During this tutorial you will be creating a low resolution ‘stand-in’ model of the reovirus sigma 1 protein (the tentacle-like trimeric protein that extends out of the virus’ turrets). The 3 monomers are thought to be in a flexible conformation during the early phases of the viral life cycle – once the surface of the virus loses its sigma3 coating (upon cleavage by chymotrypsin in the gut lumen), the sigma1 trimer transitions to a coiled-coil conformation and rigidifies. Therefore, we would like to animate each monomer as a flexible/trembling arm initially, and then have it erect and coil as a triple helix (with the other 2 rigid monomers).
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You have already rigged character and eyeballs with Modeler’s skelegons. But as you know using skelegons can be kind of cumbersome having to setup in modeler and convert in Layout then edit changes in Modeler if a bone was misplaced. LightWave 3D [8] introduced some full-fledged features to create and edit bones right in Layout, giving you full flexibility when it comes to rigging. Also introduced in LightWave [8] is IK (Inverse Kinematics) Booster which applies IK Handles on all created bones automatically. You can also apply dynamics to bones using this tool. N.B.
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