How to mirror armature in blender
How to mirror armature in blender
Editing Bones¶
Add Menu¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Add |
| Hotkey: | Shift-A |
In the 3D View, Shift-A to add a new bone to your armature.
This bone will be:
Extrude¶
An armature with three selected tips.
The three extruded bones.
You also can use the rotating/scaling extrusions, as with meshes, by pressing respectively E R and E S – as well as locked extrusion along a global or local axis.
A single selected bone’s tip.
The two mirror-extruded bones.
Canceling the extrude action causes the newly created bones to snap back to the source position, (creating zero length bones). These will be removed when exiting Edit Mode, however, they can cause confusion and it’s unlikely you want to keep them. If you realize the problem immediately undo the extrude action.
In case you are wondering, you cannot just press X to solve this as you would in mesh editing, because extrusion selects the newly created tips, and as explained below the Delete tool ignores bones’ joints. To get rid of these extruded bones without undoing, you would have to move the tips, then select the bones and delete (Delete Selected Bone(s)) them.
Mouse Clicks¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Hotkey: | Ctrl-RMB |
About the new bone’s tip:
The position of the root and the parenting of the new bone depends on the active element:
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a bone.
If the active element is a bone:
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a tip.
If the active element is a tip:
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a disconnected root.
If the active element is a disconnected root:
And hence the new bone will not be connected to any bone.
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a connected root.
If the active element is a connected root:
This should be obvious because if the active element is a connected root then the active element will be also the tip of the parent bone, so it is the same as the second case.
As the tip of the new bone becomes the active element, you can repeat these Ctrl-RMB clicks several times, to consecutively add several bones to the end of the same chain.
Fill between Joints¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Fill Between Joints |
| Hotkey: | F |
If you have one root and one tip selected, the new bone:
Active tip on the left.
Active tip on the right.
If you have two tips selected, the new bone:
3D cursor on the left.
3D cursor on the right.
If you have two roots selected, you will face a small problem due to the event system in Blender not updating the interface in real-time.
If you try to move the new bone, Blender will update the interface and you will see that the new bone’s root moves to the tip of the parent bone.
Before UI update (3D cursor on the left).
After UI update, correct visualization.
Clicking F with only one bone joint selected will create a bone from the selected joint to the 3D cursor position, and it will not parent it to any bone in the armature.
Fill with only one tip selected.
Fill with only one root selected.
You will get an error when:
Duplicate¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Duplicate |
| Hotkey: | Shift-D |
This tool works on selected bones; selected joints are ignored.
As in mesh editing, by pressing Shift-D the selected bones will be duplicated. The duplicates become the selected elements and they are placed in select mode, so you can move them wherever you like.
If you select part of a chain, by duplicating it you will get a copy of the selected chain, so the copied bones are interconnected exactly like the original ones.
The duplicate of a bone which is parented to another bone will also be parented to the same bone, even if the root bone is not selected for the duplication. Be aware, though, that if a bone is parented and connected to an unselected bone, its copy will be parented, but not connected to the unselected bone (see Fig. Duplication example. ).
An armature with three selected bones and a selected single root.
The three duplicated bones. Note that the selected chain is preserved in the copy, and that Bone.006 is parented but not connected to Bone.001, as indicated by the black dashed line. Similarly, Bone.007 is parented but not connected to Bone.003.
Split¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Split |
| Hotkey: | Y |
Disconnects the selection and clears the parent at the start and end. ToDo
This tool delete selected bones, selected joints are ignored.
If you delete a bone in a chain, its child(ren) will be automatically re-parented to its own parent, but not connected, to avoid deforming the whole armature.
An armature with two selected bones, just before deletion.
The two bones have been deleted. Note that Bone.002, previously connected to the deleted Bone.001, is now parented but not connected to Bone.
Dissolve¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Hotkey: | Ctrl-X |
Merge Bones¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Merge Bones |
| Hotkey: | Alt-M |
You can merge together several selected bones, as long as they form a chain. Each sub-chain formed by the selected bones will give one bone, whose root will be the root of the root bone, and whose tip will be the tip of the tip bone.
If another (non-selected) chain origins from inside of the merged chain of bones, it will be parented to the resultant merged bone. If they were connected, it will be connected to the new bone.
Here is a strange subtlety (see Fig. Merge example. ): even though connected (the root bone of the unmerged chain has no root sphere), the bones are not visually connected. This will be done as soon as you edit one bone, differently depending in which chain is the edited bone (compare the bottom two images of the example to understand this better).
An armature with a selected chain, and a single selected bone, just before merging.
Bones Bone, Bone.001 and Bone.002 have been merged in Bone.006, whereas Bone.005 was not modified. Note Bone.003, connected to Bone.006 but not yet “really” connected.
Bone.004 has been rotated, and hence the tip of Bone.006 was moved to the root of Bone.003.
The tip of Bone.006 has been moved, and hence the root of Bone.003 was moved to the tip of Bone.006.
Subdivide¶
You can subdivide bones, to get two or more bones where there was just one bone. The tool will subdivide all selected bones, preserving the existing relationships: the bones created from a subdivision always form a connected chain of bones.
To create an arbitrary number of bones from each selected bone in the Subdivide Multi Adjust Last Operation panel.
Number of Cuts Specifies the number of cuts. As in mesh editing, if you set n cuts, you will get n + 1 bones for each selected bone.
| Mode: | Edit and Pose Mode |
|---|---|
| Panel: | Sidebar region ‣ Tool ‣ Options ‣ X-Axis Mirror |
Relative Mirror Accounts for any relative transformations when using X-Axis Mirror.
Separate Bones¶
© Copyright : This page is licensed under a CC-BY-SA 4.0 Int. License
How to mirror entire armature?
Loaded into my three.js application:
I’m not looking to symmetrize this model or create a mirror duplicate. I’m trying to convert the entire model along with its bones and mesh so it resembles a human’s left arm instead.
I’m new to blender, I first tried flipping the armature across the global x axis in object mode and the result looks correct in blender:
but when I import this back into my application scene, it seems like something still isn’t correct?:
However, I do not believe that is an issue with three.js
I also looked up various tutorials which instructed me to change the suffixes of bones from «Right» to «Left», mirror the mesh, add mirror modifiers, check x axis mirror, update bone directions, etc. and these options produce the same results?
Can someone help figure what else I’m missing?
1 Answer 1
Your mesh is fine. But the bone orientation is wrong. All bones stick out of the mesh but they should be inside. And there are too many bones for the thumb. You need to fix this first or you have a hard time animating this.
Bone Layout
Your bone layout:
Good bone layout (Rigify meta rig):
Renaming the Bones
Mirroring the Bones
Blender mirrors objects at their origin. That’s the little orange dot. Because the origin is in the center of your mesh and armature they will be mirrored in the middle.
In Object mode, Switch to front view with Numpad 1 (or menu: View > Viewpoint > Front), and move the armature to the left. Then apply the Location with Ctrl + A > Location. This will move the origin to the world origin.
(Bone layout is still wrong)
Mirroring the Hand Mesh
In Object mode, just select the mesh, apply the Location with Ctrl + A > Location, add a Mirror modifier, move it to the top of the stack and apply it.
Note: If you want to keep your weight paint then don’t apply the mirror modifier yet. Parent the mesh to the armature first with Ctrl + P > With Empty Groups. This will create the vertex groups for the left bones. Then apply the mirror modifier. It will fill them when the option Mirror modifier > Data > Vertex Groups is selected (default).
Weight Paint
In Object mode, select the mesh and then the armature (must be the active object, selected last). Parent them Ctrl + P > With Automatic Weights.
Test the armature in the Pose mode.
How to mirror a bone?
I can’t find the bone mirror option.
When I used Blender about two years ago the mirror option was tucked away in the rig/object panels, but now I see no obvious options.
How can I mirror bones in 2.7+?
4 Answers 4
Enter edit mode then hit T to open the tools panel. under options, you will find a check box that says X-Axis Mirror. Check it.
Blender 2.79b
I’ve just discovered that if you mirror with the x-Axis option in the tool box, then you have to name each bone manually for both sides. If you are rigging a human, a humanoid character or an animal, the best way is NOT to check the x-Axis option but follow the steps below:
. you have to name each bone manually for both sides.
If I try the standard Blender options, nothing happens, because
the DAZ armature for G2f (ditto V4) follows the convention that
the names of left and right bones use a prefix of l or r.
Of course, for the sake of symmetrizing,
you really don’t want to rename scores of bones,
and then be obliged to rename them again,
so that their names match the vertex groups!
Editing Bones¶
Add Menu¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Add |
| Hotkey: | Shift-A |
In the 3D View, Shift-A to add a new bone to your armature.
This bone will be:
Extrude¶
An armature with three selected tips.
The three extruded bones.
You also can use the rotating/scaling extrusions, as with meshes, by pressing respectively E R and E S – as well as locked extrusion along a global or local axis.
A single selected bone’s tip.
The two mirror-extruded bones.
Canceling the extrude action causes the newly created bones to snap back to the source position, (creating zero length bones). These will be removed when exiting Edit Mode, however, they can cause confusion and it’s unlikely you want to keep them. If you realize the problem immediately undo the extrude action.
In case you are wondering, you cannot just press X to solve this as you would in mesh editing, because extrusion selects the newly created tips, and as explained below the Delete tool ignores bones’ joints. To get rid of these extruded bones without undoing, you would have to move the tips, then select the bones and delete (Delete Selected Bone(s)) them.
Mouse Clicks¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Hotkey: | Ctrl-LMB |
About the new bone’s tip:
The position of the root and the parenting of the new bone depends on the active element:
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a bone.
If the active element is a bone:
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a tip.
If the active element is a tip:
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a disconnected root.
If the active element is a disconnected root:
And hence the new bone will not be connected to any bone.
Ctrl-clicking when the active element is a connected root.
If the active element is a connected root:
This should be obvious because if the active element is a connected root then the active element will be also the tip of the parent bone, so it is the same as the second case.
As the tip of the new bone becomes the active element, you can repeat these Ctrl-RMB several times, to consecutively add several bones to the end of the same chain.
Fill between Joints¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Fill Between Joints |
| Hotkey: | F |
If you have one root and one tip selected, the new bone:
Active tip on the left.
Active tip on the right.
If you have two tips selected, the new bone:
3D cursor on the left.
3D cursor on the right.
If you have two roots selected, you will face a small problem due to the event system in Blender not updating the interface in real-time.
If you try to move the new bone, Blender will update the interface and you will see that the new bone’s root moves to the tip of the parent bone.
Before UI update (3D cursor on the left).
After UI update, correct visualization.
Clicking F with only one bone joint selected will create a bone from the selected joint to the 3D cursor position, and it will not parent it to any bone in the armature.
Fill with only one tip selected.
Fill with only one root selected.
You will get an error when:
Duplicate¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Duplicate |
| Hotkey: | Shift-D |
This tool works on selected bones; selected joints are ignored.
As in mesh editing, by pressing Shift-D the selected bones will be duplicated. The duplicates become the selected elements and they are placed in grab mode, so you can move them wherever you like.
If you select part of a chain, by duplicating it you will get a copy of the selected chain, so the copied bones are interconnected exactly like the original ones.
The duplicate of a bone which is parented to another bone will also be parented to the same bone, even if the root bone is not selected for the duplication. Be aware, though, that if a bone is parented and connected to an unselected bone, its copy will be parented, but not connected to the unselected bone (see Fig. Duplication example. ).
An armature with three selected bones and a selected single root.
The three duplicated bones. Note that the selected chain is preserved in the copy, and that Bone.006 is parented but not connected to Bone.001, as indicated by the black dashed line. Similarly, Bone.007 is parented but not connected to Bone.003.
Split¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Split |
| Hotkey: | Y |
Disconnects the selection and clears the parent at the start and end. ToDo add.
Delete Selected Bone(s)В¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Delete Selected Bone(s) |
| Hotkey: | X |
This tool delete selected bones, selected joints are ignored.
If you delete a bone in a chain, its child(ren) will be automatically re-parented to its own parent, but not connected, to avoid deforming the whole armature.
An armature with two selected bones, just before deletion.
The two bones have been deleted. Note that Bone.002, previously connected to the deleted Bone.001, is now parented but not connected to Bone.
Dissolve¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | none |
| Hotkey: | Ctrl-X |
Merge Bones¶
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Menu: | Armature ‣ Merge Bones |
| Hotkey: | Alt-M |
You can merge together several selected bones, as long as they form a chain. Each sub-chain formed by the selected bones will give one bone, whose root will be the root of the root bone, and whose tip will be the tip of the tip bone.
If another (non-selected) chain origins from inside of the merged chain of bones, it will be parented to the resultant merged bone. If they were connected, it will be connected to the new bone.
Here is a strange subtlety (see Fig. Merge example. ): even though connected (the root bone of the unmerged chain has no root sphere), the bones are not visually connected. This will be done as soon as you edit one bone, differently depending in which chain is the edited bone (compare the bottom two images of the example to understand this better).
An armature with a selected chain, and a single selected bone, just before merging.
Bones Bone, Bone.001 and Bone.002 have been merged in Bone.006, whereas Bone.005 was not modified. Note Bone.003, connected to Bone.006 but not yet “really” connected.
Bone.004 has been rotated, and hence the tip of Bone.006 was moved to the root of Bone.003.
The tip of Bone.006 has been translated, and hence the root of Bone.003 was moved to the tip of Bone.006.
Subdivide¶
You can subdivide bones, to get two or more bones where there was just one bone. The tool will subdivide all selected bones, preserving the existing relationships: the bones created from a subdivision always form a connected chain of bones.
To create an arbitrary number of bones from each selected bone in the Subdivide Multi Operator panel.
Number of Cuts Specifies the number of cuts. As in mesh editing, if you set n cuts, you will get n + 1 bones for each selected bone.
| Mode: | Edit Mode |
|---|---|
| Panel: | Tool Shelf ‣ Options ‣ Armature Options ‣ X-Axis Mirror |
Separate Bones¶
© Copyright : This page is licensed under a CC-BY-SA 4.0 Int. License.
How can I mirror weight painting?
How can I mirror my weight painting to the opposed side of my character? I know that there is Mirror function, but it doesn’t assign the weight to bones on the opposed side. Can I do it manually?
4 Answers 4
The mirror modifier takes weights into account:
In Weight Paint mode you can edit the weights they would be applied symmetrically.
Select your object then select vertex group 
Select group you want to edit
Click the dark down_arrow to its right
«This is working for one bone, but I need mirror skin to opposed side, so there is another bone, not same. «
In my experience the mirrior modifier won’t create vertex groups for you. If you have a vertex group named Arm_Right you need to add a new vertex group and name it Arm_Left before you use the mirror modifier.
Источники информации:
- http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/237182/how-to-mirror-entire-armature
- http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/15062/how-to-mirror-a-bone
- http://docs.blender.org/manual/en/2.79/rigging/armatures/bones/editing/bones.html
- http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/9390/how-can-i-mirror-weight-painting