Join Segment command?

[Jon Herron]

Yeah figured that out, Closed Spline check box in the attributes. How bout that.

Still curious what and how the join segments work. Is it meant to join two seperate spline paths or something?

[James Harris]

Hi

Not at my machine to confirm this but there are occasions when you need to have two segments that are considered as ‘one’ but are not connected by the usual ‘line’. For example a text spline for the letter O. Two seperate lines, but just one segment, or is that one spline with two seperate but connected segments?

Was that crap? Well who cares – I just love the sound of my own opinion.

James 🙂

[Brian Jones]

Join Segments works when two spline segments are in the same spline. I think James is thinking of Connect to get two splines to be one spline with two segments (as in the letter ‘O’)

[Steve Bentley]

To help out future enquiries in and around this topic, and to make the manual more clear;

to join two different splines you must first connect the splines (function menu) then you can pick segments or points along each segment and use join segment (structure/spline menu).
(When you connect the two splines a single new spline (with a gap(s) will be created that is made up of both segments; aka your two old splines – you can then turn off the old ones and select the points you wish to join on this new multi spline object).
If you have two splines that you wish to turn into a continuous spline, and after connecting and joining the first set of points you can’t get the last two to join, don’t worry, just use the close spline button in the attributes box for this object.

SB

[Jason Burnett]

The big problem is that this just simply doesn’t work. I create an arc that I want to be 350 degrees and now I drag copy the arc element (in the element list) to make a duplicate in the exact same position. I grab the object center transform tool and the move tool to move the transform point to the end point of my arc. Deselect the transform point alignment tool and select the rotate tool with my object scope selected. I rotate my second arc (which rotates around it’s last point rather than it’s center just as I wanted). I rotate it 30 degrees. I want one continuous spline out of all this.

I select both arc elements, make editable, and connect+delete. Voila one spline object, two splines, four end points. So Now I select the endpoint created on the first arc and the start point created on the second arc and select “join segments” —- nothing.
I select the weld tool (thinking perhaps it’s like illustrator and the points have to be touching or something) and I weld a point directly between the two…which messes up my splines, but hey I can fix that.

I have my HUD set to indicate the number of points I have selected and now it says none.
Dragging a selection circle around the “welded” location where there should only be one point (with the select only visible points deselected) and sure enough there are two points. Selecting them individually indicates that they are in the same location in both the object perspective and the world perspective. However, dragging either point clearly indicates that they are not connected.

I select both points and choose “Join Segments” …nothing.

I select both points and Set Point Value to ensure that they are in the exact same spot.
Join Segments….nothing.

Is this a joke?

Is there any reason that it has to be this difficult to join two segments? What could possibly be the advantage of this kind of behavior? It doesn’t make any sense to me and though I have read a dozen posts like this one that make it sound really simple, the truth is that I have never found anyone that can explain why it isn’t working even though they can repeat the steps I have taken and get the same results.

Could someone please just create a pen tool that you could click on one point from one segment and then the end point of another segment and they would join. It’s common sense and I cannot for the life of me figure out why something simple like that doesn’t exist.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. It wouldn’t be such a big deal, but I have to do this 50 times to make the shape I need and so far it’s a veritable crap shoot when it is going to work and when it isn’t.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Jase

[Steve Bentley]

That sounds right Jason,
Let me try exactly what you are doing.
What version are you running and what platform?
There might be a better way to do a step and repeat 50 times anyway. Do you have a sketch of what you are trying to build?

SB

[Steve Bentley]

Ok got it.
What you have to watch for is the “select only visible” element in the bounding box grabber attribute or you wont actually be grabbing both points when you apply the join segment tool. This has to be off.
I got it to work fine with this in mind.

[Cramer Ahn]

Thanks a lot. Man! 🙂

[Jason Burnett]

Steve,
Thanks for taking the time to reply (and to try what I was indicating). The problem only happens after the first one. What I am trying to create is a path whereby an arrow can orbit a logo (text) in a very particular manner. I want it to, in one continuous movement,orbit the text at one circular orbit at an angle, then orbit the logo at almost 90 degrees to that, so it appears to be making an X around the logo. It has really proven to be much more difficult than I had expected. Add the fact that it’s really two arrows that at a certain point have to stop and frame the logo text exactly a certain way. The biggest problem is that in order to get the arrows to render the way they look in the final product, the orbits I used would not actually orbit the text, but cut right through it. Still, it looks cool. LOL

My problem is that when I try to add the third or fourth circle to my path, it refuses to do it. I have connected the splines, joined the segments, welded the points, you name it and it works great the first time. Just not again after that.

I am trying to grab some screenshots so I can post examples and a source file in case anyone else is having this problem. I know it’s something I am doing wrong, I just can’t quite figure it out.

Thanks again for the help..

jase

[Steve Bentley]

I did not actually try more than two iterations. I will shortly. I can’t see any reason why it won’t work but then that’s where most of the really great inventions come from, so I’ll give it a whirl.

In the mean time, and without knowing exactly what it’s supposed to look like, may I suggest approaching it from another direction?

What if you used just one arrow and placed it at its orbit distance from the logo (along one of the cardinal directions will make it easier later on). Then make a few nulls that sit at the center of the logo. Nest the nulls and then make the arrow a child of the inner most null. So Grandparent, parent, child. This way you have full control over the spin and position of the arrow without the dreaded gimbal-lock (or Heisenberg uncertainty principle for that matter). Use the Grandparent null to control say, the y spin, and only the y spin, use the parent null to control the overall z spin and the use the arrow itself to control its distance from the logo as it orbits, and also the angle of its travel direction. This way you can animate the arrow’s orbit at any point along the timeline so that it can change directions, get further out, even make the orbit become elliptical by changing the timing of the distance vs the grandparent y spin. Does that help?
Make sure to use “object” coordinates and not “world” so that all rotations and distances are in reference to the parent of the object you’re dealing with. With this system, for example, the value of the distance the arrow is from the parent null will stay the same unless you change it, even when it’s orbiting. But if you look at the arrow’s world coordinates, they change wildly as the arrow orbits – too hard to track and get a handle on this way, so keep the coordinates in object mode.
One last thing – this system won’t auto rotate the arrow so that it always points in the direction of travel. You can make an expresso that does this of course, but it’s probably easier just to animate it when needed as the key frames for this will line up exactly with the keyframes of the other rotation controlling nulls.

I’ll let you know what I find with the multiple splines being married together.