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Splitting too much into different layers?

MicAelOver

Hello, I tried to find some advices about a good way to know when to split a body part or not (basically arms and legs).
Apparently, it depends about details level and wanted style. But is there basic guidelines about a minimum amount of different layers?

By trying a lot of different setups I kind of like when I make juste one image for the whole arm (avoiding gaps in the image or overlapping lines).
What would be the problems or limitations about having this level of detail in the future of my animation project?

I'm in the dark about knowing if this could cause any conception issue, because I still see a lot of animation examples that split each parts, what would be the advantages of that for a real looking bare arm?

PS: I also tried to bind a single bone to two different meshes, the result was ... funny :p

Erika

Hello MicAelOver!
As you have already read, the detail level depends on what you want your skeleton to be able to do, and also how big on screen it will be in the final result.
If you look at the example projects, some have just one image for the head, while others have every tiny bit of the eye split because they have controls for the eyes. If you don't need your character to change eyes expression, then you don't need to separate them in several layers.

Regarding your arms question, splitting the arms and legs in two is great if you want them to overlap at some point. Overlapping a single mesh on itself usually leads to a valley of tears and trial and error, especially when talking about legs, while having two separate pieces is generally much easier to control.

Meshes and weights are likely one of the most advanced and complex features of Spine, so if you don't get them right at your first try it's all right! If you want to post some gifs or screenshots I'd be happy to provide feedback and advice 😃

MicAelOver

Hello again Erikari 🙂

Thanks for your help. Yep having one image for full arm or leg can cause problems too, as was my "setup" with the same arm or leg splitted in two. I tried a few new things and now I think I know how to continue my progress.

I post the different steps below to have some review on what could be improved, and who knows, if it can help others users to have examples... 🙂

First try: everything splitted. Kind of ok for some cases where I dont bend the arm too much:

Result if I bend a lot:

Second try: I merged the biceps and the forearm together. Kind of better and ... not really.

Result:

Third and last try
So here is where I am now, I quickly created a joint to be in background and that have a black line border(and skin color) to fill the gaps. I erased the exceeds lines and color from both biceps and forearm to avoid overridings. I know this isn't perfect yet but I will continue to work on it, I know that it will be successful with this approach:

And here is the result:

Erika

Oh now I see! I think I have an approach that may be perfect for you:

It consists in separating the external lines of the drawing to get this result:

Loading Image

Spine: Tips: 28 moustache lines

MicAelOver

Nice tip, I will try that. Are each included images on a different mesh in your example?

Erika

This example features no meshes, just simple attachments layered one on top of the other!