How can I fix shoulder and hip deformations when rigging a Blender character?

[LilyCW]

I'm working on a short 3D animation in Blender and have modeled a stylized humanoid character, but I'm completely stuck on the character rigging phase; my armature deforms the mesh in weird, broken ways whenever I try to pose it, especially around the shoulders and hips. I've watched tutorials on weight painting and bone placement, but I can't seem to get smooth, natural-looking deformations, and my attempts to fix it just create new problems with vertices pinching or not moving at all. For animators who rig their own characters, what is your step-by-step process for setting up a clean, functional rig from the start? How do you efficiently paint weights for complex areas like the torso and face, and are there any specific add-ons or automated tools you rely on to speed up the process and avoid common pitfalls?

[Kenneth51]

Rigging can be tricky when the deforms aren’t natural, but you’re close. Start with a solid base rig (IK for limbs, FK for wrists/ankles, a pelvis-to-spine chain, and a subtle shoulder rig). Use Blender’s Rigify to generate a clean humanoid rig, then customize for your character. Parent the mesh with automatic weights as a baseline, test in Pose mode, and iteratively fix problem areas with Weight Paint. For facial control, combine a small set of shape keys with bone-driven tweaks rather than trying to sculpt a full-face rig from bones alone. Save increments frequently and keep a simple library of tested poses to compare progress.