Character Joint
Character Joints are mainly used for Ragdoll effects. They are an extended ball-socket joint which allows you to limit the joint on each axis.
If you just want to set up a ragdoll read about Ragdoll Wizard.
The Character Joint on a Ragdoll
Properties
| Connected Body | Optional reference to the Rigidbody that the joint is dependent upon. If not set, the joint connects to the world. |
| Anchor | The point in the GameObject's local space where the joint rotates around. |
| Axis | The twist axes. Visualized with the orange gizmo cone. |
| Swing Axis | The swing axis. Visualized with the green gizmo cone. |
| Low Twist Limit | The lower limit of the joint. |
| High Twist Limit | The higher limit of the joint. |
| Swing 1 Limit | Lower limit around the defined Swing Axis |
| Swing 2 Limit | Upper limit around the defined Swing Axis |
| Break Force | The force that needs to be applied for this joint to break. |
| Break Torque | The torque that needs to be applied for this joint to break. |
Details
Character joint's give you a lot of possibilities for constraining motion like with a universal joint.
The twist axis (visualized with the orange gizmo) gives you most control over the limits as you can specify a lower and upper limit in degrees (the limit angle is measured relative to the starting position). A value of -30 in Low Twist Limit->Limit and 60 in High Twist Limit->Limit limits the rotation around the twist axis (orange gizmo) between -30 and 60 degrees.
The Swing 1 Limit limits the rotation around the swing axis (green axis). The limit angle is symmetric. Thus a value of eg. 30 will limit the rotation between -30 and 30.
The Swing 2 Limit axis doesn't have a gizmo but the axis is orthogonal to the 2 other axes. Just like the previous axis the limit is symmetric, thus a value of eg. 40 will limit the rotation around that axis between -40 and 40 degrees.
Breaking joints
You can use the Break Force and Break Torque properties to set limits for the joint's strength. If these are less than infinity, and a force/torque greater than these limits are applied to the object, its Fixed Joint will be destroyed and will no longer be confined by its restraints.
Hints
- You do not need to assign a Connected Body to your joint for it to work.
- Character Joints require your object to have a Rigidbody attached.
Page last updated: 2007-09-12