Blendshape Basics
How to Apply Blendshapes
Controlling Blendshapes on the Timeline
To learn how to achieve specific mouth shapes in the Refine tool, read How to Achieve Specific Mouth Shapes.
Blendshape Basics
Blendshapes allow you to fine-tune the mouth movements of an actor, so you can refine a vub to your liking.
DeepEditor focuses on the lower half of the face (nose to chin).
The more of the original performance is preserved, the less noticeable your overrides will be.
Each blendshape can be given a negative (-) value. This will affect the face of the opposing movement. For example, setting Jaw - Open to -10 will close the Jaw. Setting the funnel to -10 will make the mouth less round.
How to Apply Blendshapes
Move the playhead to the frame you’d like to adjust.
You can add a keyframe by clicking the diamond to the left of the blendshape, by dragging the slider, or by clicking in the box to the right of it and typing in a numerical value.
You can add multiple blendshapes to the same frames, but be careful, as too many can cause an overworked and unnatural-looking vub.
Note: You will not be able to see your adjustments on the model until you click “Render Changes.” The grey face under PT Result will show live results.
DeepEditor keyframes operate like standard keyframes, adding an effect to a range of frames between their in and out points. Your blendshape keyframes will be illustrated in the Timeline.
Your active blendshapes will populate to the left of the timeline.
Controlling Blendshapes on the Timeline
By clicking on a keyframe in the timeline, you can use these keyboard shortcuts.
Select Keyframe + Delete/Backspace = Delete a keyframe
Select Keyframe + Left Arrow = Move keyframe one frame to the left
Select Keyframe + Right Arrow = Move keyframe one frame to the right
Select Keyframe + Up Arrow = Move keyframe up one number value
Select Keyframe + Down Arrow = Move keyframe down one number value
Select Keyframe + Shift + Right Arrow = Move keyframe right 10 frames
Select Keyframe + Shift + Left Arrow = Move keyframe left 10 frames
Select Keyframe + Shift + Up Arrow = Move keyframe up 10 number values
Select Keyframe + Shift + Down Arrow = Move keyframe down 10 number values
Click + Drag Mouse = Bounding box to select multiple keyframes
Show Advanced Blendshapes
Clicking the "Show advanced blendshapes" toggle button will grant you access to all of the following:
Next, read How to Achieve Specific Mouth Shapes.