The objective of this Master's Thesis is to provide modellers with a comprehen- sive method of rigging, clothing and animation of virtual characters. Rigging is the process of creating the necessary information for a static character to be animated. It will be described in detail through the following chapters. This chapter starts with a short introduction to the basics of 3D character animation, its use in various fields and the diferent requirements that each of these fields present with respect to the resulting animated virtual human, often referred to as an 'avatar'. In addition, a description of the process of creating avatars is given. Afterwards, the objective of this thesis is presented, as well as a brief summary of the contributions made. The chapter finishes with an overview of the rest of the chapters.