Introduction

This is a high-quality grey heron character, including the model, textures, hair, rigging, and animation. The hair is created in XGen interactive with enough details, and all materials are built with Arnold renderer for realistically replicating the appearance and texture of a real mellivora. The rigging is created with reference to real bones, making the animation in line with natural movements. The project provides a complete rigging setup along with one flying animation. This character was created at real-world scale using Maya 2024, suitable for film, animation, and high-precision character presentation scenarios.

Model Details: The model consists of the body, eyes, and multiple feather groups.
Textures and Materials: There are 80 .tx files which support Arnold, all in 4K resolution for best quality and details. The materials of the character and the hair are rendered with Arnold renderer to present realistic effects. There are 2 UV sets of the body, which support single quadrant or multiple quadrants.
XGen hair: XGen interactive is used for presenting the details of the hair faster, and all maps of density and modifier masks for hair layering are included externally, all masks are in 1K resolution.

Meshes

Body: Vertices: 19,054, Polygons: 19,026
Eyes: Vertices: 1,496, Polygons: 1,568
Feather Groups: Vertices: 274,511, Polygons: 190,714

Total: Vertices: 295,061, Polygons: 211,308

Animations

Loopable flying animation at 30 fps, frame range 1-267

Rigging

With detailed controllers, it's easier to create postures and animations, the features are as follows:

CTR_crv_MASTER – Root controller of the character.
Customizable attributes:
DEF_jnt_Vis – Controls visibility of the skinned bones.
Feathers_Vis – Controls visibility or display mode of the feather models.
MCH_jnt_Vis – Controls visibility of the auxiliary (mechanical) bones.

CTR_crv_gravity – Body controller (excluding the feet).
Customizable attribute:
RotateOrder – Controls the rotation order.

CTR_crv_gravity_F – Body controller (excluding the feet).
Customizable attribute:
RotateOrder – Controls the rotation order.

CTR_crv_head – Head controller.
Customizable attributes:
Head_Follow_Target – Controls the followed target for the head.
RotateOrder – Controls the rotation order.
Sec_control_Vis – Controls visibility of secondary controllers.

CTR_crv_L/R_B_leg_attr – Leg attribute controller.
Customizable attributes:
Foot_Eversion – Controls foot eversion.
Foot_Inversion – Controls foot inversion.
Foot_Pivot – Controls foot pivoting.
Heel_Raise – Controls heel raising.
IK_FK – Switches between IK and FK.
IK_Stretch – Controls IK stretch.
PoleVector_Follow – Controls pole vector following.
RotateOrder – Controls rotation order.
Stretch_Control_Vis – Controls visibility of secondary stretch controllers.
Toes_Curl – Controls toe bending.
Toes_Raise – Controls toe raising.
Toes_Spread – Controls toe abduction and adduction.

CTR_crv_L/R_tail_feat_attr – Tail feather controller.
Customizable attributes:
Feathers_A_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather A controllers.
Feathers_A_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather A secondary controllers.
Feathers_B_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather B controllers.
Feathers_B_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather B secondary controllers.

CTR_crv_L/R_wing_fea_attr – Wing feather controller.
Customizable attributes:
Feathers_A_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather A controllers.
Feathers_A_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather A secondary controllers.
Feathers_B_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather B controllers.
Feathers_B_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather B secondary controllers.
Feathers_C_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather C controllers.
Feathers_C_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather C secondary controllers.
Feathers_D_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather D controllers.
Feathers_D_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather D secondary controllers.
Feathers_E_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather E controllers.
Feathers_E_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of Feather E secondary controllers.
Feathers_Follow – Controls the followed target for the feather.
Shoulder_Feathers_Ctr_Vis – Controls visibility of shoulder feather controllers.
Shoulder_Feathers_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of shoulder feather secondary controllers.
Wing_Follow – Controls the followed target for the wing.
Wing_SecCtr_Vis – Controls visibility of secondary wing controllers.

CTR_crv_neck_attr – Neck attribute controller.
Customizable attributes:
Follow_Target – Controls the followed target.
IK_FK – Switches between IK and FK.
IK_Stretch – Controls IK stretch.
Stretch_Control_Vis – Controls visibility of secondary stretch controllers.

CTR_crv_spine_main – Spine root controller.
Customizable attribute:
RotateOrder – Controls the rotation order.

CTR_crv_L/R_eye_blink_expr – Eye blink controller.

Additionally, the face, body, and wings come with many auxiliary controllers and more features.

Specifications

File format: Saved as .mb files by default. It can be saved as .ma files if necessary.
Version supported: Created with Maya 2024. Maya 2024 or above is recommended for compatibility.

Caveats

The XGen hair in this Maya character asset has been converted to interactive grooming, offering fast loading and efficient rendering. Although the original guides are not included, you can customize the hair by adding XGen modifiers as needed. All XGen hair in the scene is set up with Arnold materials, ready for rendering.
By default, Arnold uses GPU as the render device, and the sampling setting is suitable for medium quality output, as is shown in the preview image of the character. If you need a fine-tuned image, you can modify Arnold settings to your hardware limit.
The animation scene comes with Arnold lighting, which can be modified if required.
Except for the above, the character can be rendered directly.