Skeleton
Create a bone chain from parameters, points, or curves.
What it does
Skeleton builds a bone chain: a set of joints with parent/child relationships, positions and per-bone lengths, for other rigging nodes to pose and animate. Chain mode, the default, lays out a straight run of joints from a root position, spaced by a bone length and pointed in a chosen direction. Points mode instead reads an existing set of points and treats each one as a joint. Path mode samples joints evenly along an input curve.
The output is a Collection of joints carrying position, rest position, rotation, scale, parent index and name, ready for a pose or animation node downstream.
When to use it
A simple procedural rig (an arm, a tail, a chain of segments) without hand-placed joints.
Promoting an existing set of points, from a scan, a capture or another node, to a posable skeleton.
Joints distributed evenly along a drawn curve.
| Parameter | Type | Default |
|---|---|---|
source | OneOf([Collection, Curve]) | — |
mode | String | "Chain" |
count | Number | 5 |
length | Number | 20 |
direction | Number | 0 |
root_position | Vec3 | (0, 0, 0) |
Gotchas
Count sets the number of bones, not joints. A Count of 5 produces 6 joints, one extra at the tail of the chain. To match a specific joint count, dial Count down by one.
Direction and Root Position apply in Chain mode only. Points and Path mode hide them, because joint placement then comes from the input geometry or curve instead.
The in-viewport bone visualisation currently draws in Chain mode only. Points and Path mode still produce a valid skeleton, without the on-canvas preview; check the joint count and positions via the outputs to confirm the layout.
In Points and Path mode, Bone Length is not measured from the actual joint spacing. Every bone is stamped with the same Length value set on the node, regardless of how far apart the joints really are. Use it as a nominal thickness for downstream tools, not a measured distance.
Worked example
Add a Skeleton node. Leave Mode on Chain.
Set Count for the number of bones, and Length for how long each bone should be.
Adjust Direction to angle the chain, and Root Position to move the whole chain to where it should start.
Wire the skeleton output into Pose to start posing the joints.
See also
Pose · Stroke · Bake Keyframes · Points