Chad Vernon has created a short course on Creating a Custom Jiggle Deformer in Maya, ready for use in real productions for a small fee of $60.00. A Jiggle deformer is a great way to add a second layer of realistic motion to animated characters.

…This lesson will teach users how to create a production-ready, high-performance, custom jiggle deformer using the Maya API and C++. The resulting jiggle deformer will be faster and easier to use than Maya’s jiggle deformer and will be ready to use in a production environment…

This course looks like some serious stuff where you actually learn how to create a jiggle algorithm in Python to prototype the math that will be used when making the actual deformer – creating a Python dependency graph node to flesh out the math for the jiggle. Check out the course for Creating a Custom Jiggle Deformer in Maya here.

The course (and others from Chad Vernon) which clocks in at over 108 min, is available for viewing and purchase over at CGCircuit. Some of Chad’s other courses on CGCircuit are Applied 3d Math and an Introduction to the Maya API.

CGCircuit an online tutorial marketplace where you can create, share and purchase CG Tutorials. CGCircuit provides the infrastructure to develop and deploy courses easily.

  1. Chapter one introduces viewers to the jiggle deformer we will create. We will also go over the math used to create the jiggle effect.
  2. Chapter two focuses on implementing our jiggle algorithm in Python to prove that it actually works before spending the time to create a production-ready C++ deformer.
  3. Chapter three shows viewers how to convert the algorithm prototyped in the Python node to a C++ deformer. Chapter 3 also goes over various was to improve the deformer and to add additional features to adjust the effect of the jiggle.