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The character studio functionality in 3ds Max
provides professional tools for animating 3D
characters. It is an env ironment in w hich you
can quickly and easily build skeletons and then
animate them, thus creating motion sequences.
You use the animated skeletons to drive the
movement of geometry, thus c reating virtua l
characters. And you can generate crowds of these
characters using character st udio,andanimate
crowd movement using a system of delegates and
procedural behaviors.
character studio comprises three components:
Biped, Physique, and Crowd.
• Biped (page 3–916) builds and animates skeletal
armatures, ready for character animation.
You can combine different animations into
sequential or overlapping motion scripts, or
layer them together. You can also use Biped to
edit motion capture files.
Note: Biped does not create character mesh
objects. You should create your character mesh
before using Biped to create a sk eleton for it.
• Physique (page 3–994) uses the biped ar matures
to anima te the actual character mesh,
simulating how the mesh flexes and bulges with
the movement of the underlying skeleton.
Note: YoucanusePhysiquewithother
hierarchies beside the biped skeleton.
• Crowd (page 3–925) animates groups of 3D
objects and characters using a system of
delegates and behaviors. You can create crowds
with highly complex behaviors.
If you are new to 3ds Max, read What You Should
Know to Use character studio (page 2–832) and
Un derstanding character studio Workflow (page
2–839).
If you are already a 3ds Max user , proceed to
Understanding Biped (page 2–833) to continue.
To f i n d o u t a b o ut P hy s i q u e , r e a d Understanding
Physique (page 2–834).
To learn about t he Crowd system, read Crowd
Animation (page 2–1154).
What is character studio?
character studio is a set of components that
provides a f ul l set of tools for animating characters.
character studiolets you create skeletal hierarchies
for two-legged characters (called bipeds)that
can be animated quickly using a wide variety of
methods. If your character walks on two legs, the
software provides unique footstep animation (page
2–856) that automatically creates movement based
on gravity, balance, and other factors.
character studio