Scale red hand install bones to the tips of the fingers. (top view)

Rotate the red hand install bones in the Y axis. (top view)

Hide red hand install bones.

Unhide the orange/white/green install bones.

Translate orange finger install bones on the X and Z axis. Start of the index fingers first knuckle. (top view)

Note: the hilghted bone is the bone you are translating.

Translate the orange finger install bones in the Y axis. (front view)

Translate orange carpal install bones in the X and Z axis. Start of thumb pivot point. (top view)

Translate orange carpal install bones in the Y axis. (front view)

Scale orange finger and carpal install bones. Outer edge of hand geometry. (top view)

Translate and rotate the white finger install bones through the center of the fingers.

Rotate white thumb install in the Y axis. Aim at the center of the first knuckle of the thumb. (top view)

Rotate white thumb install bones on the X axis. (front view)

Rotate the white thumb install bones in the Z axis. Aim pointer bone at the thumb nail. (bird's eye view)

Rehide the orange/white/green install bones.

unhide the black finger install bones.

Scale the black finger install bones. Scaling to the knuckles. (top view)

Rotations were not needed.

Scale and rotate the black thumb install bones through the center of the thumbs. (multiple views)

Rehide the black finger install bones.

Save project.

ONTO STEP 5

I cannot believe how easy this is!!!!

THANK YOU!!!!

OK on to step 5 LOL.

I agree. This is pure genius. Mark, David and whoever else have developped this rig, you have my highest respect.

I redid all the steps after you updated the rig. I have one question and one issue.

The question is how important is it to scale the end finger bone? Say the scale_black_middle_3_XYZ_axis? What are the consequence if it is not scaled or not scaled correctly? And if scaling it is important, then I guess it should be scaled right to the tip of the finger?

The issue is I cannot get the black_thumb bones to orient correctly with the thumb phalanx. I think it is because I rotated the "rotate_thumb_Z_ais (aim_pointe_install_at_nail)" so it have a more natural folding angle. I think this is this rotation because if I rotate it back to its default angle, I can psition the other bones correctly.

You don't have to scale the end finger/thumb bone to the tip of the finger, but, there are some underlying nulls that you can unhide that wouldn't be at the end of the finger as intended. I don't think there would be any other problems when not scaling it far enough.

The other issue Mark would be better able to answer.

Where's that thread about the thumb issue, so I can see what the thumb phalanx is.

Are you saying you need Z rotation on the black thumb install bones? You don't want the thumb bones to bend in-line with, what David calls, the thumb carpal?

My naming may be inaccurate...I think they should be called "metacarpals".

Well, I had time to sleep on this and I figured, this morning, that this issue with the thumb phalanxes was may fault. I was not following the instructions.

I wanted to turn the tumb bones so the thumb phalanxes turns in a more natural way:
Click to view attachment
The second grab shows what I mean although I exagerated the turn angle here.

And when I was aligning the phalanx bones, I could not get them to align with the actual thumb:
Click to view attachment
I could get them to align from the top view but not from the face view or vice-versa.

But it turned out I was not following one of the previous instruction that says "Rotate_thumb_Z_axis (aim_pointer_install_at_nail)". As you can see in the first two grabs of the first attachment, I was not aiming at nail. Once I aimed at nail, then I could get proper phalanx alignment.

For reference, here are the hand bone names I'm using as reference by Dr Paul Richer "Artistic Anatomy".
Click to view attachment

Ok, I'm glad we got this settled. I was begining to think that there was a problem in the installation rig. So everything is good now?

For the hand and thumb? Yes.

I got to where I translate the black finger bones ,then somehow I lost a bone so closed AM and restarted it but now there is no ON/OFF swiches there,is there any way to get them back,I can't unhide the bones so can't see them properly
Was going good untill then

Sorry Steve, I don't know what to tell you. This seems like a pc problem (low resources). Do you have alot of things running in the background?

I did have 3 pages up off the AM forums at the sametime screenshots ,but its got dual core 3.8 and 3 gig of ram ,but it don't seem any better than it was before I upgraded it so not really sure ,heres a screencap you maybe can see something ,othewise Ill have to start over and try again .Thank's Mark

I may not be understanding you, Steve...is this what you're looking for?

Ok, first, you didn't hide the red install bone using the on/off pose. Next, you didn't hide the orange/green/white install bones using the on/off pose. Why the green install bones aren't showing, I'm not sure, did you hide them manually?

The black finger install bones have a pose to unhide them under the black finger install bones in the pose slider window (see Davids post above). You don't need to concern yourself with anything other than following the pose sliders.

Iv been turning the bones off in the bones under action,is that not correct ?but now the little red thing is gone from all the bones at the end where you turn them on/off.Yea David thats what Im looking for ,Iv now turned the red and the green bones off in the poses ,atleast I think I have .I have put a zip with the prj that I am using ,could you just take a look and see if it still doese it for you please,as you say Mark it maybe my machine
zip file

You DO NOT hide or unhide the bones in the PWS. You are suppose to use the on/off poses I provided in the pose slider window. I'll look at the project and see whats up.


I just looked at your project, It doesn't seem that you are using the installation poses at all. You do not have to touch any bone what so ever in the action. The installation process is all done with pose sliders.

Thanks Mark I thought I must be doing something wrong ,sorry for that I just didn't understand what was going on .Ok will start again ,cheers

edited ah now I see the light ,I was making it a lot more complicated than it really is ,this is going to be funn now .What a graet way of doing it ,magic Mark