Curved skeletons
 

Just wondering if using nurbs-curves/whatever for skeletons is possible in Maya. Ex: If you wish to wag a tail by only editting control points on the curve which then alter the direction of the bones.

Basically having joints turn other joints in smooth motion. Basically I'm trying to make a monkey tail.

Yes. The SpineIK uses a NURBS curve to conrol the skeleton joints.

Thanks for the help.

yeah. make a heirarchy with high number of joints. then, go to skeleton>ikSplineHandle>option box. turn off auto simplify curve. create ikSplineHandle for the heirarchy.
then, make a heirarchy with a fewer number of joints, while snapping to the curve created by the ikSplinehandle.
then, select the heirarchy with less number of joints, select the ikSpline curve, apply smooth skin bind.
go to the component editor for the curve, go to the smooth skin tab, adjust the weights for all the vertives.

now, you have a joint heirarchy which has 3 or 4 joints, which can control a heirarchy that controls a heirarchy with 12-14 joints.

if you want more details, there is exactly one such setup in the book inside maya 5. the rigging section written by erick miller is pretty good...