3D Creature Production: Rigging, Animation & CFX

In early August, we launched our first course, where Principal Material Artist Rosen explained how to create procedural game environments from asset creation in Houdini and Substance 3D Designer to shader implementation and scene setup in Unreal Engine.

Great news! We are ready to continue helping you master 3D in our next course, which covers creature animation from start to finish. Experienced Animator Nav Singh will guide you through the steps so you can create an outstanding project by the end of the course.

Why Take This Course?

If you want to learn creature creation, this is the place for you, offering in-depth analysis of rigging, animation, muscle simulation, and more. You will take full control of your creatures and gain unique insight into the processes involved in production.

The course provides a curriculum that can't be found anywhere else:

Rigging

• Creating advanced creature rigs with complete facial control with Zoo Tools.
• Advanced limbs with a leg lock feature.
• Next-level spline control on body, tail, and trunk.
• Game-ready single-hierarchy rig.
• Advanced jiggle control.
• Using blendshape-driven controllers.
• Layer-based rigging using ngSkinTools.

Animation

• Understanding how to animate giant creatures.
• Making realistic animation using references.
• Understanding the concepts of cycle animation.
• Using ragdoll for secondary animation.
• Understanding principles of creature animation.
• Exploring various animation workflows.

Muscle Simulation

• Attaching a muscle rig to an existing rig.
• Setting individual muscle properties and values.
• Exploring various muscle concepts like activation, attachment, sliding, tendons, and fibers.
• Simulating fascia and fat on top of muscles.
• Simulating skin on top of fat tissue.
• Mixing animation and muscle simulation.

Course Content & Breakdown

3D Creature Production for Animation includes 41 hours of video lectures, covering the whole creation process, from the initial skeleton to advanced, animator-friendly controls.

First, you will create a creature rig using Zoo Tools, aiming to make a game-ready single-hierarchy joints rig, compatible with AdonisFX. You will add many advanced features, like multi-layered IK/FK limbs, a shoulder lock, and jiggle controllers that move with the limbs. Then, you will skin the creature using ngSkinTools.

After, you will move on to creating a walk cycle, focusing on building creature behavior animation to prepare the rig for muscle simulation. Finally, you will make a complete muscle, fat, and skin simulation setup in Maya using AdonisFX and combine the muscle simulation with animation.

Course Outline

Rigging Module (13 Hours):

• Parts 01-02: Introduction and Workflow. Start with a course overview and then dive deep into understanding a professional rigging workflow. You'll establish the key concepts and a plan of action before starting building the rig.
• Parts 03-06: Building the Core Rig. This core section covers the construction of the entire creature rig. You'll learn to build robust and flexible systems for the spine, legs, face, trunk, and tail. You will then add detail by creating secondary controls for the ears and setting up dynamic jiggle controllers.
• Parts 07-09: Polishing and Advanced Controls. Elevate your rig from basic to production-ready. You'll learn how to polish the rig's behavior, create advanced animation controls, and integrate external components for a clean and powerful final product.
• Parts 10-13: Skinning the Creature. With the rig built, you'll move to the crucial process of skinning. You will learn how to assign influence and paint weights for the entire body, including the legs, head, neck, ears, and jaw, to achieve smooth and appealing deformations.
• Parts 14-15: Final Cleanup and Polish. In the final lessons, you'll focus on the essential cleanup phase. Learn how to polish your skin weights, organize the rig hierarchy, perfect controller orientations, and ensure the rig is tidy, efficient, and ready for animators.

Animation Module (15 Hours):

• Part 01: Getting Started with Reference. Kick off the course by learning how to find and analyze reference footage, setting a strong foundation for a believable performance.
• Parts 02-03: Full Body Blocking. Dive into the animation process by blocking out the primary poses and timing for the entire creature, focusing on weight, mechanics, and creating a cohesive initial pass from front to back.
• Parts 04-05: Refining the Main Pass. Transition from blocking to splining. In these sections, you'll refine the creature's motion, adding breakdowns, developing fluid movement, and integrating the front and back body animation seamlessly.
• Part 06: Body Polishing. Bring the core body animation to a near-final state. Learn professional polishing techniques to add appeal, fix any awkward movements, and perfect the arcs and timing.
• Part 07: Head and Neck Animation. Focus on secondary animation, starting with the head and neck. You'll learn how to add overlapping action and convey the creature's focus and intent.
• Part 08: Trunk Animation. Animate the creature's trunk, applying principles of overlapping action and follow-through to create a dynamic and lifelike performance.
• Part 09: Tail Animation. Learn the techniques for animating a believable tail, mastering wave-like motions, and the successive breaking of joints for fluid, organic movement.
• Part 10: Ear Animation. Add another layer of life by animating the ears, showing how they react to the primary body motion and the environment.
• Part 11: Jiggle Controllers. Explore how to use specialized jiggle controllers to automatically add subtle, fleshy secondary motion to muscles and skin, enhancing realism with minimal effort.
• Part 12: Extending with Behaviour Animation. Go beyond the basic mechanics and infuse your animation with personality. This extensive lesson covers how to add subtle behaviors and character-specific actions to make your work stand out.
• Part 13: Ragdoll Setups and Face Animation. Finish the animation by leveraging Ragdoll Dynamics for realistic secondary physics. You'll also tackle the final facial animation to complete the performance.

Creature FX Module (13 Hours):

• Part 01: Introduction. Begin your journey into creature FX with an overview of the course, the AdonisFX toolset, and the final simulation result you'll be working towards.
• Part 02: Skinning Skeleton to Rig. Lay the essential groundwork by skinning the creature's skeleton to the animation rig. This step is crucial for ensuring a solid base for the muscle simulation to operate on.
• Part 03: Creating Muscle Locators and Sensors. Dive into the core components of the AdonisFX system. Learn how to set up the muscle locators and sensors that will drive the entire simulation based on the rig's performance.
• Parts 04-08: Creating and Painting Muscles. This comprehensive multi-part section is where the creature's anatomy comes to life. You'll learn the complete workflow for creating muscle presets and meticulously painting their influence across the entire body, including the thighs, lower legs, neck, head, back, and torso.
• Parts 09-11: Connecting Muscles to Sensors. With the muscles sculpted and painted, this next crucial step involves connecting them to the sensor network. You'll systematically link the front leg, back leg, body, and neck muscles, enabling them to fire and react realistically to the underlying skeletal motion.
• Part 12: Mirroring Muscles and Sensors. Learn a vital time-saving technique. This lesson shows you how to efficiently mirror your completed muscle and sensor setup from one side of the creature to the other, dramatically speeding up your workflow.
• Part 13: Setting Up Fascia, Fat, and Skin. Go beyond the muscle layer to achieve ultimate realism. Learn how to build and configure the fascia, fat, and final skin layers that simulate jiggle, sliding, and collisions over the muscle anatomy.
• Part 14: Merging CFX and Animation. In the final lesson, bring everything together. You will learn how to integrate your completed creature FX system with a character animation, cache the final simulation, and prepare it for rendering.

Aside from the lessons, you'll also receive a package of downloadable assets to help you learn and practice:

• Finished Game Rig: A complete, single-hierarchy game-ready character rig.
• Complete AdonisFX Muscle Rig: A fully functional muscle, fat, and skin simulation rig for you to study and use.
• All Project Assets: Get all the models and practice files used throughout the course, allowing you to follow along and dive deeper on your own.

Recommended Software

To follow along with the course easily, please use the following software and plugins:

• Autodesk Maya (2025.3 recommended)
• This is the primary software used for all rigging, animation, and creature FX lessons. Using version 2025.3 will ensure your results are consistent with the tutorials.
• Zoo Tools (plugin for rigging)
• This powerful rigging toolset is included with your course purchase.
• ngSkinTools (plugin for rigging)
• You will need to install this essential plugin to follow the character skinning lessons.
• animBot (plugin for animation)
• This tool is highly recommended to animate more efficiently. A 30-day free trial is available, which is sufficient for the animation section of the course.
• Ragdoll Dynamics (plugin for animation)
• You will use this plugin to create dynamic secondary motion. A 30-day free trial is available.
• AdonisFX (plugin for creature FX)
• This plugin is required for the lessons on muscle, fat, and skin simulation. You can follow along using the available 30-day free trial.

About the Instructor: Nav Singh

Nav Singh has been in the VFX industry since 2016, working at ILM and Folks VFX in the past. Now, he is a Lead Animator at Pixomondo Toronto and an Animation Instructor at Seneca Polytechnic.

He is extremely proud of all the shows he's worked on and the courses he released on his website Creature Station. His greatest accomplishment is being able to help people around the world by sharing his skills. He confessed that the love he had received from many rising artists gave his life a new purpose.

This past decade, Nav worked on and learned from famous projects, such as The House of the Dragon, Loki, and The Mandalorian. He's been teaching animation for the last 5 years to students from various backgrounds, skills, and ages, so his experience will surely help you in this course. He can share many industry and animation secrets that people from all walks of life can benefit from.

You can contact him through YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, or email.

3D Creature Production for Animation is for beginner- to advanced-level 3D artists. If you're just starting your journey, you will need a basic understanding of 3D. You can learn Maya beforehand using this series.

Enroll here. Start your creature creation journey now!