Skeleton Setup - Game Character Development with Maya - page 687

Note
Think about how you want the hand to bend before you jump in and reset
the orientation. If the alignment process described here is not going to
work, then you will have to edit the rotational axis manually, which we
will look into shortly.
4. For the fingers, simply select each joint and press orJnt ( Figure 11.28 , middle).
FIGURE 11.28 Fix the orientation of the fingers and thumb.
Now the thumb will have the same orientation as the fingers, but if you rotate your
own thumb you'll notice it works on a different axis. To rectify this, the GCDM
shelf has another button labeled rot45. This tool will rotate the joint's rotational
pivot around the X axis at 45-unit intervals.
5. On the left hand, select the thumb joints, and press the rot45 button seven times
( Figure 11.28 , right).
6. For the right hand, you only need to press this once because the orientations are
mirrored.