topic Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue in Maya Animation and Rigging Forum

Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

PJD1990 — Mon, 15 Oct 2018 22:56:39 GMT

Hey guys, I'm having an issue with a simple rig I created in maya 2018. I set up a Pole Vector controller to control the knees on my character's leg joints. The Pole Vector controls the knee joint direction fine. I have a root controller for the entire rig that all the controllers on my rig a parented to in my heirarchy. My knee pole vector controller is parented to my foot controller and my foot controller is parented to the root controller. When I rotate the root controller the Knee Pole vector, even though it follows the root controller fine, it affects the knees rotation. So if I wanted to rotate the character to face a different direction, the knees would not move along with the root controller.

I'm not sure how to ask this, but how do I get the Pole Vector to only affect the Knee direction when I use the Pole Vector Controller directly and for the knee direction to not be affected by the Pole Vector Controller when I rotate the Root Controller?

Here is a gif to help see what I am saying.

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

Anonymous — Tue, 16 Oct 2018 07:25:23 GMT

Hey @PJD1990

Would you be able to attach the rig file to check out? thanks!!

____________________
Daniel López de Medrano

Remote Character Rigger
*14+ hour Rigging Course*

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

PJD1990 — Tue, 16 Oct 2018 19:45:52 GMT

No problem. The file is attached to this message.

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Oct 2018 11:22:20 GMT

Hey @PJD1990

I tried attaching the file, but wasn't able to! Send me. your email through here or through private messaging and I'll send you the file your way and explain what was wrong! (:

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

dinofiguera — Tue, 23 Oct 2018 14:33:21 GMT

Did you already fix this?
I was curious about it.

Cheers,

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

PJD1990 — Wed, 24 Oct 2018 20:36:09 GMT

Not yet, once I get the email from @Anonymous I will post solution on here.

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

Anonymous — Wed, 24 Oct 2018 22:53:21 GMT

Hey @PJD1990

I'm so sorry, I thought I had it solved but it still gave the same error as before.

Its something to do with the IK setup... busy at the moment, but I will try again for about an hour tomorrow to see if I can work it out for you!! (:

Super sorry for the delay in getting it right, just been super busy.

____________________
Daniel López de Medrano

Remote Character Rigger
*14+ hour Rigging Course*

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

dinofiguera — Thu, 25 Oct 2018 08:12:20 GMT

I was actually asking you to post it so I could have a look. Maybe I can help you to find the problem.

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

Anonymous — Thu, 25 Oct 2018 13:43:06 GMT

@PJD1990
Got it! Quite tricky to understand what was wrong, but now that I solved it, it genuinely makes perfect sense. I just never had to rig something like this before myself.

The simple answer is you can't have one control serving as a pole vector to 2 IK's, thats whats giving you the awkward rotations when moving your character entirely around.

I deleted both IK's with their constraints as you'll see in the video. Created them again, made 2 controls as pole vector controls and I made sure to align them straight with the joints, thats very important when creating a pole vector constraint!

I will attach the rig file here and the video showing what I did in detail as well! (:

____________________
Daniel López de Medrano

Remote Character Rigger
*14+ hour Rigging Course*

Re: Knee Pole Vector and Root controller Issue

PJD1990 — Fri, 26 Oct 2018 03:11:05 GMT

Wow, see, I knew it was some some small thing I was missing that I just couldn't sort out. Thanks alot for spotting that because I would never have found it lol. Thanks again man you didn't have to do it but I am happy you did and this will help for my next rig.