Hi 
mac999
I love that you are thinking about learning. I spend a lot of my time doing that exact thing.
What you are describing sounds a lot like ‘Productive Failure’, and while it does promote deep thinking and deep understanding (eventually), it’s probably not the best style for learning when there is low levels of prior knowledge.
In the world of rigging this type of problem solving actually occurs at the higher end of mastery. Ie - when you need to invent a solution to a new problem or invent a new solution to an old problem.
At the beginning levels, all learners benefit more for direct instruction.
In regards to the exercises in this course. They are designed to help the learner practice and interact with the software and the technical skills they require as they progress through the content. This allows learner to overcome small stumbles (like weight painting issues for example) before taking on a larger project. They also are a check for understanding and allows me to correct any misunderstandings and fill any knowledge gaps along the way.
Speaking of which, I can see you have submitted some exercises (and that Spikey solved your weight paining issue). I will get to your submissions as soon as possible. It’s the weekend in my timezone and is meant to be a days off.
But keep thinking about your learning. It’s always a good thing to do. Especially when you want to learn.
I personally found rigging to be easier than modeling and sculpting. Your method of learning rigging I feel would work best if you were teaching people who want to become riggers. For a lot of people rigging is more of a necessary evil that needs to be done so I can get to animating. Again that's just my limited experience/feeling.
that is more or less how the 'rig' course is set up. You get a diagram and you can try out to work it out for yourself. Wayne does demo it but so bloody fast that it's definitely not a follow along class, lol
Hi Wayne Dixon,
What you say makes perfect sense.
I am aware of my own ignorance and I see that learning the tools (and some basic concept) is just scratching the surface.
I started just wanting to make my characters move, now I see how one could spend decades perfecting the craft:) (as almost anything worth learning in life)
Thank you for the course I enjov it very much.
The exercises are fun and I think you teach this very well.
You expressed how you wanted the students to really think about it and not just mindlessly reproducing what you are doing. So this is my quest.
I look forward to learning more.