← ArchivePaper2019
Sliding the Pieces into Place: Rigging the Pigeons of Spies in Disguise
Head rig for Spies in Disguise pigeons where beak and facial features slide freely on curved head volumes, enabling 2D-inspired expressions on 3D characters.
Abstract
The birds of Spies in Disguise required several technological advancements and techniques to achieve the simple graphic style of the film. One technology was a re-designed wing rig with unique mechanics that allowed for clean lines and graphic shapes rather than our previous anatomical based wing rig. The production style also required extreme posing involving sliding limbs, large open mouth ranges and jiggly eyes. These requirements were achieved with a combination of new workflow techniques, updates to the pipeline and the creation and updating of proprietary deformers.
How to read this
- Category
- Production talk: a character rigging and deformer breakdown
- Contributions
- A re-designed wing rig with mechanics for clean graphic shapes rather than anatomical wings
- Techniques for extreme posing including sliding limbs, large open-mouth ranges, and jiggly eyes
- New workflow, pipeline updates, and proprietary deformers to slide facial features over curved head volumes
- Context
- Builds on prior proprietary rigging tooling (referenced ChopRig System), applying it to the stylized graphic look of Spies in Disguise birds.Builds on: ChopRig System
- Correctness
- Studio practice, not peer-reviewed; the rig is validated by shipped shots and a specific stylistic target, so the techniques are production-proven for this art direction rather than shown to generalize.
- Clarity
- Accessible and example-driven; one read conveys the rigging problems and solutions, with detail tied to a proprietary toolset.
- How to read it
- Read once focusing on how the sliding-feature and graphic-wing mechanics achieve a 2D look on 3D geometry; treat it as a design-pattern reference rather than a reproducible method.
Builds on
- ChopRig System 2018
Built upon by
Nothing yet.
Related work
- The Versatile Rigging of Splat in Strange World 2023 / SIGGRAPH
- Building and Animating User-Specific Volumetric Face Rigs 2016 / SCA
- Stable and Efficient Differential IK 2010 / SIGGRAPH Asia
- Using Deep Learning to Approximate Joint Placement in 3D Bipedal Characters 2020 / Thesis
Keywords
This page summarises the entry and links to its original source. The archive never hosts or redistributes the publication itself.Show it in the full archive list →