Скачать или смотреть Before AI: A Fully Hand-Rigged Creature in Maya (Pure 3D Craftsmanship)

Watching this feels like a nostalgia trip to the era of real 3D labor.
This entire hippo-like creature is built using blendshapes in Maya, with modeling done in ZBrush. No AI. No shortcuts. Just thousands of parameters, sliders, and painstaking manual control.

In 2D generative AI we call it ControlNet.
In 3D, it has always been called a rig — or a setup.
Every facial expression, deformation, and motion is driven by hand-crafted blendshapes.
Every slider represents hours of sculpting, testing, and refinement.

Why this matters:
• This is what full manual character rigging really looks like
• Managing hundreds of controls is a skill in itself
• It highlights how brutal — and beautiful — traditional 3D workflows are
• A reminder of how much human effort goes into pre-AI animation pipelines
The big question isn’t even how to build this.
It’s how anyone remembers what all these controls do.

3D has always been hardcore manual work.
And honestly — respect.

Source (LinkedIn post):   / urn:li:activity:7415425556999110656  



#3DRigging #BlendShapes #Maya3D #ZBrush #CharacterRig #3DAnimation #CGI #VFX #DigitalArt #BeforeAI #ControlNetFor3D #Hardcore3D