Rig Master by Tiago Castro

Ready to ditch endless keyframes and animate characters with real control? The Rig Master course dives deep into character rigging using After Effects, teaching you to build flexible, expressive rigs for everything from cartoon characters to animals. You’ll learn to create structures that allow for smooth motion, natural expressions, and a much faster animation workflow, making your character animation process way more efficient and professional.

🎯 What you’ll learn

• Build structural rigs for flat and collage-style characters.
• Create detailed hand rigs with flexible finger controls.
• Master head rigging for a wide range of expressions.
• Rig animal characters with natural joint movement.
• Utilize Duik Angela and Bao Bones plugins effectively.
• Implement advanced lip-sync techniques.
• Understand the character rigging market and pricing.
• Apply fundamental animation principles.

✅ Requirements

• Skills: Familiarity with After Effects interface and basic animation concepts.
• Tools: Adobe After Effects, Duik Angela plugin (free), Bao Bones plugin (paid).
• Hardware: A computer capable of running After Effects smoothly.

📝 Description

This course is your deep dive into the world of character rigging in After Effects. You’ll go from understanding the fundamental anatomy of a rig to building complex control systems for diverse characters. We’ll cover everything from simple flat designs to detailed photo-based characters and even animal rigs, using powerful free and paid plugins like Duik Angela and Bao Bones. The curriculum is structured to build your skills progressively, ensuring you grasp the core concepts of creating expressive and controllable characters. You’ll also explore advanced topics like lip-syncing and understand how to market your new rigging skills in the professional world.

🧑‍🎓 Who this course is for

• Motion designers looking to significantly speed up their character animation workflow.
• Animators who have struggled with rigging or have always improvised.
• Anyone who finds the process of linking rigs confusing and wants clarity.
• Creators who want to achieve smoother, more expressive, and tightly controlled character animations.
• Individuals interested in specializing in character rigging for commercials, games, and advertising.

🧑‍🏫 About the Author

Tiago Castro is a seasoned animation director, motion designer, and character animator with over 12 years in the industry, specializing in rigging. His impressive portfolio includes work for major clients like Disney, Adobe, ESPN, Netflix, and Warner Bros., as well as contributions to games such as Free Fire, Counter-Strike, and Valorant. Tiago’s work has even been recognized with a Cannes Lion award. His passion now lies in sharing his extensive knowledge to help other animators build successful careers.

🏁 Final Result

• A portfolio-ready character rig, demonstrating your ability to create complex and controllable rigs for various character types, along with a solid understanding of animation principles and marketability.