[Bf-funboard] Re: Some skinning feature ideas

[Michael Crawford]

On Apr 3, 2007, at 7:44 PM, Benjamin Tolputt wrote:

> Tony Mullen wrote:
>> I'm not sure if this was directed towards me, but since my  
>> suggestions
>> are what seemed to inspire it I'll point out that while numerous
>> people suggested hacks or workarounds for the example problems that I
>> described, (not all of which I'd been aware of, and I appreciate the
>> tips) none of the methods described were similar in actual
>> functionality to what I proposed, which I still think would improve
>> how weight painting works.
> This is something I am in agreement with (to be on the record).
>> <snip "poor documentation state" comments>
> This is very true. For example, have a look at the Blender  
> documentation page for details on Weight Painting. I quote "In this  
> mode dark blue represents areas with no weight from the current  
> group and red represent areas with full weight". There is no  
> mention of "full weight" being something different to what it says.  
> As such, how I read it (and I can only assume *many* others do to)

You're right if they came from maya and I can see how that could be  
very confusing.  It's a good thing i never read the documentation.

> is that "RED = 1.0 weight for deformation". This is (as nobody here  
> denies) a patently incorrect reading

Nope.  It's a 100% correct reading from a maya user's perspective.   
Someone new to 3d (or rigging) might interpret it differently entirely.

> , but there is nothing (not even in the Wiki) that corrects this  
> plain english understanding of the text.

Sometimes it's hard... damn hard, to put an abstract concept into words.

> I personally found the comment a little offensive as I do not  
> believe it is the user's fault (as I felt was implied) for not  
> reading all the comments & tips scattered across tutorial websites,  
> forums, hell even Orange/Blue Elenphant comments.
>> So to paraphrase your frustrated quote, I'm saying "but I can find  
>> the
>> influencing bones five different ways already! the real problem is
>> that I want full control over setting one specific weight so that I
>> don't have to care about all those other bones!"
> A nice summary of my position as well :) I do not doubt that there  
> are many ways to accomplish the task of weight painting. I am  
> simply suggesting some functionality will make certain common tasks  
> much more efficient without affecting the workflow others seem to  
> enjoy.

Hey man. I'm a blender libertarian. If you can do your thing without  
messing with my thing, it's all good.