Simple Lightwave 9 WeightMap Bone Tutorial

Shows how to create weightmapped bones in Lightwave 9. Quick and dirty. I may be missing things or using old-fashioned methods.

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• lightwave
• weightmap
• bones

[kargaroc386]

what are weight maps? is it how the bones interface with the mesh?

[imjinc2k]

Without using WMs, I think each vertex in the mesh is deformed based on its distance to the bones, and the bone strength. A weight map is a list of vertices with a strength value for each one. Using WMs, you can specify which vertices a particular bone will control, exclude other bones, and adjust the amount of influence a bone has on a particular vertex. There's even an airbrush tool you can use to gradually spray (+/-) bone influence in the nooks and crannies of your model to fix glitches.

[kargaroc386]

but are WMs how the mesh interacts with the bones?

[imjinc2k]

A WM defines how MUCH specific bones affect specific parts of the mesh. Using generic bone strengths for say,.. your fingers.. they might compete with each other because they're so close together. Large parts of your middle finger would be dragged by the bones in your ring finger, and your index finger. But by creating separate weight maps for each finger, and painting the weights (e.g. 100% orange for fingertip, 50% for the shared bit of webbing at the palm...) you'll keep them independent.

[00paranoimia00]

I didn't see what did u do in the last part in layout.. did u put a null in each ending skelegons?

i did that and my model is not working ;(

Thanks~~~

[imjinc2k]

No nulls. There's no IK or anything in this vid.  What I was doing is resetting the pivot rotation for each bone by selecting them, and hitting shift-P.

[shahou88]

thank you easy ^^

[DancingMagnus]

This tutorial kicks ass! Thanks a bunch. I've been searching for years (literally, on and off) for a tutorial that goes straight to setting up weight maps and bones and not bothering about creating pretty meshes, or a complex hierarchy, and getting stuck in details that are not relevant. Love it how I now, 20 minutes after I found your video, have actually made a rudimentary skinned mesh. Only downside is the low resolution of the video.

[Algae998]

look up lightwave fundamentals. its a great introduction of video tutorials. explains all you need to know to start off, which is where i am :)

- imjinc2k - is there a higher res version on your tutorial? it looks very informative, but, since im a beginner, i dont know where everything is.