Vector Field Locator
A Vector Field Locator is a paintable locator which can be used to drive the navigation of entities.
Example of Entity navigation driven by a Vector Field locator.
Creation
- Context: Paint Tool Context
- MEL command: createNode VectorFieldLocator;
Configuration
| Display color |
Vector Field Locator with a red display color Color of the arrows for the display. It has no impact on navigation. |
| Arrows size |
Same point off view but with a Arrows Size value of 2 Size of the arrows for the display. It has no impact on navigation. |
| Outter flow |
Amount of unpaint border that is automaticaly computed as a normal to nearest vector. It is used to move the characters onto the painted vector field.
The same vector field with a Outter flow of 0 (top) and 1 (bottom) |
| In Mesh | Maya mesh on which the painted data will be projected |
| Resolution | Resolution of the painted map. This goes from 256x256 to 4096x4096. Changing resolution resamples the map. Bigger map takes longer to save and uses more memory. This works the same way as the Painted Zone Locator. The effect of size change is less visible though. |
| Clear surface | The surface should be cleared |
| Splines Render Period |
The splines can be key framed. This period specify how often the splines will be rendered during simulation. A value of 0 means no render will be done automatically. A value of 1 means attached splines will be rendered in the surface every frame. A value of 10 for a render every ten frame. |
| Splines Samples | Controls the rendering quality. The number corresponds to the discrete points evaluated on the spline. |
| Use Surface Normals | If Use Surface Normals is enabled, a dot-product is made between the surface normal and the vector between the surface point and the closest spline point. |
| Direction Smoothness | A value that specify how the tangent of the spline is smoothed along the curve. The higher the smoother. |
| Add Spline | Add a spline free slot where you can map a spline and specify its rendering attributes |
| Render |
Rendering splines will erase the surface if at least one spline is enabled |
| Spline Attributes |
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