ArmaRig for Blender

[Macser 776]

 

A constrained Ik rig built in Blender.Aimed at A2/A3. Intended for use with Alwarren's Arma toolbox.

Static and hand anims can be exported direct to PBO. Dynamic animations like walk/run cycles can be also be exported directly with some extra work. 

 

I'm not an expert on the internal workings of Blender. Nor would I consider myself a grade A rigger/animator. So bear that in mind if you find mistakes or bugs.

DOWNLOAD
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https://www.moddb.com/games/arma-3/downloads/armarig

 

 

 

An experimental version of Armarig. Set up to allow the import of rtms, without complete loss of IK functionality. As stated it's experimental. So certainly not perfect. But where I can improve it, I will.

 

DOWNLOAD

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https://www.moddb.com/games/arma-3/downloads/armarig-im

 

It does require you to use an import script, obviously. In this case one with a few extra options. From the author 4d4a5852.

 

https://github.com/4d4a5852/rtm_import/releases/tag/v0.5

 

On import you'll have a couple of extra options in the import menu. Here's what I use:

 

The rigs are compatible with Blender 2.9. They should work with earlier versions. But you may get warnings about lost data.

[Macser 776]

I made some small changes and corrected one or two things.First post updated.

[Guest]

With a little delay but better late than never ;)

Release frontpaged on the Armaholic homepage.

ArmaRig for Blender v2



Blender 2.6x

==================================================

You are not registered on Armaholic, or at least not that we are aware of. In the future we offer the possibility to authors to maintain their own pages.

If you wish to be able to do this as well please register on Armaholic and let me know about it.

This is not mandatory at all! Only if you wish to control your own content you are welcome to join, otherwise we will continue to follow your work like we have always done ;)

When you have any questions already feel free to PM or email me!

Edited January 8, 2014 by Guest
updated to latest version

[Macser 776]

Thank you for that.Much appreciated. :)

I hope people get some use out of it.

[Macser 776]

Recently it was pointed out to me that the"A3" rig actually does need the "Neck1" bone.

So the "A2" version should work for both games.As the armature contains "Neck1".

Confusion existed because the P3d mesh for the A3 character example,doesn't

have that selection.Not even on the lower Res lods.But it does exist in the model

config.Which is obviously important.

[Macser 776]

First post updated with new link.

Newest archive is ArmaRig_V2.

The entries for the bones in the dope sheet didn't update after my last edit.

This basically disassociated the actions from the rig.Preventing the 4 hand/arm

controllers from operating.

I also removed the "A3" version.

[HJohnson 16]

Awesome, just what I need. Spent half the day trying to clean up the previous rig floating around. Now I don't have to. Awesome.

[Macser 776]

Glad to hear it. :)

Just be sure to let me know if you encounter any major problems.

As I mentioned it's stability hasn't been really tested.So feedback is

welcome.

[HJohnson 16]

Also, how did you get the bvh bones to export properly. I've been animating weapons, this requires me to add in more armatures to animate parts on the weapon for accuracy. I have to manually delete these in blender so that the .bvh file will export properly. The problem? If I don't export them, the weapon bone will not be oriented properly (as you know) but if I just deselect the other bones (bolt, charging handle, etc) the weapon bone is still oriented wrong.

But it seems you've got this working properly, so what did you do?

[Macser 776]

There's some inherent limitations in the BVH format.

Any bone that will be weighted to a mesh(Or proxy) must be kept

connected to the rest of the rig.If a bone is disconnected,it will

operate locally from it's parent.But only in the blender environment.

When you export it will show up with an offset,equal to the length of

the disconnected bone.

If you go into the Armature tab,and turn on both the first and last bone layers,

you'll see the proxy bones connected via disposable Ik chains.I simply moved them

to another layer to avoid clutter.

As I was keeping the existing A2 bone structure,I needed to add more "link" bones

throughout the armature.These are also disposable.You'll see more of them in

the hands.

So link any animatable bones to the rest of the rig.This will avoid unwanted offsets.

If you add more bones keep an eye on the bone rolls.You can affect the orientation

in edit mode using CTRL-R.Odd bone roll can lead to some strange behaviour when you

start animating.

PS:

On another,related note.Alwarren recently added an rtm component to his Arma toolbox.

Given the way this works,I may add another version of ArmaRig.But without any link bones.

As of this moment the toolbox can export RTMs directly to game.He's still making adjustments

and adding functionality.

I encourage anyone interested in using Blender for modeling or animation,to try it out.

Arma toolbox thread

Edited January 9, 2014 by Maczer

[rigek 10]

im kinda relatively new to blender and how do I import the file. Do i need to convert it to a .blend file or something?

[Blackys85 10]

So the "A2" version should work for both games.As the armature contains "Neck1".

Confusion existed because the P3d mesh for the A3 character example,doesn't

have that selection.Not even on the lower Res lods.But it does exist in the model

config.Which is obviously important.

[Macser 776]

I'm kinda relatively new to blender and how do I import the file. Do i need to convert it to a .blend file or something?

Ok.There isn't anything to import into Blender.In the archive is a rig.You use this to create an animation.

Then export that animation from Blender to a BVH file.You then import that BVH into O2Pe,and convert it

to an RTM.This RTM is then used in game. :)

[Alwarren 2767]

Thank you for this rig, Maczer. Very nicely done, and easy to animate. Finally got my ACR a new reload anim :)

[Macser 776]

No problem Al.Glad it's been of use.

And thanks for the mention in the toolbox manual. :)

[defk0n_NL 2]

This is fantastic, very nice job.

[Macser 776]

Small update.1 new rig added for use with Alwarren's Arma toolbox.

ArmaRig_BVH is the original blend file for the BVH exporter.

ArmaRig_AT is for Al's toolbox.It's basically a simpler version of the

original rig.This is a good thing,as far as I'm concerned.

First post updated with link. :)

[Macser 776]

A few small corrections have been made to the rig.

First post updated with link.

Brief video tutorial provided.

[Guest]

Thanks for informing me of the update :cool:

Release frontpaged on the Armaholic homepage.

ArmaRig for Blender v4



Blender 2.6x

==================================================

You are not registered on Armaholic, or at least not that we are aware of. Soon we offer the possibility to authors to maintain their own pages.

If you wish to be able to do this as well please register on Armaholic and let me know about it.

This is not mandatory at all! Only if you wish to control your own content you are welcome to join, otherwise we will continue to follow your work like we have always done ;)

When you have any questions already feel free to PM or email me!

[Macser 776]

You're welcome.And thanks for the link. :)

[bad benson 1733]

you sir are great! keep doing what you're doing. it helps a lot of people and makes awesome things possible. :man3:

[cifordayzserver 119]

WOW! Great work! Thanks so much for sharing with the community!

Awesome video walkthrough too! You should embed the video so it's more obvious.

Really fantastic stuff!

[Macser 776]

Thanks for the kind words guys.I appreciate that. :)

Despite the fact I didn't cover config work,I think at least I've shown that

it's fairly easy to create RTM source files.I hope it might get people interested

in an often avoided aspect of modding.

You don't need to be an expert to get something of value out of the existing tools.

You should embed the video so it's more obvious.

I never thought about embedding the video.But I suppose it does grab the attention

a bit more than a text link.I'll give that a go.

[Arctor 1]

I have some (noob) questions on this subject as I'm at sort of a crossroads with my modeling and I'm hoping someone can clear some stuff up in a few sentences.

I understand there is a base skeleton upon which you can base your own armature. I also understand one needs to name the bones of this armature exactly like they are defined in the base skeleton (or model config?). Does that mean you can't simply create your own skeleton with different bones? Let's say I wanted to make a crazy spider with eight segmented legs, would that be possible?

Could I make my own base skeleton (model config) with names for bones of my own choosing and include that in the mod or is that hardcoded territory?

[Macser 776]

Hello Arctor.

For me the "skeleton" is the armature/rig used to animate.The relevant parts of the model are "named selections".Each bone in the "skeleton" corresponds to a "named selection" in your model.

The model.cfg lists these named selections and their hierarchical structure.As I understand it,most people here seem to refer to,this,or the named selections as the skeleton.Which is fine.Just a bit odd for me.

I don't have any examples in A2 to demonstrate.I'm still working on the old RV1 engine(Cold war assault).Anyway.The process isn't much different.For that engine I've already created non human entities.And characters with very different proportions and scaling to a default human.

I don't know what the limit is for A2 bone wise,but it's 64 or so for CWA.I imagine it's considerably higher for A2,given the hands and such.

Obviously if you decided to go a non-standard route,then you're out on your own.Meaning you'll

need to create all the necessary animations for the entity yourself.

If you were to config the entity as a man class,then you could feasibly use a default Cfgmoves

and simply redirect to your new animations.

One other thing.The following applies to OFP/CWA.I assume it still applies for the newer titles.

The selections in your model can be manipulated by the engine in real-time,despite

a key-framed animation being run at the same instant.This is how your character can

look up and down while in your custom pose.The engine knows what selections are the head,chest,arms etc.

If you deviate from the default naming convention this real-time process might be affected.

Of course,depending on what you're creating that may not be an issue.