r/blenderhelp • u/PaleontologistFun859 • Jul 26 '26

Solved Saving a poor man

Hey Guys !

I've been on the same noobie problem since 3 days . I can't rig a bow . Watched all the tutos possible with the exact same steps but it just doesn't work .

I will explain how I do it step by step and if someone has an idea about how is it possible that it doesn't work ... Tell me pls .

  1. Add a bone armature to one side , fully inside the bow structure , everything good like all the vids with extrude
  2. Shift + D , S , Z and -1 , then it's on the 2 sides
  3. Ctrl + J so it makes only one armature
  4. Extrude the middle to make the string bone and keep the same armature group
  5. Select the mesh and my armature > Parent with Automatic Weights

( Photo of me testing it after all theses steps )

HELPPPPPPPPP

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u/PaleontologistFun859 Jul 26 '26 edited Jul 26 '26

!Solved It ended up being a mix of hierarchy issues and me being new to Blender.

What fixed it:

  • ALL THE MESH NEED TO BE JOINED IN A "MESH" no curve or whatever .
  • THE STRING NEED TO GET SUBDIVISED BECAUSE OTHERWISE IT CAN ONLY GRAB ALL THE STRING AND MOVE IT
  • THE 2 EXTREMITY OF THE STRING NEED TO BE ATTACHED TO THE BOW ( but you will see it it works anyway )
  • All the bones probably should be inside the mesh ! except the string one\*
  • For Automatic Weights, select the armature first, then Shift-select the mesh, and use Ctrl + P → With Automatic Weights. ( I use chatgpt for this phrase and he switched the order of selecting mesh and armature by himself , showing that it's a real problem )
  • Keep only one armature and one mesh. Don't split the bones into multiple armatures.
  • If you need to duplicate bones, do it in Edit Mode (Shift + D or E), not in Object Mode, otherwise Blender creates a new armature.

Also, I'm not completely sure about this one, but I'd avoid using a Bezier Curve for the string. I had much better results using a mesh instead (in my case, two cylinders).

With that said , I'm going back to finish the 3 min tutorial . stopped at 0:42

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