Anzovin Studio demos Anzovin Rig Tools for Maya
[Originally posted on: 3 October 2011. Scroll down for updates.]
Anzovin Studio has released an interesting demo of Anzovin Rig Tools, its upcoming Maya rigging plug-in.
The brief video above shows a very simple arm rig in action, demonstrating some nice volume-preserving deformation without the need to paint weight maps.
More eye-catchingly, ART treats bones as curves, enabling users to add ‘bone CVs’ to deform them without affecting the other properties of the rig.
Watching the video, the potential to create corrective shapes is obvious (although Raf Anzovin’s comment that “an animator can go add these at any time” will strike terror into the hearts of riggers everywhere).
ART is still pre-alpha, so no details of pricing or timescale have been announced. When it is released, it will complement Anzovin Studio’s existing Maya rigging products, The Setup Machine and The Face Machine.
Updated 15 January 2013: Anzovin Studio has just launched an IndieGoGo crowdfunding campaign to raise $25,000 in development funding for ART. If the goal is met, it aims to release the plug-in around June.
Incentives range from getting your name in the manual to one week’s on-site pipeline integration work. The studio says it is aiming to price ART at around $499 – but pledging $300 will get you an advance copy.
Check out this thread on CGTalk for more on the development work, and links to new demo videos.