COCONUT TREE RIG

 

Rigging a coconut tree :

 

 

 

The above image depicts the coconut tree.

 

To rig the tree, joints were added and skinned to the trunk of the tree. Adding joints provides flexibility to the trunk of the tree.

 

A Volume preservation expression was added to the joints, instead of stretch and squash deformer.

Volume preservation expression functions as stretch and squash in a independent way.

 

 

The above image shows the joints added to the trunk.

 

A linear curve was created which was named as tree curve, which consists of 4 vertices. Clusters were created by selecting the vertices and cluster handles were created to gain easy access to the clusters.

 

 Moving the cluster handles moves the respective section of the trunk.

 

 

The blue curves indicate the Follicle.

 

The joints added to the leaves(hidden) to obtain the dynamic motion.

 

The next part was a little hard, but interesting. Curve were created to each leaves. After this the curves were made dynamics. It is available in nDynamics > nHair > Make selected curves dynamic.

 

Tools used to obtain the dynamics of leaves - ik spline handle, joint tool, Bind skin.

 

By making the curves dynamic, Hairsystem is created for each curve. This creates a nucleus.

 

Nucleus controls the dynamics of leaves.

 

Creating the dynamics was fun and I learned the difference between dynamics and nDynamics.

 

 

Have a look at my final rig and outliner.

 

Windspeed, Gravity, Air density and bend resistance are the attributes of leaf dynamics.

I obtained the controls by playing around with node editor.

 

Here's a video to show the rig.