I've watched the part where trying to line up the custom shape for the foot several times. I'm over here pulling my hair out for 45 minutes because I've been rotating over and over and I can not figure it out. I'm in edit mode and rotating 180˚, 90˚, -90˚, -180˚... I've added more geometry so I can see it not line up. I'm pausing and trying to use the on screen buttons but it's not working at all. Who can explain exactly how to get there? What are the exact rotation steps?
I had the exact problem. I deleted the the mesh and added another one. With the new one I had no problems
What caused the problem was I accidentally rotated it once by 180 in "edit mode" without knowing, and then there was no way for me to get it working by rotating it in object mode.
I feared the day this question would be asked 😅
It's a hard thing to wrap my head around and even more difficult to explain. The key is to understand that the local orientation of your control shape needs to match the local orientation of the bone you assign it to. So when the control shape and bone orientations match, that's when you can adjust the control shape in edit mode to be positioned the way you want it.
@Combee Chan: Honestly, I'm not sure if I figured it out. I do remember being really frustrated with it. Maybe it has something to do with appling the scale and rotation? It's been months since I've done this exercise and if I was taking this course now, I'm sure I wouldn't be too confused. So I've been moving forward with other lessons. Luckily, CGCookie supplies a lot of files so if something just isn't working, I can use their file from that point.
I think I may have figured out the solution you are looking for. When you rotate the custom bone shape object you are trying to make in Edit Mode, the transformations are "automatically" applied to the bone itself. However, if you rotate the custom bone shape object in Object Mode, you can freely rotate the custom object without it affecting the bone.
To see what I mean, try to grab a vertex on the custom bone object in Edit Mode and see how it affects the bone itself. You will see that the vertex of the object AND the bone will move. Now, freely rotate the custom object with your mouse while still in Edit Mode. You can see that the bone itself follows the new rotation of the custom bone object as you move it. This is behavior you don't want as you are trying to match the custom object's rotation to the bone's "local" rotation but you can't do that if the bone itself keeps moving when you move.
So, the solution you are looking for is to go into Object Mode and then rotate the custom object to be in the same rotation as the bone so that all the vertices match up with both the custom object and the bone itself. To see what a mean, assuming you are trying to create the controller to move the foot, you're using a plane to create the custom object, and it is parallel with the grid, do the following:
Select the object in Object Mode, hit R to rotate, then hit Z to rotate specifically on the Z-axis, now type 90 on your keypad to rotate the object 90 degrees, and finally hit Enter to confirm the rotation. Now, when you tab back into Edit Mode, try to move the vertex that is in the same spot as the vertex you tried to move previously on the custom object. You can see it is now affecting a different vertex on the bone.
In conclusion, as long as your object is parallel to the grid, you will want to rotate it on the Z axis by 90, 180, OR 270 degrees depending on how much you need to rotate the custom object to match up with the bone.
It's important to note that if you type in the degrees on your keypad when rotating the object, it will rotate it COUNTERCLOCKWISE relative to if you were looking at it from above (Hit 7 on your keypad in the 3D view to enter "Top View" if you want to know what I mean by "above").
With this line of thinking, if you had a plane (otherwise meaning you had a square with four vertices), rotating the object on the Z-axis 90 degrees will move each vertex one "spot" counterclockwise. And, what I mean by "spots" is that each vertex is consider being in it's own spot, position, space, etc. You would have four spots total as you have four vertices to the place.
So, rotating the object 180 degrees would be two spots, 270 degrees would be three spots, and rotating it 360 degrees would be four spots and would leave each vertex in the same spot because you would have rotated the object in a full circle. If you want to move the object clockwise as opposed to counter clockwise, just hit the minus "-" key on your keypad before putting the degrees in.
Here's a final step-by-step example to explain it in a holistic fashion:
1. In Edit Mode, you move a vertex on the custom object with your mouse to see which vertex it affects
2. The vertex on the custom object affects a vertex on the bone two vertices "counterclockwise" to the vertex you are manipulating on the object
3. You go into Object Mode and select the custom object
4. You hit R to rotate, Z to specify you want to rotate on the Z-axis, 180 to specify to rotate 180 degrees (or two "spots"), and then Enter to confirm the rotation
5. You go back into Edit Mode and try to affect the same vertex on the custom object and now see that it should be affecting the "same" vertex on the bone
I hope this long winded explanation helps you and any others who find it. Let me know if you have any questions.
Cheers!