Putting a Skin over a biped object

1. For this tutorial we tok the model of han solo. First you must scale the character. If you want to use several characters later in a scene, make them all the same size, because it annoying to escale a character when the Mesh is linked with the Biped object. 1 unit = 1 cm.

2. Turn the arms like in the picture. Then freeze the whole Mesh.

3. Create a Biped object. Make it the same size as the Mesh. Change the root name from bip01 to someting other (eg. Biphs) so you wont have any problem when you want to merge the character in another scene.

4. Goto the animation panel. Go under general and activate the figure mode. It button with the line man on the left.

5. Then move, rotate and scale the Biped Bones/part till it fits with the Mesh.

Tips: move first the Biped root to the right place. Then adjust the legs and fet. Then the spine, then the head, the arms, and at the end the fingers. Most meshes are very symetrical, so press the button to choose a los the other symetrical object. (eg, left arm and right arm) you must press it each time youve selected something.

6. The most dificult part are the hands and fingers. First you should scale the hand objects. The move the fingers, you can move the first part of each finders. Then scale the fingers. Because it sometimes very dificult to se where the fingers are, you should use the perseptive view with Smooth and highlight. When the Bones are right you shouldnt se to much from the green or blue of the fingers, only the grey of the Frozen Mesh.

7. When you are finished, it should look like in the picture below. Unfreeze the Mesh.

8. Now it time to apply the Mesh over the Biped Skeleton. There are two ways:
A) normal linking: select the Mesh part and linked it to the nearest Skeleton part. You should use this method as often as posible. This only goes god when the Mesh part is nearly as long as the Bones.

B) but sometimes the method a) wouldnt work, because the Mesh is bigger then the Bones. In this case use Physique. Chose the Mesh part on which you want to aplly the Physique modificator. Click on Physique in the modificator panel. Now click on selcect Physique root. The choose the Bones part which is nearest to the Mesh. E.g. : if you want to skin the hand choose the Bones part hand or fore arm, depending how long the hand is.

9. Now you must chek if all vertexes of the Mesh parts have ben assigned to a enlace. Make it so:
Choose the Mesh part. In modificator panel, activate the sub-object mode in Physique. Then choose vertex. In vertex type click on the red and green cross to deactivate them. Now choose all vertex in the Mesh. If nothing happens, there is all right. If blue crosses appears, you must assing them to an enlace. For that choose all vertex that must be assing to the same enlace. Now activate the red cross, the other must be deactivated. Then choose in blending between links: no blending. The click on assing enlace and then on the nearest bone. Now the blue crosses should become red. Repeat this until there no blue crosses when you selct vertex.

That it.

10. Hide all Biped objects expect the root. Now save the file. Be sure you havnt created any foot steps when saving. If you want to test the character create some fot step and assing keys to them. Watch it. The close the file without saving. If you create foot steps, it Will be very dificult to move the character later, eg, if you merge it in another scene.

Important note: the author is not a natural english speaker and there is a high chance of mistakes in every way. Corrections and comentarios are welcome.

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