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Josh Burton edited this page Oct 16, 2023 · 78 revisions

cgmTools is an out-of-the-box rigging and animation pipeline solution for Autodesk Maya. It has dozens of tools, the biggest being MRS - a modular rigging system with tons of features to rig anything your production needs, and CGMProject/Scene - a project and file management utility that eases the process of file organization and export of assets to other software or game engines.

Because we don't charge for the toolbox, others allow us to share their work as well.

Notes:

Important links

User Supported

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The cgmToolbox is free to use for both commercial and personal projects. For now consider it as attribution share alike. You can't resell our code nor call any of it your own. You're free to modify it however you like.

We chose not to put a license on it because we wanted others to be able to experiment and collaborate with us to make it better. However, development takes time and resources so we will offer ways to use donate or support the platform more as the system expands.

ℹ️ | A discount on the class is available to patrons on Discord.

Maya Compatibility

Some versions of maya play better than others. Here's our current list.

Version Status Notes
2022-23 Evaluating Have python 3 build of tools
2020.4 Solid Have users actively using this version
2019.3.1 Solid Active production
2018.7 Solid Active production
2017 Usable Limited MRS features. Controllers not available
2016 Usable Limited MRS features. Controllers not available

⚠ WARNING: Student versions of maya have known issues. Not recommended.

Installation

From Maya

Use this standalone installer script, need to update the video: cgmUpdate File

cgmTools Install from Maya

image

  1. Download this file and put it it in your scripts folder. (Typically C:\Users\[user]\Documents\maya\[version]\scripts )
  2. Open maya
  3. In a python import cgmUpdate …then…
  • Maya 20 and below OR Maya 22 in py2 mode: cgmUpdate.here('MRSDAILY') or another branch name if you know one.
  • Maya 22 and above: cgmUpdate.here('main')

Note - cgmUpdate will detect your maya version and pull from the py3 repos if 22 or above and this repos if not.

If you pull an older branch of py2 it may have extra directories at the root, you'll need to pull the the stuff out of mayaTools and put that in your scripts folder manually. Easier to just pull MRSDAILY unless you know what you're doing.

When you do this, you’ll get a confirm dialog showing you where it’s detected the install location. You can change if you like. Confirm. As long as you have a net connection, this should:

  • Grab the latest build from one of our branches
  • Download it
  • Unzip it
  • Move everything to the scripts folder as needed
  • Delete the zip stuff.
  • Load the toolbox

Mac users. One user had issue on Mac for 2023 and running this got around an SSL issue before the regular method would work:

import ssl
ssl._create_default_https_context = ssl._create_unverified_context

Via Repos

Maya Env PC Example

REPOSPATH = D:/repos/
MAYA_SCRIPT_PATH = %REPOSPATH%/;
PYTHONPATH = %REPOSPATH%;

Mac Example

#MacOS guidelines
#Do not use ";" at the end of a line
#For variable substitution "$variable" instead of "*variable"
#Variable path must end with "/"
#To troubleshoot paths
#Use mel cmd for getter
#$s=`getenv "PATH"`;
#Replace "PATH" with path name
REPOSPATH=/Users/"UserName"/cgmTools/
MAYA_SCRIPT_PATH=$REPOSPATH/mayaTools
PYTHONPATH=$REPOSPATH/mayaTools

Identifying Your Version

You can go to CGM>Help>About CGM to see. Note – older releases will not have the branch tag on them. Only builds after 21.4.0.2 have this. If you don’t have the option in your ui, your version is quite old and you should update.

image

Updating Builds

There’s two ways to get new builds of the tools

  • In Maya. CGM>Dev>Git>Pull, then whatever branch you want. Not all branches represented here This method has been hit and miss with some users You may need to reload core after doing this action or just restart maya
  • Git UI | Using SourceTree or another WYSIWYG git app is our preferred method
    • After you pull you'll need to run cgm > dev > [Reload Core] to reload your modules

Note - You should NOT use both methods together. Pick one. Things will get funky otherwise.

Branches

You can change your active branch via the Update Tool you can find the docs for in the expanded details link above.

Current recommended branch: MRSDEV

  • main| This will be where we keep our most stable build of tools. Last merged at the beginning of May 2020
  • master | We’ll be depreciating this branch
  • MRSDEV | Our active dev branch we’re working on most of the time for dev work
  • MRSWORKSHOP | Snapshot of the tools each time I update the stand alone workshop docs
  • MRSDAILY | Our daily branch with the most up to date (and buggy) bits
  • PY3 Repos | there is a separate py3 repos

Autoloading cgmToolbox

The next time you open maya if cgmTools don’t show up, you can enable that by:

  • Typing cgmToolbox in a mel command line OR cgmToolbox.ui() in a python command line
  • Opening the toolbox if it doesn’t open cgm > Open Toolbox UI
  • Top right menu there – Setup > Autoload on maya start. image

Other bits

MRS in Production

The Morpheus Rigging System (MRS) is a core part of a open content development platform for Autodesk Maya. These docs are for the core of the content development system. Other tools in the cgm library may be found here.

  • Phaser Lock
  • [Other studio]

MRS Examples

Here's some work examples. These are a couple of full rigs made by one of our talented users, Rodrigo Lopez for personal tests Available here!

IMAGE ALT TEXT

IMAGE ALT TEXT

Proxy Rigs build just with MRS.

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License

The cgmToolbox and Morpheus Rigging System (MRS) specifically are free to use for both commercial and personal projects. You can't resell our code nor call any of it your own. You're free to modify it however you like. We're using the MIT license

Copyright <2012> <CG Monks>

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

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Contributors

CG Monks

  • David Bokser
  • Josh Burton
  • Ryan Comingdeer

Additional Contributors

  • Benn Garnish
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