Rigging a Corgi

While on Intrepid, one of the jobs I was tasked with (or really, tasked myself with) was to rig and animate our four-legged main character, Tank the corgi.  I wanted to challenge myself, never having worked with a quadruped before.  It's challenge of the rig and animation was also what kept me sane during the harder weeks, because really, I loved every minute of it.

It was interesting to say the least.  I didn't model the character, and we didn't have the time or manpower to iterate, so there were a lot of little things I had to roll with.  One of the hardest parts was the muscles of the leg, where it connects to the chest-area.  This probably won't come as a big surprise to any dog-lovers, or anyone who's animated dogs before.  But getting that to work in the rig took a lot of studying and tweaking before my corrective joints worked on what I had.

I've also included here several resources I used for animation reference, for the benefit of myself in a future project, or anyone else who might grace this page.  Not included is the Edward Muybridge book for animals (which actually was of only limited benefit, due to it's physical, not digital, nature) and any reference that I personally took.

The Thundering Herd (slow motion running)
Goro the corgi slow motion recordings (there are several with this dog that were great reference)
Dog Normal and Abnormal Gait study
Line Test Journals - dog slow walk animation reference
Line Test Journals - how to key dogs walk animation notes