Create blend shape deformers

You can create a blend shape deformer for an object that you want to be deformed by a series of shapes. This object is known as the base object. You can create multiple blend shape deformers on an object, each with its own set of target shapes. For example, you could have one deformer for the mouth and one for the eyes to keep the shape animation calculations separate for different parts of the face.

For more complex shape deformations, you can also create a group of objects to be deformed and apply a blend shape deformer to that group. For example, you could create a group that includes a character's T-shirt and jeans, and create a single blend shape deformer for the group. Then you could edit the target shapes so that the t-shirt overlaps the jeans.

When you create a blend shape deformer, a Blend Shape node (blendShapen) and a Tweak node are created for each blend shape deformer that you create on the base object. See Nodes and attributes for blend shapes for more information.

To create a blend shape deformer

  1. Do any of the following to get set up, depending on your method of shape animation:
    • If you're deforming the base object directly, select the base object - see Create blend shapes using only the base object.
    • If you're deforming a group of shapes, create the group (select the objects and press Ctrl+G), then select the group transform node.
    • If you're using multiple target objects to deform the base object, press Shift and select the target objects, then select the base object you want to deform (you must select the base object last) - see Create blend shapes using multiple target objects for more information.
    2. Note: Selection is highly important when creating a blend shape deformer. In most cases you will want to make sure you have geometry selected at the object level, not the component level. Be especially mindful of this when creating a new blend shape immediately after working on a previously created target shape.
  2. Do any of the following to create the blend shape deformer:
    • Open the Shape Editor and click the Create Blend Shape button to use automatic settings.
    • Choose Create > Blend Shape Deformer in the Shape Editor. Click the Options icon to first set options.
    • Right-click in an empty area of the Shape Editor and choose Add Blend Shape Deformer to use automatic settings.
    • In the Animation, Rigging or Modeling menu sets, select Deform > (Create) Blend Shape > .
  3. If you selected the to open the Blend Shape Options, select the creation options you want, including Advanced options that let you choose where the Blend Shape node will be located in the object's history.
    4. Note: If you're working with multiple target objects, select Check Topology to check that the target objects have the same number of vertices as the base object. Errors occur (such as a "No Deformable Objects Selected" message) when this is not the case.
  4. With the base object selected, the new blend shape deformer appears in the Shape Editor, and the Blend Shape node and Tweak node appear in the INPUTS list in the channel box for the base object.

    If you created the blend shape deformer using multiple target objects, a target shape is added for each target object that you selected.

  5. With a blend shape deformer on the base object, you can now add target shapes to it (see Add target shapes), or add more blend shape deformers.

    The blend shape deformer (Blend Shape node) uses the target shape weight settings to create the blend shape deformation on the base object.

Note: When you create blend shape deformers using the Shape Editor, new blendShape nodes are chained sequentially by default. If you want to put one blendShape node in conjunction with another one, open the Blend Shape Options and change the Deformation order on the Advanced tab to Parallel.

Selecting a blend shape deformer

To select a blend shape deformer (blendShape node), do either of the following:

Related topics

Parent topic: Shape Authoring