mirrorVertex for maya 1.0.7 for Maya (maya script)

oyMirrorVertex for maya 1.0.7

oyMirrorVertex is a tool essentially designed to get symmetric blendShapes, or to make mirrors of your allready created blendShapes...

PS: the plugin part is removed from the script, so it is now working properly under any platform and any maya version (lately tested for maya 2011-x64 under linux and windows )

Installation

Windows:

• put the oyMirrorVertex.mel to my documents/maya/scripts directory

Linux and MacOsX:

• putthe oyMirrorVertex.mel to /home/userName/maya/scripts directory

Usage

• create your object to be blendShaped
• your object must be as symmetric as possible ( but not need to be scientifically symmetric )
• duplicate it, rename the new object to baseObject, it is for you to remember that this one is the duplicated one, so you never touch this object, because it contains the symmetry information
• open the script UI by typing oyMirrorVertex; to the commandLine
• select the baseObject and click ! SET BASE OBJECT ! button
• as soon as you press the ! SET BASE OBJECT ! button the script will calculate the required ID Table for matching vertex IDs (be patient, it will take time)
• the calculation of the ID LUT is for one time only job
• to mirror your object:
  • select the blendShape target you want to mirror than hit mirror
• to reflect the position of the vertex to the other side to make a symmetric blendShape target:
  • select the blendShape targets vertices that you want to make symmetric and then hit reflect
• if you have some problems in those vertices lying in the symmetry axis (center), that means your vertices are not close enough to the symmetry axis, to fix this:
  • before using mirror or reflect, select one of the edges of the baseObject at the center, convert the selection to edge loop and than convert the selection to vertices ( don't forget we are working on the baseObject but not changing it, only making the script to calculate some numbers )
  • then hit "get tolerans" button
  • it will calculate the distances of that selected vertices to the symmetry axis, and then it will set the tolerans to a plausible number ( tolerans number is for the vertices lying on the symmetry axis, not for the other vertices )
  • as soon as you hit "get tolerans" it will create a new ID LUT
  • use mirror or reflect button to continue your blendShape creation, you shouldn't get any other problems

The original idea belongs to Bora Dayioglu, I only efficiently programmed the tool and add some little tweaks to the workflow... we are using this tool in our production pipeline very heavily...

Erkan Ozgur Yilmaz

Lead Technical Director

eoyilmaz@gmail.com

www.ozgurfx.com