Currently trying to learn Maya through projects/tutorials and now after having finished a model and laying out the UVs, got stuck at the skinning stage of rigging. While modelling I thought I'd do myself a favour by setting aside quick selection sets of the parts of the body so that I could recall them back after setting out the joint/skeleton system but I'm getting 'No deformable objects selected' error after trying to combine the faces and the relevant joints and hit skin. I'm aware of the fact that deformers only work on shape nodes and not on transform nodes. Also, I have tried importing a low polly body mesh out of Z-brush to Maya so to practice rigging but it comes in a default shape group. I can only think of selecting faces/vertices and grouping them in order to create hierarchies but when I try to do that I get a 'Not enough objects or values' error..
Obviously I'm doing something wrong here with all this and I'm sure you knowledgable and helpful folk out here could shed some light to this poor man's problems
Appreciate any good practice workflows/tips as always.
Cheers.