Setting Floor Contact Planes for the Hands and Feet

In iClone, a character can have floor contact for the feet and hands so that the character walks or touches terrain or any terrain components. If done correctly, you do not need to worry about penetrating issus for the feet and the hands.

The Floor Contact is ON.	The Floor Contact is OFF.

The Floor Contact feature is defined in the character by invisible Contact Planes that are appended onto the soles and palms of the character. These planes are areas that detect the terrain. Once the contact with the terrain is detected, then they will force the character's fingers and toes to bend in order to keep them from passing through terrains and surfaces.

Contact Planes under the soles. The front planes bend the toes backward when they contact the terrain.	Contact Planes under the palm. The front planes bend the fingers backward at the knuckles when they contact the terrain.

Setting the Contact Planes

3DXchange will automatically determine the sizes and positions of the contact planes as soon as you active bone-mapping; however, you may manually adjust them if necessary.

1. Map at least 15 basic bones in the character.
2. Enable the Active box under the dummy pane.
   
3. Switch to the Floor Contact tab.
   
   The contact planes will be displayed in light-blue anchor markers under the soles and palms.
4. Type values into the numeric fields to change the size and positions of the planes.
5. Alternatively, double-click on one of the light-blue anchor markers and use the gizmo to drag the plane to the desired sizes and positions.

Regulations for the Contact Planes

When you wish to manually adjust the contact planes, then please follow the regulations below:

• The planes must be right under the soles and palms.
• Match the sole planes to be as wide and as long as the soles.
  
• Match the length of the contact plans to the length of the palms.
  
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• Move the middle anchor markers of the hand contact planes so that the lines they generate cross the knuckles of the fingers.

  The line formed by the middle anchor markers crosses the knuckles of the palm.	The effects of the fingers and palms with the front and back planes when contact with terrain occurs.

• Move the middle anchor markers in the contact planes of the soles so that the lines they generate cross the roots of the big toes.
  

  The line formed by the middle anchor markers crosses the root of the big toe.	The effects of the toes and sole with the front and back planes when contact terrain occurs.

• Contact in the fingers and toes take both the Contact Planes and Tip Bones for reference.
  • If the front planes are longer than the tip bones, then the contact reaction happens even when the tip bones do not touch the ground.
  • If the front planes are shorter than the tip bones, then the contact reaction happens only when the fingertips or toes touch the ground.
• If you want the fingertip bones to be involved in the contact feature, then you MUST map the tip circles for the hands. Please refer to the Mapping Finger Bones section for more information.