Meet Mike and Tina!

One of the many character rigs that we recommend here at Animation Apprentice is Mike and Tina - available for free download at Creative Crash.

Mike and Tina get 5 Stars at Creative crash and 41 positive ratings - not bad at all for a free rig!

Best of all, Mike and Tina are highly customisable, so you can adapt the rig to suit the style of your shot.

Who created Mike and Tina?
Mike and Tina were created by Jason Baskin

What is the license type?
Freeware

How does it work?
Animation Apprentice student Ian Green has road tested Mike and Tina and describes it as "a very good rig", highly recommended "if you're looking for a versatile, easy to use rig with the option to customise it to work with your scene".

Customisation
The rig has a lot of customisation options, giving you the option to add glasses, change hair styles, change the clothes they wear, change the skin and hair colour, change to either male or female - and more.

Complexity
Overall this isn't a complicated rig to use and you can get some great poses and gestures. Don't forget to watch the video from the creator (see below) before using the rig just so you know where to look when changing the appearance and how to turn on/off certain controls.

Face Cam
Another really useful feature while doing lip-sync is the Face Cam - the rig comes with a camera that follows the characters face - so the face is on screen the whole time your scrubbing through you animation. This saves time having to keep changing you camera view to see or adjust the mouth shapes.

High Res and Low Res
There is a toggle on the world control which allows you to smooth the mesh (for rendering) and also un-smooth it so you can work rapidly in Maya.

Is there a video walkthrough?
There is! To see a video walkthrough of how Mike and Tina work, watch this video below:





To see other free Maya rigs available for student use, follow this link.

To find out more about Animation Apprentice, click here for a link to Frequently Asked Questions. To sign up for our next classroom at Animation Apprentice, follow this link.