"Toast!" Character libraries are half way there. It took me one day to learn the two ways of rigging in flash. I just had to take advantage of this new function. Though it still has some minor issues to iron out.
There are two ways to use the bone tool in flash, and my curiosity just had me use both. For smooth deformation I used the shape rig for the boy. Rigging a shape can be tricky and I found that in the hard way. Almost a whole day of frustrating trial and error tests paid of in the end. What did I learn? Well, you have to be careful how you draw your character. Just as it is with skinning in 3d, you have curve control points on your character, which will be affected by the rig.For that reason, its preferable to have less of these points where not needed (they might mess up the character after the rig). It's also tricky where you put them and skin them,so the shape bends predictably without deforming too much.
Cons of a shape rig:
- it can NOT contain any symbols which can be keyed! (can't connect the head to the body and the arm to the hand) My solution:separate legs+feet and arms from the rest of the body
-Sometimes when you constrain some points,and you move the rig, you have to edit constrains all over again...
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I just started the robot rig, doing the other way- the symbols rig. This way seems to be easier than the shape rig, but it also has some issues. I found it to be slightly unpredictable and glitchy. I shall note the problem after I find out why it's acting like that some times. I just hope it doesn't blow up my robot before I manage to finish this project in time...
