Locking a curve deform point?

Harmony Harmony Support and Troubleshooting
#1

Hello folks -

I’ve been playing with the curve deform tool. I noticed that if I have a line with the curve deform points (beginning, middle, end of the line) and move the anchor points for only the middle one to make a sort of ~ shape, then in between my two keyframes point 3 will move around a bit as well.

Curve point 1 is locked, perfect. Curve point 2 is only moving based on what I tell it, huzzah. Curve point 3 has no changes between keyframes but during the tween it moves around based on the amount of curve applied to point 2.

How can I lock point 3 so it doesn’t do this?

Thank you!

#2

I’m interested in the answer to this as well.

This weird tweening only happens when the tangent handles are used. If I only move the location of the control point then this doesn’t happen.

What’s the normal workflow for locking down poses as you animate with the curve deformer?

#3

if i was to take a guess, you may have had some ease applied to your keyframes at some point before possibly copying and pasting. even if the position info is the same between two keys, this can lead to some wonkiness in the function curve. you can head into that particular curve’s FCurve and straighten things out, or more simply, just set its keyframe to hold.

#4

Is there a way to setup your preferences so all motion keyframes are always linear, without any spatial auto-bezier shapes?

It seems odd to me that if I change the tangent handles of a middle curve point that my tip control point won’t stay locked in place between keyframes.

#5

by default they are linear. what you may also be missing is that each curve on your deformer has its own key frame. if you are not manually setting key frames, the tip, for example, will keep floating along to its next key frame even though you may have added movement elsewhere in the curve in between using the transform tool. just something to keep in mind.

#6

The way I put a keyframe down is via the (+KF) button in the timeline tool bar, and then move my curve vs scrubbing forward in time and then manipulating in the camera view. My understanding is that by doing the (+KF) button first I’m putting a keyframe on everything under my deformation whereas if I manipulate directly in the camera view I’m only adding a keyframe for that modified item. Is my understanding/workflow flawed?

#7

i generally hit F6, but yes you are correct. dropping a key frame down will put one on everything that is nested under that layer/deformer group. all i can think of is that your Fcurves are getting screwy. good luck!

#8

A deform curve is a line of connected points

That’s why moving the bezier handle of point 2 affects the curve to point 3

why it affects the movement of point 3 itself is a MYSTERY

as is TB Harmony’s heavy CPU usage when applying a single deform to multiple layers

#9

Place your peg above the deformation group rather than under it to avoid the heavy CPU usage.

#10

Thanks,

I connect multiple cloned drawings to a single deform that’s why I need something to move the drawings

I’ve tried Pegs, Apply-Peg-Tranformations, and now I’m trying to script a scriptModule to function as a simplified peg

but I have my doubts now that I tried moving the drawings on the layer properties of the drawing and got the same heavy CPU usage

#11

The heavy cpu usage happens when you place the peg under the deformation group in the network due to the mechanics of how the redraws are calculated. Place the peg above the deformation group to avoid this issue.