14.0

78 AutoRigger and CMotion

Position the wrist next to the cufinks. Six joints are located because this is where the ngers will be

generated later. To locate the right joint, right-click on the wrist and select the right joint from the list that

appears (…Hand_con+). Now we just have to adjust the ngers and the head and our rig will be ready to be

bound to the character’s mesh.

Binding the Rig to the Character’s Mesh

Before you start binding the rig to the mesh it would certainly be a good idea to save your Project. After doing

so, make sure that the Character object is selected in the Object Manager, i.e. that the rig is selected. In the

Attribute Manager, switch to the Binding tab.

This will again change the appearance of the rig in the Viewport. It will again be made up of joints and bones.

Double-check the position of the bones and joints before getting started. The Binding tab contains an inclusion

eld (Objects). Simply drag the polygon objects body and eyes from the Object Manager into this ﬁeld. If you

need to place multiple objects into this ﬁeld you can do so by either dragging each object individually or by

using the Object eld’s Start Pick Session function (click on the arrow in the white circle or right-click on

Object eld). Note: Do not click and release. This will display the selected object‘s attributes and the Bind

function‘s Object eld will temporarily be hidden. If this happens, select the character object anew.

Note: Do not place the HyperNURBS object into the Object eld.

This more-or-less completes the binding of the rig to the character’s mesh. However, before we move on to

the Animation menu where we will actually move our character, we still have to complete one more important

step. Don’t forget that the rig that we just bound to our character’s mesh is much more complex than it

looks. Numerous bones, Null objects and Controllers are needed in order to make the rig behave correctly

when animated. These have already been generated automatically by CINEMA 4D but are not visible. These

components are actually irrelevant for the person(s) creating the animation.

Important for the animators are the Controllers. These Controllers represent virtual strings of a marionette –

which our character de-facto is. Hence, we only need these Controllers to be visible. Too many elements in the

Project would clutter up the view and slow your workﬂow.