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Stopping the Spline Wrap Deformer from Banking on a Tracer
Hey,
I have a dynamic chain of cubes that are connected by ball/socket connectors and springs – this chain dynamically follows a target object, like a tentacle.
I used the tracer to draw a spline through these cubes as a path for the Spline Wrap deformer to stretch a model of a tentacle across it, but when I use this deformer, the model banks and spins unnaturally upon sudden movement…
I tried fixing this problem by constraining cubes to the PSR of the original chain segments, locking their Up Vectors, then applying a protection tag to disregard all of the chain segment rotations and only allow XYZ movement – essentially I end up witht the same chain, except the segments are locked facing upwards so when traced again the points arent full of rotation values… Still getting weird banking – even after using this as a rail spline too!
All i want, is to be able to use the Spline Wrap deformer and have the tentacle’s suckers facing upwards (towards the target object) the whole time without random twisting… I was thinking that maybe I should rig it with joints instead of the Spline Wrap Deformer… Would that keep the segments facing the right way up? I even set the Up Vector on the deformer settings – no luck!
Looked online and not found a solution. I’m sure it’s easy to do. Would love some advice on Spline Wrapping tracers without twisty artefacts!
Many thanks
Hayden
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5 Replies
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I would try using a MoSpline as the reference for the Spline Wrap deformer. The MoSpline would basically trace the Tracer, but it gives you controls to adjust rotation.
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Thanks for getting back to me Adam,
How would I go about doing that exactly? Never thought to use the MoSpline…
I’ve attached the scene file just so we’re both on the same page!
Cheers,
Hayden
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This is weird, but it’s not working with your file. Possibly it has to do with priorities because of the expressions and tags you’re using, but it seems to me like if it works with the tracer in simpler scenes it should work in any scene. Sorry.
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Hi! I realise I’m a couple of years late… ???? but, for what it’s worth to anyone having similar issues, I was able to fix a similar situation by using the same spline as a rail.
Initially, I was using a Sweep and had a bumpy texture on my final object that would rotate unnaturally with every movement. I pinned the issue down to exactly what the OP has: the thing was banking like crazy, instead of acting as a “solid object”. That’s because it’s the spline that’s being affected by dynamics, and the spline is just that: a spline! a single string with no volume. I think there should be an option included into the Spline Dynamics tag that allows one to specify what the diameter or width, the volume, in any case, of the actual object to be rendered will be, because a spline by itself makes no sense. So the object “surrounding” the spline is just a shell that does what the spline does.
In my case, the splines generated hanging moss-like things, and these had to sway with the wind and movement; instead, they turned as if on a swivel. So what I did was change the Sweep for a Spline Wrap (because Sweep doesn’t have to option for a rail), changed the circle spline for a capsule, duplicated the spline in question, and set it as a rail in for the Spline Wrap! And although the result isn’t 100% what I needed, it’s about 95%, and that’s fine for this particular instance.
In conclusion, it does work, at lest for me, and it does stop the object from rotating on its axis. Still, I repeat I think would be better solved by including a specific command in Spline Dynamics.
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Hey folks , If someone is still struggling with a similar issue I found another way to stop the unnatural flipping of objects. In my case I defined a direction for the rotation’s up vector of the splinewrap according to the motion I required, this stopped the flipping of my objects.
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