line on the mains screen again with the fill tool give it a width of 12. Paste the line on the clipboard back over the line on screen and give it a fill colour. Now bind the points on the line to a couple of bones and you have a perfetly flexible hose.

I use this technique all the time. It has a couple drawbacks but nothing you can't handle.

Cheers
D.K

[Víctor Paredes]

I just updated the tutorial link. Thanks for pointing it out, Dennis.

[Hassan]

It really helps, thank you.