A Different Approach to Multiple Limb Smears in Maya

Brian Horgan sneaks a look into a prototype tool that shows some promise for a new approach in creating multiple limb smears in an animation. That is to say, without outfitting a rig with any extra limbs.

It takes very minimal setup and works on any rig.

Brains mentions that adding extra limbs to a rig is less than ideal. It makes the rig operate slower, and there are many more controls for the animators to keep track of, not to mention that they can be tedious to work with.

After giving the problem some thought, he set about to create a better way to create multiple limb smears in Maya. One that takes a minimal amount of setup, and can work with any given character rig.

The tool is based on Brian’s other animation tool, bh Ghost, which allows you to create ghosted or onion skinned poses in the Maya viewport while you are animating. Brain admits that the multiple limb smears tool sis still very much at early stages, but it does seem promising. Hopefully we will see something released soon.