(As of version 1.15.00)
Experimental – this attachment is experimental. Its behavior, attributes and results may change in future versions.
‘Overlap’ adds secondary motion on top of the node’s joints: lag, follow through and overshoot, like floppy ears, tails, antennas or capes.
Unlike ‘MakeDynamic’ it does not use nHair or any simulation. The whole effect is built from Maya nodes only (no expressions) and, since it does not store any state between frames, behaves exactly the same when scrubbing, jumping in time, playing back or baking.
How it works:
For every overlap joint, the history of the driving joint is read a few frames back in time (using ‘frameCache’ nodes) and filtered with the sampled response of a damped spring. The result is where the joint ‘wants’ to be. The overlap joints then aim at those positions while keeping the length of their bones. Rotating or moving the node’s ctrls makes the chain trail behind and overshoot before it settles on the animation. When nothing moves, the overlap joints sit exactly on the animation.
Attributes:
- ‘Switch Skinning Tag’ – Switch the skinning tag to the new overlap joints (_OVL).
- ‘Enable Joints Color’ – Enable changing the color of the new overlap joints.
- ‘Joints Color’ – Specify the color of the new overlap joints.
- ‘Overlap Joints’ –
- ‘create_overlap_joint’ – When checked, creates an overlap joint for this joint.
- ‘parent_joint’ – Specify the joint that is the previous link in the chain. A chain needs at least 2 joints and a joint cannot be the parent of more than one joint. The first joint of each chain follows the animation (its pivot does not move).
- ‘Reset Changes’ – Remove any changes made to the ‘Overlap Joints’ table.
- ‘Overlap Ctrl Parent’ – Under which ctrl to parent the ‘overlap’ ctrl.
- ‘Overlap Ctrl Offset’ – Position offset of the ‘overlap’ ctrl from its parent ctrl.
- ‘Overlap Output’ – A driver attribute that follows the tip joint of the (first) chain.
- ‘Ctrl Defaults’ – The starting values of the attributes found on the ‘overlap’ ctrl (see below).
- ‘Spring’ – (Requires a rebuild)
- ‘Samples’ – 16 or 8 past frames sampled per joint. 8 is lighter to evaluate but is a coarser spring.
- ‘Fast Period’ – Period of the spring, in frames, when the ctrl ‘lag’ is 0. Lower values are quicker and tighter.
- ‘Slow Period’ – Period of the spring, in frames, when the ctrl ‘lag’ is 1. Higher values are slower and heavier.
- ‘Damping’ – How fast the spring settles. 1.0 does not overshoot at all, lower values overshoot and bounce more. The history used is limited to 36 frames so very low values are cut short.
The ‘overlap’ ctrl attributes:
- ‘strength’ – 0 turns the effect off, 1 is full overlap. It can be keyed to disable the effect in parts of the animation.
- ‘lag’ – Blends the spring between the ‘Fast Period’ (0) and the ‘Slow Period’ (1).
- ‘falloff’ – How much more the tip moves than the base of the chain. 0 moves all joints the same.
- ‘max_swing’ – Limit for how far a joint is pulled away from the animation, relative to the length of its bone. Prevents fast animation from folding the chain.
Notes:
- Only joints tagged as ‘skinning_jnt’ appear in the ‘Overlap Joints’ table. If a joint is missing, tag it as a ‘skinning_jnt’ using the ‘JointsSettings’ attachment.
- The last joint of a chain uses a hidden locator, placed under it, that extends the chain to give it a bone.
- Overlap reacts to the animation of the ctrls. It does not collide and has no gravity.
- Overlap can be slow when active, especially on long chains or with 16 samples. Setting the ‘strength’ attribute on the ‘overlap’ ctrl to 0 turns the effect off.
- Do not use ‘Overlap’ together with ‘MakeDynamic’ on the same node.
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