The Aligned Rig is an experimental Armature based on the original Second Life Rig. The rig is fully compatible with the original Avastar Rig. The only difference is in the definition of the Joints: All bones are strictly aligned to armature space, thus they contain no restpose rotations from the Armature.

The visual difference is: The location of the Bone tails is no longer aligned to the bone heads of their children (see image).

This rig Variant is mainly used for an improved version of the Avastar Shape Slider System, see further down.

A word of warning

Since this feature is very experimental we have chosen to disable it by default. We strongly recommend to use this feature only for experimenting and testing and not use it for any production purposes!

Enabling the Aligned Rig feature

You can enable the feature in the Avastar Addon Properties Panel:

  • Edit -> Preferences
  • In the Add-ons section search for Avastar
  • Locate the General settings Panel
  • Enable Advanced Rig Options

Make sure you Save your preferences to keep this option enabled permanently.

Create an Aligned Rig

We provide two options for creating an Aligned Rig:

  • If you plan to use the Aligned Rig frequently, then you can define a Rig Preset.
  • If you want to use the Rig just for exporting, then you can use the Rig converter within the Rig Inspector.

Setup an Aligned Rig Preset

You can define a new Rig Preset in the Avastar Addon Properties Panel:

 

  • Edit -> Preferences
  • In the Add-ons section search for Avastar
  • Locate the Character Definitions Panel
  • Select the attributes for the new Character preset
  • Make sure that the option Align bone axes is enabled

Finally click the plus icon (see image) and name your rig. In the example we have named the new Rig preset: Complete Aligned

Now you find a new entry in the Avastar create menu.

Convert a Standard Avastar Rig

If you prefer to work mostly with the Standard Avastar Rig, and you need to use an Aligned rig only for parts of your workflows, then you also can convert your rig on the fly.

Note: While it is not strictly necessary, we still recommend to convert rigs only with the white stickman shape:

  • Open the Avatar shape Editor
  • Select the White Stickman/Stickgirl icon

Now your rig is in SL neutral Shape.

The Rig Update Tool

Next you can use the Rig Update Tool as indicated below:

  • Locate the Rig Inspector Panel in the Avastar Tab
  • Scroll further down to the Rig Update Tool
  • Make sure the Align Bone Axes to Rig Option is enabled
  • Optionally disable other options as indicated in the image
  • Optionally set the target rig type (See image)
  • Finally click the Replace Rig Button

Info: When you set the Target Rig Type to Reference (see image)  then you get a rig that only contains the official Second Life bones.

Important: When you enable the Align Bone Axes to Rig option, then the converted Rig will not(!) contain the HipLink bones and the CollarLink bones!

The Aligned Reference Rig

When you create an aligned Rig as indicated above (Target Rig set to Reference), then you end up with a Reference Rig that contains only Second Life Bones. Nevertheless the Reference Rig can be used just like any other Avastar Rig, except that it does not have the green animation bones and no IK bones

Note: It is not necessary to use Reference Rigs when you want to get the bones aligned! Actually you are free to use whichever Rig type you prefer in combination with Aligned bones!

Important: We do not recommend to use Aligned Rigs for animation purposes yet, because the animation system has not yet been reworked for this type of rig.

The Shape as Pose Option

The first practical use of the Aligned Avastar Rigs is an experimental feature where we use Blender’s own Animation module to create Avatar Shapes. What does this mean?

By default Avastar modifies the Restpose of the Rig when slider values change. This allows to reset a pose at any time without loosing the current character shape. But this approach has a few really bad caveats. Foremost the slider system is very slow and its implementation is very complex.

The Shape as Pose feature is a first attempt to replace the original Avastar Slider system with a much faster implementation based on the Blender skeletal animation module.

Important: Please use this feature only in combination with Aligned rigs (see first part of this page) to make sure the Avastar Sliders still work exactly as needed for Second Life!

You enable the feature in the Avatar Shape Editor.