8

Saving and Loading Physique Data 949
10.
In the Selection Level group, turn on
Control Point, then in a viewport, select one
or more control points.
11. In the Edit Commands group, turn on Attach,
then in a v iewport, click a different link.
Tendons span the area between the links.
12. Adjust the Pinch, Pull, and Stretch settings to
adjust the skin behavior.
13. Adjust the Upper and Lower Boundary
settings to control the extent of t he effect on
neighboring links.
To a ttach a tendon to a nother link :
1.
In the Selection Level group of the Tendons
rollout, turn on Contr
olPointtomakeitthe
active selection level.
2. In a viewport, select one or more of the tendon’s
attach points.
Click a point to select it; use CTRL+click to add
points to the select
ion; or drag a rectangular
region to select multiple points.
3. In the Edit Controls group, click to turn on
Attach.
4. In a viewport, click the link to which you want
to attach the tendo
n.
In the view ports, r
ed lines appear showing the
tendon’s connection from its base to the other
link. The skin mesh might also deform as a
result of attachi
ng the tendon.
Tip: The tendon ca
n have fixed attach points
that are not connected to another link. These
are useful for giving some rigidity to the skin,
aswhen(inanact
ual body) a b one lies close
to the skin’s surface. For example, you might
leave two fixed attach points on either side
of a character’
s chest area, to simulate the
effect of the sternum. When all tendons are
attached to other links, the skin over the base
linkcanhavea"squishy"appearancewhen
it is animated. This is appropriate for some
animated characters, but not for others.
To delete a tendon:
1.
A t the Link selection level in the Tendons
sub-object, select the link that has the tendon
you want to remove.
2. In the Insert Settings group, click Delete.
Saving and Loading Physique Data
You can save Physique data to a Physique ( . ph y )
file to save data common to all objects that share a
given Physique modifier
Later, you can reload the data file, either to restore
the data that belongs to a particular skin or portion
of skin, or to transfer the Ph ysique of one skin (or
portion) to a different one.
See also
Physique Rollout (page 2–958)
Physique Load Specification D ialog (page 2–974)
Reinitializing Physique Settings
When you need to reset vertex, envelope, and
other skin parameters on a Physique mesh, click
Reinitialize to display the Physique Initialization
dialog. Using controls in this dialog, select the
category to update, and apply the new global
settings.
For example, if you’ve added a new bone to the
hierarchy and want it included and influenced
bythePhysiquemodifier,usethereinitialization
mechanism to effect its inclusion. Or maybe
you’ve repositioned the biped str uc ture relative
to the mesh, you’d need to reinitialize Physique
settings to recognize those changes.