Morpheus Re-imagined – The Path Ahead

Posts.Update

As we get closer to launching this new venture I wanted to take the time to elaborate a bit on what our plans are for Morpheus.

This post will not be about looking back. You’re welcome to go back and look at that update if you want a perspective on what prompted a drastic change.

Since then, we’ve been working on taking what worked and putting aside what didn’t. 2017 was a year of improving our code base, updating old tools and laying the framework for what would become MRS (Morpheus Rigging System).

Last December or so we posted a intro video to MRS with some simple geo. Now we’re doing production work rigs with full characters, wings, talons, and more. Much of that we can’t show yet but you’ll see it soon. It is currently targeting game production and Unity specifically as that is where our current work is.

The seed of the original Morpheus Rig was one rig that could be lots of things. MRS is about a modular rig system that lets you make whatever you want and use the same familiar rig and tools to work efficiently

The Road Forward

Moving forward our plan for Morpheus is this:

  • mVariant Rigs – mDrake here is our first mVariant rig. The asset is currently in final modeling and texturing and we expect to be doing final rigging this month. Our plan is to use the cgmRigs team to decide how we branch out – be it in incorporating a ninja outfit, another base mesh from which to explore, just more hair or whatever.
  • MRS – Our mrsCollaborative team will be where we’ll teach that team how to use MRS and then invite them to help make it better, use it in their own work and keep pushing the boundaries. We’re actively using MRS in production for Unity projects and expect you to be able to in short order.

To our Morpheus 2 Backers

All Morpheus 2 Backers who didn’t request refunds will be getting an email containing membership sign-up information. Your patience has been long and we don’t feel it’s right to ask a penny more from you until we’ve delivered usable assets or other services commensurate with that original backing.

Thank you reward possibilities:

  • cgmRigs Membership – Members of this team have permanent access to any of the rigs and variants released while active subscribers. We’re on target to have at least two full rigs in the next 6 months.
  • MRS Collaborative Membership – This team will be learning how to use MRS and helping flesh out the team docs to that end.
  • Morpheus for Unity Membership – This team is focused on initially taking the mDrake asset and setting up animation sets, test levels and more in unity for team members to take and make their own content.
  • Proxy Rig Design – This reward will be to design a proxy rig of your choosing. As long as our modules can handle it, we’ll do it. If not, we’ll add the requirements to the queue and do it as soon as possible. Currently there are only a few proxy rigs up, this will start growing soon. The winner of our first challenge has chosen a Griffon so we’ll be proxying one up in the next few weeks.

We’re seeding these initial teams with Morpheus backers along with a few friends before we making them public.

Note -these memberships will not start ticking down their time until we release our first Morpheus variant – mDrake.

If your non-refunded backing level was:

  • $1 – 49 | cgmRigs – 6 months.
  • $50 – 99 | cgmRigs – 1 Year
  • $100 – $499 | cgmRigs + mrsCollaborative  or Morpheus for Unity – 1 Year
  • $500 + | cgmRigs + mrsCollaborative  or Morpheus for Unity – 2 Year | 1 Proxy Rig Design

If you receive an email as a backer, please do not share your codes with other people. We’re going to have to screen these lists anyway and it just wastes time we could be using making more stuff for you to use. If you’d like to transfer your reward to someone else, you can contact us with your backing info and the contact email of the person you wish to gift it to.

How this will work…

  1. Register an account on the CG Monastery
  2. You’ll get an email with a link to ‘buy’ a Friends of Morpheus membership. That email will include a coupon to make it cost $0. The actual price will be high because we don’t want anyone else jumping in and this seemed the best way to handle the memberships. The coupon should zero it out at check out. Please do not move forward on a purchase without the coupon active.
  3. After a week we’ll go through and check the lists there against our backer lists to makes sure only backers are there. We’ll then add the benefits as laid out above. If you’re in the choice tier. We’ll reach out to find what team it is you want to join.
  4. Jump in on the teams and help us figure out what we’ll be working on after mDrake or learn MRS if you’re at that level

If you haven’t received your email by October 8th, 2018. Please contact us on Facebook by PM with your original backing email address.

Our future won’t be about promises but about delivering quality tools and rigs and taking joy in what you, our long patient fans, create.

 

Josh Burton

[MRS Project Lead | CG Monks] Josh is an animator turned TD who hails from Oklahoma, pre-undergrad in the Marine Corps, animation basics at Savannah College of Art and Design, cut his teeth in gaming and commercials before co-founding CG Monks and more recently the CG Monastery. The Morpheus Rigging System is a culmination of years of R&D and he is now thrilled to see what users can create, collaborate and expand on with this open source MRS platform.