Mother Character Production

The next scene of the animation involves the mother character. I have been searching for a couple of hours now to try and find a character rig or model that would be appropriate, however, I have had a lot of issues. Firstly it is important that the character looks appropriate for the role, a lot of the models are half dressed which I don't think is.. Also most of the models are available for 3dsMax, which I do not have because I am using a Mac and it is not available.

I find I constantly encounter issues such as this when I am producing work, I don't think Maya is used as much as the other 3D software available which creates problems gaining accessibility to information and tools.

I have finally found a character which I think would be acceptable to use, now I just have to rig it which I was trying to avoid as my skills are not strong in that area.

I have been attempting to rig the character however as her arms are down by her side this has created some deformation when I move the skeleton therefore I am having to use paint weights. This is taking me a little while as I find paint weights difficult to use, I understand the concept but I don't think the tools are very clear.

I was going to use this character however as you can see in the pictures her hands are touching her body and I have tried to use paint weights for a good hour to fix it and I managed to fix a majority of it but it was too noticeable to use.

So I am going to have to try and find another model to try and rig..

Next I found a good quality model but it was a 3dsMax file, I researched as to whether it was able to convert the file into a file that Maya could read, it is possible however I am using an iMac which does not support 3dsMax..

I am getting increasingly frustrated with all the obstacles that I keep facing however, someone did point out to me that I am overcoming these obstacles by using my knowledge. I am also getting concerned about the amount of time that I have to finish my project before the deadline, the mother character is taking a lot longer than I anticipated and I need to ensure that I have enough time to render and edit.


I had to gain access to 3dsMax to export the file as an fbx., I then loaded it in Maya and rigged the character. I thought I had finally found a character that I could use however when I attempted the render the character in Mental Ray, initially Maya just kept crashing and when it did render, the entire scene was black so I gave up on this model too.

I have attempted to rig four models now and have not had any luck, it has taken me two days to find a character that I am able to use. I did think that I had previously found a character that I would be able to use earlier on in the production stages however that had failed.

I found a rigged female character which I am going to use as I am running out of time. The quality of this character isn't as high as I would have hoped however I need to move on to the next stage as soon as possible.