I'm trying to model a chainsaw low-poly game model inside of Maya LT 2018.2. I have the chainsaw blade and a piece of chain to duplicate and animate (follow) along the chainsaw blade like a real-life chainsaw would do. Similar to tank tracks as well. I have googled and youtube this issue for a few hours and found some solution but it doesn't fix my issue I am having and now I need some help if you can provide me with so. So I will tell you the steps-by-steps I did to create the effect and problems.
I selected my curve which was created by 'Convert polygon edge to curve' then rebuilding it with 100 spans and smooth.It's named 'chain_crv_02'.
Also, select the chainsaw chain model (chainBlade_1).
Went to Animation tab, clicked on 'Constrain > Motion Path: Attach to Motion Path' options (then reset tool settings). Check images for tool settings setup.
The chain model it slightly tilted then it when I move the time slider forward, it seems to be correctly positioned at the front of the chainsaw blade, then when it moves towards the bottom of the curve, it faces sideways which is incorrect. I have tried playing with twist settings in the attribute tab for the curve but I haven't gotten any good results. I don't understand why I'm getting this issue. Is it my curve? Does it need to be rebuilt? If so, I don't know what settings I should use for curve rebuilding tool settings. Any other things causing this odd issue? This also seems to be a major problem for other Maya users trying to make objects using motion path but with very little help online via Google or YouTube. Any amount of help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. I will also try to reply to your comments asap.
I have solved this problem! I discovered that if you select the object then select all the keyframes it been used for the motion path (ex: 1 to 200 for me as shown above in the first post). Then selected rotation X and set it to 0 then right-click and 'break connection'. It should not tilt anymore. Now my chainsaw it working properly and I can now start animation snapshot and start animating it. Hope this helps anyone who also gets this problem.
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