I have no clue when it comes to scripting…so I have no idea how hard this would be or if it is even possible…but here goes, maybe someone in here would know if or how this could be done…
If you go into the stack of a poly object you have the extrude along spline option…Is it possible to create a script that can extrude that poly along the spline in a way that you can control the percentage along the spline that it extrudes? Also having it so that the percentage could be animated, and maybe even keep the history of the spline like a loft object, so that if you decide to move the verticies of the spline the resulting geometry would also change.
For example: let’s say you have an object and you want a tenticle to grow out along a specific path and wave around, the only way I have found to do this is by adding a few dozen edit poly modifiers and extrude/bevel one level at a time…this sucks cause your stack get rather large in no time at all, and it becomes tricky if you wanna go back and edit the direction of the extusion/bevel…
Just wanted to put this out there and see if anyone had any ideas or if it can even be done…
Cheers,
Mike
Ok so maybe it was a bit confusing the way I described it above, but I mocked an image up that may help illustrate it better. Can it be done?
I really want to learn maxscript, so that I can create these ideas that I have, does anyone know of any classes or really good videos, for learning maxscript?
here are some simple examples animations…
That sounds like a Jolly-Good-Idea!!
Hmm, it seems like Grow does something similar, though not quite. Maybe it’s useful.
- R
yeah I checked out grow…it’s a very cool…not exactly what i had in mind, but still very cool…
Draw a line spline with smooth/smooth setings very.- very short to start and however many
vert ticks you want, this will be the extrude profile shape along spline – under a poly edit.
Draw out a spline circle and add an edit poly modifier to the stack.in the edit poly stack
use extrude along a path…this has taper controls,twist etc.
-you can manipulate the splne vertexes to animate the shape all over the place.
So start the spline off really small- almost a straight close segment and then move those
verts out animate/grow. works okay-just checked it.
-not a scripty thing-but it gives you a way to start off.
…
I agree with CLONEOPS, firstly that dialog box is part of the Edit Poly plugin so, as far as I know, it can’t be added to. The Edit Poly has an animate mode which deals with this kind of thing.
I made an animated tentacle growing with a single edit poly modifier and two splines, one for extrusion and one as a PathDeform path for the extrusion spline.
Check it out the max file here.
Thanks for the feedback guys!
Wahoo…Wahooney…wow sweet…I never thought to do it that way, i did use the edit poly but i thought you had to commit the animation and add another edit poly for each extrusion…that’s how i did my sample files…but the stack got to be rather large, your way works sweet…I guess you don’t need a script to do it, but it would still be cool…thanks again!!