degree in animation and vfx la salle campus barcelona

Bachelor in Animation and VFX

What if your idea made it to the big screens around the world?

Description: 

A rig is the digital structure attached to a 3D model so that animators can manipulate it and bring it into the desired pose. It is, essentially, a digital puppet. This introductory subject presents the fundamental principles and techniques of character rigging and ends with the construction of a first complete rig.

The course starts with rigs for simple objects and characters, covering hierarchies, controls, constraints, connections and deformers. The second half focuses on a fully functional biped character: skeleton, forward and inverse kinematics, skinning, correctives, automatic systems and basic facial components. By the end, students master the fundamentals of building 3D character rigs and understand the role of rigging within the production pipeline.

The subject has its own handout in English that covers all the theory and how to apply it, so the contents can be followed even when a session is missed.

Type Subject
Obligatoria no de Primer
Semester
Second
Course
2
Credits
4.00

Titular Professors

Enrique Velasco Mairal
Professor

Professors

María Güemes Ruiz
Previous Knowledge: 

Fundamentals of 3D production tools in Maya: navigation, selection, transformations, basic hierarchies and modelling. No programming knowledge is required.

Objectives: 

  • Understand what a rig is, what animation needs from it and how rigging fits in the production pipeline.
  • Build tidy, scalable hierarchies, controls and connections with professional naming.
  • Build the skeleton and kinematic systems of a biped, with twist, no-roll and a reverse foot.
  • Deform the model with skinning, deformers, blend shapes and correctives.
  • Diagnose and solve technical problems in a rig and prepare it for production.

Contents: 

  1. Foundations of rigging
    1. Definition of rigging and its role in production
    2. Maya configuration, script paths and plug-ins
    3. Naming conventions
    4. Rig hierarchy overview
  2. Hierarchical and structural organisation
    1. The dependency graph and the DAG
    2. Parenting and grouping principles
    3. Attribute control
    4. The master control
  3. Control systems
    1. Global scale management
    2. Control structure, naming and shape design
    3. Relative and local controls
    4. Rotation management
    5. Control tagging and pickwalk
  4. Constraints and connection methods
    1. How constraints work
    2. Direct and indirect constraints
    3. Direct connections, utility nodes and Driven Keys
    4. Choosing between the three
  5. Joint systems
    1. Joint properties, orientation and preferred angle
    2. Labelling and placement
    3. FK, IK and FK/IK blending
    4. Twist and no-roll systems
    5. Spline IK for the spine and neck
    6. Leg, foot roll and the reverse foot
    7. Space switching
    8. Spring systems and quadruped limbs
    9. Add-ons and clothing
  6. Deformation systems
    1. Non-linear deformers
    2. Specific deformers: cluster, softMod and lattice
    3. Falloff deformers and component tags
    4. Weight painting and skinning tools
    5. Copying weights, proxy geometry and exporting weight maps
  7. Blend shapes and correctives
    1. Static and live blend shapes
    2. Shape Editor and sculpting
    3. Combination blend shapes
    4. Corrective deformation and radial basis functions
    5. Shot sculpting
  8. Facial rig components
    1. General structure of a facial rig
    2. Lips
    3. Eyelids
    4. Sticky lips
  9. Rig behaviour and dynamics
    1. Custom multi attributes and channels
    2. Automated rig responses
    3. Automatic clavicle
    4. Jiggle and secondary motion with nHair
    5. Muscle simulation and volume preservation
  10. Export and pipeline integration
    1. Export formats
    2. Pipeline compatibility
    3. USD and Alembic
    4. Preparation, validation and publishing
  11. Tools and introduction to scripting
    1. Utility tools, shortcuts and working habits
    2. External rigging and skinning tools
    3. Autorig toolkits (for reference only)
    4. Introduction to Python in Maya
  12. Rigging workflow and methodology
    1. Rig development pipeline
    2. References and inspiration
    3. Testing, debugging and communication with animation
    4. Documentation, versioning and rig performance

Methodology: 

The subject follows a theoretical-practical, progressive and applied methodology: students build their knowledge by directly implementing rigging systems in a real working environment.

Weekly sessions last 4 hours, in a single block or in two 2-hour blocks. Each session is divided into:

  • 50% conceptual development and technical demonstration of the contents
  • 50% guided practical exercise in the classroom

During the practical part, the lecturer and the teaching assistant give individual support, answer questions and guide the application of the concepts in real time. Learning is therefore based on solving real technical problems, as in a professional studio.

The teaching methodology is based on:

  • Guided hands-on learning
  • Progressive learning through system construction
  • Problem solving in real contexts
  • Technical demonstration followed by immediate replication
  • Continuous, personalised feedback in class
  • Collaborative learning: group problem-solving session
  • Autonomous learning outside the classroom, supported by the subject handout

Students are expected to spend at least as much time outside class as in class, consolidating the exercises started in class, refining and optimising the systems built and preparing the assessable submissions. Every week students submit the practical exercise done in class, which is part of the continuous assessment.

The subject follows this progression, where each exercise builds on the previous one and prepares the three assessable submissions:

  • Basic concepts, hierarchies, controls and deformers
  • Construction of biped systems: skeleton, kinematics and skinning
  • Advanced deformation and correctives
  • Automated systems and production integration
  • Problem solving and optimisation, with a group work session

Evaluation: 

Assessable exercises, 70% (three exercises weighted 30%, 30% and 40%), and continuous assessment, 30% (guided practical exercises in class, 70%, and attendance, 30%). Each exercise needs a minimum of 3.5 to average and has four submissions: over 10, over 8 and over 6, two days apart, and the resit at the end of the course over 5.

Evaluation Criteria: 

  • General structure: a masterWalk control that transforms all the geometry, a geometry reference attribute, rig groups well organised in the Outliner and only the attributes useful for animation.
  • Systems: well-built FK and IK with a switch without popping, twist and no-roll, reverse foot, spine and neck with spline IK, space switches.
  • Deformation: smooth skinning without leaking between joints, well-triggered correctives and appealing shapes, with no intersections.
  • Professionalism: correct naming, scalable rig, tagged controls and pickwalk set up. Serious naming or scalability errors cap the grade at 2.2.

Basic Bibliography: 

O’Hailey, T. (2013). Rig it right! Maya animation rigging concepts. Focal Press.

O’Neill, R. (2015). Digital character development: Theory and practice (2nd ed.). CRC Press.

Ritchie, K., Callery, J., & Biri, K. (2005). The art of rigging: A definitive guide to character technical direction with Alias Maya (Vol. 1). CG Toolkit.

Additional Material: 

Autodesk. (2026). Character animation in Maya. Maya 2026 Help. https://help.autodesk.com/cloudhelp/2026/ENU/Maya-CharacterAnimation/files/GUID-0D0DCBE5-01BA-4AA2-BC4D-85C3285933AD.htm