Avastar 1.1 Panels

We moved this section out of the skinning Panel because because the Freeze Mesh tool now works on all Mesh objects, not only on rigged meshes.

We have reorganized the Rigging Panel into 2 main sections:

SL Rigging Style

Here you will setup the Avastar Armature either for Classic Rigging (default) or for Fitted Mesh rigging.

Note: This setting affects only which bones of the Rig will be used as Deform Bones. The Bone Weight Maps can be configured with the weight generator in the Skinning Panel (see below).

Bone Display Style

Here we have added 2 new settings:

• Shapes: enables/disables custom shapes of the bones.
• Limits: enables/disables the limit indicators for bone rotation limits.

We added these settings to avoid unnecessary mouse moves  and searches for these settings in their original panels (properties sidebar and bone data properties window)

Parent to Armature has been renamed to Bind to Armature. Reason: It is not necessary to parent an object to an armature in order to get it animated.
It is sufficient to have an Armature Modifier. Also the correct name for the process is Binding and not Parenting.

The slider attachment section has been cleaned up a bit. This section appears only for meshes which have previously been bound to an Avastar Armature.

The skinning Panel now contains a Weight Generator section. In this section you can initialize (re initialize) your mesh to predefined weights (from various weight sources).

Note: This panel does NOT affect the rig, but only the weight maps of the selected Mesh Objects (see also above)

Detach is now Unbind

Detach Armature has been renamed to Unbind from Armature. This seems to be an accepted standard term for this process.

If you have projects made with older versions of Avastar then it is likely that the armature is no longer compatible with the newest Avastar release

Note: The Armature Info Panel shows the version difference between your Armature (in the example My Rig and the Avastar Version (1.1.20 in the example).

 

The Armature Info Panel contains following data:

• Armature name
• Avastar Version number
• Rig version Number (may be empty)
• Version Mismatch Info (if applicable)
• List of assigned Custom Meshes
• Number of animated Bones

Avastar can now do an in place update of old Armatures. For this purpose we have added a conversion tool. So if your Armature is indicated as outdated in the Armature Info panel, then the Update tool shows up in Object mode:

• Select your old mesh or your old Armature.
• Then – in the Tool Shelf – look for Armature Info. If Avastar indicates a Version Mismatch, then…
• Look for the Avastar Tools Panel and click on Update Avastar.
  
  

The Motion Transfer Panel shows up in the Vertical
“Animation” Tab. This panel has been reorganized slightly:

Separate Pose section

The Pose section has been separated into one sub section. Here you now specify the Animation reference Frame and here you find the Match Scales operator. Transfer Pose transfers the pose in the current tie frame to the target armature.

make Seamless (Experimental)

this section has always been experimental. You normally do not want to use it, unless you import motion capture files. In that case this section helps you to reduce the complexity of the animations.