Skin Tools utilities and tools

This section covers the additional tools and utilities available in the Skin Tools UI and related menus.

Prune Small Skin Weights

Removes weight values below a specified threshold.

When skinning layers are present:

• If activated from the Skin menu, small weights are removed from all skin layers.
• If activated from the Tools tab, small weights are removed from the currently active layer only.

This allows you to prune weights globally or per layer, depending on the context in which the command is executed.

Undo

• Shortcut: Ctrl+Z
• Function: Standard undo functionality is supported for all weight painting and layer operations.

Joint Locking

• Location: Right-click context menu in the Joints panel.
• Function: Provides options to quickly lock or unlock joints to prevent accidental painting.

Available commands:

• Lock Selected
• Unlock Selected
• Lock Unselected
• Unlock Unselected

Locking joints prevents them from receiving weight changes while painting. These options allow you to isolate specific influences or protect selected influences during editing.

Component Editor Integration

The Component Editor supports editing layered skin weights.

When editing a skinCluster that uses skinning layers, additional controls are available in the Smooth Skins tab:

• A Skin Cluster selector
• A Skin Layer selector

These controls allow you to switch between skinClusters and individual skin layers.

The controls are collapsible and are only displayed when a skinCluster is active. They are hidden when switching to non-skinCluster tabs in the Component Editor.

You can edit weights per layer and lock influences at the layer level directly within the Component Editor.

Max Influences (Effects tab behavior)

If you use a Max Influences setting in the Effects tab, the limit is applied when weights are written to the Maya skinCluster.

Because this setting is applied as a post-process, the results are not visible while painting. To enforce an influence limit that is visible during painting, use the controls in the Set Weights section of the Paint tab.