Add wind rigging to a hero mesh

Add realistic wind animation to an imported hero mesh and edit vertices to fine-tune wind rigging.

Note

This page provides guidelines to add wind rigging to a hero mesh for which you already created a spine hierarchy using Mesh helpers.

Integrate the mesh into your model

Before you can add wind rigging to your imported mesh:

  • Make sure you added the mesh to your model's hierarchy.

  • Use mesh helpers to add a spine hierarchy to the mesh according to the different parts of the mesh that should independently move in the wind.

Set up wind animation for the mesh

To make the mesh animate in the wind according to the spine hierarchy you added to it:

  1. In the Generation Editor, select all the spines you created for the mesh.

  2. In the Property bar, select Animation, and in the Wind section, check the Apply box.

  3. In the Tree window, Select the mesh, and in the Property bar, select Wind.

  4. In the Wind section:

    • Set Apply to yes.
    • Set Compute weights from spines to Best guess + manual.

To test the resulting animation, press the 8 shortcut key on your keyboard to enable or disable the Fan.

Fix unexpected mesh deformations

If some areas of the mesh don't match the proper spines in the hierarchy you previously created, you might notice unexpected mesh deformations when the mesh animates in the wind.

To reassign a selection of mesh vertices to a specific spine:

  1. Select the mesh, and in the Property bar, select the Freehand mode.

  2. In the Vertex section, select Edit, and then adjust the Brush properties to your needs.

  3. In the Tree window, select the vertices in the area of the mesh you want to reassign to the expected spine.

  4. In the Property bar, click on Pick, and then in the Tree window, select the spine to assign the selected vertices to.

Make parts of the mesh stationary

To make sure a part of the mesh that shouldn't animate in the wind is stationary in the model:

  1. In the Tree window, in the View section, select Render > Wind weights, and then select the wind weight level you want to look at.

  2. Verify if the considered parts have a wind weight applied. If so, continue with the steps below.

  3. Select the mesh, and in the Property bar, select the Freehand mode.

  4. In the Vertex section, select Edit, and then adjust the Brush properties to your needs.

  5. In the Tree window, select the vertices in the area of the mesh that shouldn't move in the wind.

  6. In the Property bar, click on Make stationary.

Uniformize wind rigging across all LODs

To make sure the wind animation looks continuous across all levels of detail (LODs) you have defined for the mesh:

  1. In the Tree window, in the View section, select Render > Wind weights, and then select a specific wind weight level you want to look at.

  2. Move the cursor up and down in the LOD scale at the left of the Tree window to visualize the current wind weight state across the LODs.

  3. Select the mesh, and in the Property bar, select the Freehand mode.

  4. In the Vertex section, select Edit, and then click on Update lower LODs.

  5. Move the cursor up and down again in the LOD scale to see the resulting continuity of wind weights across LODs.

Additional resources