LogInTim van Dulmen shared his latest experiment.
Senior Character Animator Tim van Dulmen is currently experimenting with the idea of publishing rigs without joints, a technique he has been investigating lately. As Tim explained, he's using the joint's offsetParentMatrix connected directly to the skinCluster's matrix input. The skinClusters still exist, but the controlling driver switches from the joint to its offset parent.
"It's hard to see how much of an optimization boost this gives the rig, but early tests seem to be giving a big improvement. I can fully test this out when I have a fully skinned rig with all bells and whistles. But for now, this looks really promising", commented Tim.
There are some drawbacks to this approach, such as the inability to add modifications to the rigs since the joints are removed. Also, you can't use these rigs in a game engine. The artist will provide both versions: the no-joint rig and the joint rig, along with a script that optimizes the rig. This way, everyone can work with the best possible version of the rig after customizing the character for their own shot.
Follow Tim van Dulmen on LinkedIn for updates, and check out his breathing setup and get his rig for Morph from Disney's 2002 animated film Treasure Planet:
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