IMBRAT’Z MULTIMEDIA

How Small Businesses and Non-Profits Can Afford Multimedia for the Web

By: Patricia Schmal and Mark J. Jaklovsky,
Polar Design (www.polardesign.com)

Introduction:
Multimedia is everywhere on the Internet, whether in the form of floating ads at major websites, streaming video or animated presentations. Of course, there is a good reason why multimedia has become such an integral part of the web experience: it’s an effective tool for capturing attention or provoking visitors to buy or contact the site owner. For these reasons, many educational institutions, businesses, and other organizations desire multimedia presentations. Unfortunately, at first glance multimedia, often appears prohibitively expensive for small businesses and non-profits. The following represent a number of ways to control the high cost that typically accompanies multimedia production without losing quality. We believe these suggestions will ensure that you save money but still feel good about your investment.

Components Affecting Costs:
Let’s begin by understanding the components of professional multimedia production, which include creative development, actual production, and various stages for revisions. The lion’s share of multimedia production costs typically stems from creative development. This is often the most controversial line item for frugal business owners, who may ask, "shouldn’t the cost of the creative be part of the design or production costs?" As with fine clothing, where the choice of designer adds to the cost of your product more so than the actual material or sewing, multimedia design costs depend on the creative input as well. For example, if you hire a designer with more experience or with a track record of creating unique, catchy concepts, your creative development costs may be higher. Of course, the final product may result in having a stronger impact as well. The solution isn’t to pick the least expensive creative professional, but rather to understand their process in order to help speed production (thus reducing cost).

The second component of multimedia production, the design and production of the piece itself typically requires less guesswork in terms of defining cost. The cost per minute of production depends on a limited number of specific parameters, such as the complexity of the animation and the overall quality of the design agency selected. Generally speaking, there are three types of firms - from a cost perspective - you can choose to work with: a purely on-shore, purely off-shore, or a hybrid off-shore/on-shore firm. The type of organization you choose will have a strong correlation with the quality and the price you pay.

The third component, client revisions, is an area controlled most easily and typically is the cause of inflating or deflating multimedia development costs beyond a designer’s original estimate, or your expectations. The most basic revisions consist of three rounds: changes to creative concepts, changes to a draft version of the final product, and a final review. Often, more revisions may be needed when a designer is provided with inconsistent or incomplete information. This invariably results in a higher cost than expected. With the extensive time that some multimedia presentations call for, requiring the efforts of creative professionals and skilled developers, it’s not surprising that multimedia presentations and ads can be expensive. Why, then, consider them? Are they effective?

Multimedia Effectiveness:
Multimedia presentations are very successful at grabbing people’s attention. Multimedia results in higher retention of marketing information by viewers, or more enthusiasm for an offer. When compared to static text, graphics, or even audio, multimedia is simply more compelling due to its ability to trigger multiple senses at the same time.

According to DoubleClick (quoted in ZDNet.com, Joseph, 2002) multimedia ads have a 71 percent higher impact than their static counterparts. Similarly, in 1997, the California Community College system, "implemented a test design to assess the efficacy of multimedia technology as a non-traditional form of instruction" (Luna & McKenzie, 1997). Surveys take after the test determined, "40% of the students felt multimedia improved understanding and 73% found it a positive addition to the course." Finally, a study published in the Journal of Management Information Systems (Benbasat & Lim, 2002) determined that multimedia "facilitat [es] the retention and subsequent recall of explanative information…" The study consisted of two test groups. One group processed information through a "text-based system" and the other a "multimedia system." The subjects who were tested on the basis of a "multimedia system" received a higher mean test score of 2.70 compared to the 2.10 of the text based group (p.114); clearly demonstrating that higher retention is possible with multimedia.

Cutting Multimedia Costs:
The case for implementing multimedia into your marketing, sales or advertising is clear. What can your business or non-profit do to cut its costs? The first method involves separating the development of the creative (the message, concepts, and storyboards) from the production (design, animation, and sound production), or at least finding ways to control it. An article by Mark Frits for EMedia Professional (1997) discussing a fax survey taken of 100 different multimedia production specialists determined, "the creative time spent by designers and project managers, as the most expensive factor of production." Therefore, if a business has already developed a detailed creative concept, storyboard, schematics, or other documentation of what needs to be done, it can reduce the total cost of producing multimedia by utilizing a small design firm or freelancer. Costs are cut because the time and skill spent on one creative is replaced by an in-house team. Of course, to ensure success, only those small businesses who believe they possess strong creative assets (with professional advertising or marketing expertise) should attempt this approach.

Remember, if you do ask your designer or design firm to handle the creative, that the route of working directly with a designer (rather than a firm with a creative team) may cut costs and also quality. Firms with full time creative professionals that are not involved in day to day design are often able to craft unique storyboards that describe and explain products, services, or company mission in memorable ways. Freelancers are a poor choice for strong creative since they often work alone and have limited means to brainstorm and perfect concepts with other creative professionals - a principal differentiating factor and benefit of working with a firm.

If you do select a firm for your creative and production, make sure that the creative team understands the message you need to convey. Is a creative firm with a great portfolio and appealing style really able to promote effectively your product and/or service? Only client testimonials, references, case studies with solid results, or market research can tell you this. Even when obtaining the creative from a top line firm, if you do your homework, you can still keep costs down. Prepare as much information about your target audience, goals, customers, products and services as possible. Develop a few rough concepts of your own, in-house, to help orient the creative team. Finally, discuss these endeavors with your chosen firm up front and negotiate a reduction in fees if you both agree that the information you provide is helpful.

A second way to cut costs is to ask for fixed price development. This direction can mean losing some flexibility in the design of your site. However, the tradeoff can be worthwhile if you are able to exert self-discipline. For that reason, when choosing fixed price development, be limited with revisions, as you only get a few as part of a fixed price. Avoid common mistakes such as being unsure of what design direction you desire or being unsure of your marketing message. Carefully consider each deliverable in order to provide all your comments in as few phases as possible - take a couple of days, at least, to do this.

Finally, when working with a firm, make sure that you provide them with only one point of contact so they don’t spend additional time coordinating between people in your company - although seemingly amusing, that mistake is quite common, especially so with growing businesses. Requiring your designer to handle internal coordination of ideas leads to dramatic extensions in project timelines, so be sure that you appoint someone internally to act as a point of contact and clearinghouse of internal discussion. Another way to save on multimedia costs is by concentrating on developing powerful ideas while keeping implementation simple. When too much time is spent on design and not enough on concept, you will waste production money and effort. To make this strategy effective interview firms that may front load the creative, but also display portfolio pieces that focus on conveying ideas rather than showing off lots of special effects. Work with the designer to simplify the production process by brainstorming easier ways to animate key concepts, and be open to using less labor intensive "vector" animation rather than 3D animations or video production. When it comes to sound, seek out talented and "undiscovered" freelance musicians or voiceover actors working from home who can provide original audio that will cut licensing costs.

As a final point, the operational structure of your chosen design firm can impact cost and quality as well. Off-shoring software development is well established, but outsourcing design work abroad is less common and can lead to interesting results due to cultural differences or lack of marketing knowledge. At the same time, larger multimedia projects often benefit from repetitive production taking place off-shore. Depending on your needs, a "full" off-shore firm with just a sales presence in the US may not be able to provide you with the customer service needed. On the other hand, a fully US firm will likely double your production costs.

Conclusion:
The best choice for small businesses is a design firm employing a hybrid approach, where creative development and high level design is handled by professionals that you can meet and build rapport with, but where larger production is handled costs effectively by a well managed offshore team.

By controlling the costs of multimedia your business can afford a highly effective communication tool that can pique site visitors’ or ad viewers’ interest. Remember these key points:

Think "simple" when it comes to producing animations - focus on strong ideas instead.
Be disciplined with your revisions to avoid charges for many rounds of changes.
Take over creative development and let your designers simply produce your vision when your in-house creative is strong. Otherwise seek out a trustworthy design agency with a track record of strong creative development.
Work with firms that employ an optimal mix of US and off-shore development.

One never needs to cut out quality while cutting costs. Strong concepts and ideas will make the biggest difference in your presentation’s success at the end of the day.

http://www.ugo.com/ugo/html/index/?id=2
http://www.dccomics.com/comics/
http://www.freecomicbookday.com/Default.asp
http://www.comicscommunity.com/boards/brereton/?frames=n;read=3783
http://www.newfreedownloads.com/find/comic.html

From Adrien-Luc Sanders

My End Result

Did you take on the challenge? I did, in an attempt to improve and upgrade the basic application that I created as an example. What I came up with was a paint application with the following features:

# Multiple skin colors to personalize the interface.
# The option to change the base canvas color.
# Two different working layers.
# A removable guide grid.
# Standard brush with user-set size, opacity, and color.
# Opacity and brush size settings that can be entered manually or set using a slider.
# Both a basic and advanced color palette, as well as the option to enter custom hex values for colors.
# A solid fill line tool with opacity, color, and thickness controls.
# A solid fill ellipse tool with opacity and color controls.
# A solid fill rectangle tool with opacity and color controls.
# A gradient rectangle tool with opacity and color controls for both starting and ending colors, as well as angle settings to control the gradient direction.
# A text tool that allows color changes, size changes, bold, and italics.
# A “clear layer” option that only deletes the contents of the current active layer, leaving the rest of the drawing intact.
# Custom cursors based on the tool used, which reflect the color and opacity chosen in certain instances while reverting to the basic mouse cursor when certain windows are active or when selecting tools.
# Menu button highlights to mark which tool is currently selected.
# A tabbed help content menu explaining each tool.

As you can see, it’s a bit more complex than the original version.
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Some of the functions that I used are:

# swapDepths;
# setRGB;
# setTransform;
# The Flash Drawing API tools, including lineTo, moveTo, curveTo, beginFill, and beginGradientFill;
# createEmptyMovieClip;
# Dynamic and Input text fields
# ; Dynamic text properties;
# Listeners;
# _visible;
# Mouse.hide( ) and Mouse.show( ) ;
# A huge mess of onClipEvents; and,
# An even bigger stack of if statements.

The great thing about using Flash for an application like this is that it’s very easy to share with others so that they can install it on their website. All they have to do is download the file, then upload it to their own server and embed the proper code into their web page:

    <!–SkinsSkinsLayer:HEXADECIMAL000000Select a ToolColorBrush Size2Opacity100Gradient OptionsColor 1 Alpha0000FF100Color 2 AlphaFF0000100Angle (0-360)0Text OptionsGradient Options12–><OBJECT classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,0,0" WIDTH="800" HEIGHT="600" id="oekakiv1.1" ALIGN="">
    <PARAM NAME=movie VALUE="http://www.yourdomain.com/yourfolder/oekakiv1.1.swf"> <PARAM NAME=quality VALUE=high> <PARAM NAME=bgcolor VALUE=#000000>
    <EMBED src="http://www.yourdomain.com/yourfolder/oekakiv1.1.swf" quality=high bgcolor=#000000 WIDTH="800" HEIGHT="600" NAME="oekakiv1.1" ALIGN="" TYPE="application/x-shockwave-flash" PLUGINSPAGE="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer"></EMBED>
    </OBJECT>

The only edits needed are to replace "www.yourdomain.com" with the URL of your website, and replace "yourfolder" with the name of the folder that you uploaded the swf file into.

Now that the initial challenge is over, the real challenge will begin: deconstructing the entire application, one tool at a time, to explain in detail how each was created and explore the Flash Drawing API. Watch this page and this site in the coming weeks for each new lesson. Or, if you just want to play around, go have a little fun and draw!

by Brad Schwede
 

The idea for this design came out of a late night coffee with Dejan whilst listening to jazz.
The concept of a little seed coming up out of ground was agreed upon and I went straight home to start designing the seedling. It is obviously influence by Autechre’s Gantz Graf and clean modern vector styles but visually I wanted to push the contrast of heavy ‘harmonic distortion’ on a tiny little organic plant. Almost as if the plants DNA was being modified by sonic pulses.

Process.
The distortion map is created in after effects using ‘audio spectrum’ where a 16:9 map of the soundtrack was rendered (which was to become the base of all vector movements). To create harder and softer distortions on the plant the audio file was then filtered so that high frequencies would be the physical distortion on the plant and low frequencies would be the shake movement. After the seedling was satisfactorily distorted the camera move was exported in RLA so that the vector overlays could be matched. The overlays were to reflect a sort of monitoring system of the amount of audio and the plants distortions.

soundtrack (Reason File)
The audio sphere (or bass ball) is created out of the same audio map but traced around a 3d sphere (‘alpha infection’) and then treated in after effects to produce a glowing, pulsating ball which is wrapped around the plant.

Sound (by Dejan Petrovic)
Doing a soundtrack for this piece was a bit of a challenge. The coffee-table idea bounced off our heads and we both had the same, yet different mental picture of how this animation should look like.

So it started with sound. Knowing Brad’s recent influences in music I’ve decided to go with the most unpleasant and distorted option I had up my sleave Malstrom synthesizer served me well in this case. And so I started.

First thing I had to visualise was the sound, a void would make just before the seed comes out. For this I used a very deep bass in Subtractor Synth. I had all sorts of ideas in my head but they would all take a very long time to implement, especially for this experimental piece.

Sometimes the most time consuming thing is experimentation. It seems like no one dares to experiment anymore, I mean, there are zillions of samples, synths and loops out there so musicians keep recycling over and over again. I guess every now and then an innocent error happens in the process of sound design and that’s how some of the best sounds are created.
 

The idea in a form of a track bounced off couple of more times until we’ve polished it to our liking. At the same time Brad was constructing his little 3D world, and at some point it all seem to have merged into one. In our case it was very hard to tell which one should have been done first - sound or the animation so they were done simultaneously.

Enough talk.

Author: Spengs

The San Diego Comicon has been pretty good, so far.  Entertainment News International has promotional clips for both Transformers Animated and The Spectacular Spider-Man.  Both look exceptionally good, to me.

Transformers Animated has me hyped the most.  The animation for the show is being done by Mook Studios, better known for their work on Swat Kats and Eureka Seven.  As you can see in the clip, the animation is extremely fluid and pleasing.  The promotional image posted above has a few new faces on it, namely the Decepticons.  From left to right you can see: Starscream, Blackarachnia, Blitzwing (with an awesome Colonal Klink motif going), Lugnutz and Megatron.  For those not in the know, the Autobots featured from left to right are: Ratchet, Prowl, Optimus Prime, Bulkhead and Bumblebee.

Spectacular Spider-Man looks mighty fine, too.  The show’s head writer is Greg Weisman, better known as the creator of Disney’s Gargoyles, one of the most outstanding animated programs ever conceived, so I have high hopes for this series.  And as you can tell by the clip, there will be villains-a-plenty in this show.

I’d say that right now is a very good time to be a Transformers and Spider-Man fan.

© Tim Lasiuta

Comic strip and book creators do not just fade away. They move on, and often never realize just how much we appreciate their work. This is your chance.
Viewed from my corner of the collecting field, illustrated mediums have got the short end of the stick. Whether it’s comic books, comic strips, or the graphic novel, story telling has become a lost art, and the practishoners, under appreciated.

That statement is not entirely true though, select creators have been singled out for acclaim, but they have had to stray out of the ‘juvenile’ formats. To keep work loads up, an out of work comic book artist was ‘in advertising’, or an ‘illustrator’. Respected creators like Jerry Robinson, Neal Adams, Dick Giordano, Frank Miller, Frank Brunner, Creig Flessel, and even Harvey Pekar turned to storyboards, and advertising to practise their craft.

Jerry Robinson made his mark in comic books in the early 1940’s on Batman with Kane and Finger, but left an indelible mark with his Creators and Writers Syndicate. Recently, he has been honored with entry into the Comic Book Hall of Fame. Morton Walker, has been prolific in cartooning since the late 1940’s, and his leadership role in the National Cartoonists Society has led to his legacy, the museum he has nurtured for over a decade now will open in the Empire State Building in 2007. Not only has he been behind Beetle Bailey, Hi and Lois, and Boners Ark, but he has written screenplays, and published over 50 books. Neal Adams has turned Continuity Associates into an international success story. Lew Sayre Schwartz ghosted Bob Kane during the 1950’s, and turned to film production, earning numerous Emmy nominations over the years. The prolific Will Eisner, who started his career in the 1930’s taught, produced work for the army, and mentored many students until his death in 2005.

Sheer talent is not enough. Drive is not enough. Timing is not enough. The term ’starving’ artist is more than accurate at times, yet it is what drives us creative types to produce. Pay us $200 a page, we’ll get by on fewer pages. Pay us $75, we’ll work just as hard, but produce twice as much. Appreciate us, and we’ll work like dogs and make sure you’re satisfied.

Back to the point of this piece. Writing, drawing, coloring, lettering, selling (our work) is WORK. Doing columns like this is WORK. Sometimes the ideas flow. Sometimes not. What makes it easier is the little things like fan letters. Having recently written many to comic strip artists, and writers, the most common comment I get and am told is that they are glad that people remember, and that fans make them like their work was important. The late Tom Gill told me that he was always surprised that people remembered.

How do you find these folks?

Glad you asked. Often you can find their addresses through their own websites, or companies like DC and Marvel. They do forward mail. If you want to get hold of comic strip artists, write to the syndicates. They will get their mail. Look for email addresses on the strips. If you have an idea of where they live, check 411.com, that works too.

As another way to help out the artist and writers is buy their work. Look for it at the various bookstores, online at their websites, or check out ACTOR. ACTOR supports those men and women who have produced the art we have seen for years and are not now financially stable.

Some email addresses that will help are:

www.creators.com

www.kingfeatures.com

www.unitedsyndicate.com

www.dccomics.com

www.marvel.com

www.darkhorse.com

www.ncs.com

www.ACTOR.org

www.accomics.com

These are only a few….search away. The men and women who make us laugh, cry, and shake our head in wonder will appreciate your words.

I remain,

A Fan of the genre.

Tim Lasiuta

3 Questions a Small Business Owner
Should Ask Themselves When Considering Multimedia
By: Patricia Schmal and Mark J. Jaklovsky,
Polar Design (www.polardesign.com)

Multimedia is known to be an effective tool for educating and entertaining. It’s no wonder that many businesses large or small want to use it for a variety of reasons: employee training, sales presentations, to educate consumers, communication, etc. An article on INC.com stated that, "A survey conducted by Business Research Group found [small businesses] that were developing multimedia applications most often used them for presentations." (Mangeldorf, 1997) Presentations are usually used for product launches or as a complimentary sales tool. As a small business there are certain situations where using multimedia is appropriate and others where it’s not.

The first question you should ask yourself is, "Can my business benefit from multimedia?" There are a variety of factors that can influence the benefits of multimedia. First, think about your audience. Are you marketing to a young group of consumers? A 1997 article discussing how "The exposure of American children to TVs, videos and computers has accustomed them to multi-sensory stimulation in the development of their learning capabilities," illustrates that multi mediums are the best way to help them learn (Golden, 1997). Therefore, multimedia would be a good way to target a young audience. Also, marketing to a broad range of people can influence the benefits of multimedia. If your market consists of various levels of education, multimedia presentations can help get your message across because it uses more than one sense. For instance, those who perhaps are not very literate could understand the message you are trying to communicate by listening to voiceovers.

A second factor that influences the benefits of multimedia is the type of product/service your business offers. A business that provides videography/photography services would benefit from multimedia in a couple of different ways. They could use this to display much of their work, especially if they provide digital photography services. A second example that can help you understand whether your product/service will benefit from multimedia is to compare a business selling an LCD TV to a business selling a new ball point pen. If you are an internet retailer selling a new brand of pens the same idea will reach the consumer regardless and more cost effectively by using static text and images. Also, it’s highly unlikely a consumer is willing to invest their time into watching such an interactive and elaborate presentation on ball point pens. Then again, if you are a business selling an LCD TV, a consumer will be willing to invest their time in educating themselves on such a high-ticket item. Not only could a multimedia presentation benefit the business online by providing the consumer with a 3D view of the TV, but when a consumer visits the retailer to purchase it they could view the multimedia presentation on the same LCD TV they are considering. In this case multimedia offers several benefits.

Quality is another factor that influences the benefits of multimedia. In relation to the videography/photography service example you can understand how quality may benefit a small business like this. It is important for a photographer to establish a sophisticated and professional image. High-quality multimedia can provide this to a small business such as a photographer. Vice versa, a small business that is looking to target the consumer with a small pocket may benefit from a lower-quality multimedia presentation where as a high-quality presentation may intimidate the customer.

While quality can also influence the benefits of multimedia it also has an influence in costs, as do many other factors. There is a direct relationship between quality and costs. Other issues influencing costs are: length of multimedia, voiceover & sound production, 3D vs. 2D animation, and production speed. Each of these factors can influence costs based on your specific production needs.

The second question that you should ask yourself, as with any investment: "Will the benefits of multimedia exceed the costs?" In this context, the "benefits" can refer to increased conversion of sales leads to customers, while the costs include design, programming, and hosting. In some ways cutting costs can lead to greater return. For example, a small architecture firm would benefit from 3D animation where in they could display a new or current project. A small business which doesn’t have many resources that larger corporations do could outsource this 3D design for a multimedia presentation. Therefore, the business would benefit but costs would be lower. . In this example cutting costs can lead to a greater return. However, in other situations where the benefit really depends on quality, cutting costs can have the opposite effect. If the firm were to rely on lower quality design or 2D design clients may not feel as confident in their investment because 2D doesn’t give them the perspective that 3D can. Therefore, a client may have trouble picturing what the actual structure will be like. As a result, a client may resort to a firm that provides this type of design. Not only would this result in a lower return on investment but also possibly lost revenue. After reviewing the costs and benefits of choosing multimedia one should ask, "Based on our expected benefit, how much are we really ready to invest into the cost of multimedia?" Does the company have enough working capital to support employment of multimedia? If you don’t have the cash flow, how will you finance your investment? Be aware, the last thing you want to do is invest a good deal of money into a mediocre multimedia presentation.

Due to the costs of multimedia it is vital for you, a small business owner to consider your goals and objectives to determine whether or not to utilize multimedia. By asking yourself a few questions and assessing your goals and objectives, you can feel confident in your investment.

Resources
Golden, B., (1997, October) A glimpse of possibilities. Techniques, 19. Retrieved August 5, 2004, from Infotrac Web: Gen’l Refrence Ctr Gold.

Mangelsdorf, M.E. (1994, November) In the Vanguard: Putting Multimedia to Work. INC Magazine. Retrieved January 17, 2004, from http://www.pf.inc.com/magazine/19941101/3199.html

In 3D game animation, the character model that is applied to a bone structure is called a skin. The skin should be one combined object with no overlapping parts. You can think of the skin as a glove that is placed over a hand. The glove doesn’t move when it is off the hand, but when the fingers are moved underneath, the glove moves and bends along with the fingers. If there are any holes in the glove, they get stretched open as the fingers move. The same works for a skin over a bone structure.

Skinning a character
Character models typically are created one part at a time, but to make a model into a skin, you need to combine all parts into a single object. If the model consists of any groups, you should dissolve these groups. Objects still can be attached to the skin, but all parts of the skin that move with the bones need to be able to bend and flex.

After a skin is attached to a skeleton, the second part of skinning is to make sure that the skin deforms well when the bones are moved. Each bone has an influence volume that defines the portions of the skin that moves with the bone. If these influence volumes are incorrect, then the skin can deform unrealistically when the bone is moved.

For example, if the influence volume for the upper arm includes part of the side of the character, then rotating the upper arm pulls the character’s side out as the arm is raised, causing a funny-looking bump. To control these deformations, you can precisely control the influence volume. Attaching a skin to a skeleton

After a bone structure is created, it can be attached to the character skin that has already been created.

Some software programs make this a separate step, and others simply require that the bones be positioned within the skin.

Follow these steps to attach a skin to a bone structure in Maya:

1. Choose File –> Open Scene, and open the IK enabled.mb file.

This file is the same file that was saved at the end of the preceding example. Be sure to move the bones back into place before attaching the skin.

2. Select the character model, press and hold the Shift key, and select the pelvis bone. Then choose the Skin –> Bind Skin –> Smooth Bind menu command.

The skin is now attached to the bone structure, so moving any of the bones moves the character model with the bone.

3. Select the ankle joint with the IK chain attached, and move the ankle forward in the Front view. Then select and rotate one of the arms about its upper arm joint.

With the skin binding in place, the character model moves along with the bone movements.

4. Select the File –> Save Scene As menu command, and save the file. Close the file when you are finished.

Setting a bone’s influence
Surrounding each bone is an influence volume (called an envelope in several animation packages) that you can control. The skin that is within this volume moves along with the underlying bone, and the skin that is included in overlapping influence volumes are the areas of the skin where the bending is most extreme, such as at the elbow.

The influence volume is initially set to surround each bone, and the closer the bone matches the skin for each body part, the more accurate the influence volumes are. If any portion of the skin isn’t included within any influence area, then that portion of the skin is left behind when its bones are moved.

Influence volumes can be altered using controls to increase their radius on either end of the bone.

Another way to control which skin parts deform with the underlying bone is to paint the skin vertices using a paint brush. Select a bone and then paint the weight. Different colors depict the skin vertices’ influence. It is important to have a gradual change between skin influences so that the skin moves realistically.

Adding deformations to create muscle bulges
Another aspect of working with the skin object is that you can define deformations based on bone positions. This provides a way to make muscles bulge. For example, deforming the bicep muscle to bulge when the angle between upper and lower arm bones is shortened is a realistic deformation that you’d expect from a realistic character.