[Maya] - Get twists when i use the "flow path object"

GoSsS

Hi guys !

I have a weird problem with the "flow path object" within maya.

So basically, I create a curve :



After that, i use the "flow path object" (on a cylinder for the example) and get all these twists ...



I tried "rebuild curve", "smooth curve" etc but nothing seems to solve this problem ... Do you have any idea of what I did wrong?

By the way, I have no problem at all if I use; let say a plane, and extrude it along that same curve.

rebb

http://www.digitaltutors.com/forum/showthread.php?4567-Flow-path-twist-problem

( Gist : Go to the MotionPath Attributes, Change World-Up Type to Vector : 1.0 0.0 0.0 )

Bal

Still get weird twists sometimes by just changing the Vector, but often enough you can just find the right one for a given situation.
Changing the World-Up Type can help depending on the setup as well, stills feels inevitable that you'll get a twist sometimes on complex paths, more so than with 3dsMax's path deform modifier.

GoSsS

Oh thanks rebb, it fixes some problem, but it's still not perfect.
Besides, the Wire tool is just what I was looking for (Bal told me you talked about this tool yesterday).

Thanks

malcolm

I found this same issue when I tried the flowpath tool. As far as I remember there is a limitation of that tool that it only works on horizontal curves, nothing can be vertical. Try your same test on a curve drawn in the top view. I gave up on that crappy tool because of that limitation and went with the wire tool but it wasn't that great either because it stretches the geo it's attached to.

kodde

While on the subject, is there some kind of twist data stored for a curve? Would rebuilding the curve be a solution for this?

CheeseOnToast

Not tried this yet myself, but how about making your own ghetto flowpath by using a wire deformer on a lattice (aka FFD) which in turn is applied to your geo?

GoSsS

@ malcolm : Yeah it stretches the geo but I don't consider it as a problem, you can't have no deformations if your object is following a curve.

@ kodde : I tried the rebuild curve but it doesn't clean it up If there is a twist data stored it could be cool but I don't know if it exists somewhere.

@ CheeseOnToast : Oh yeah that could be an idea! With this you can just untwist the bad areas by rotating lattice's points.