3ds Max 9 Bible

Inverse kinematics provides a unique way to control and animate hierarchical structures by transforming the child node. In this chapter, you accomplished the following:

• Learned the basic concepts behind inverse kinematics

• Explored the difference between interactive and applied IK methods

• Created and animated an inverse kinematics system

• Used the IK settings in the Preference Settings dialog box

• Learned how to use IK solvers

Now that your characters are rigged and endowed with IK solvers, you can begin the skinning process, which is covered next. Skinning surrounds the skeleton with a mesh skin and matches how the skin aligns and moves with the underlying rig.