I’ve been using Blender for a while now, but i still have one question left unanswered. What on earth does the lattice function do thats helpful? It doesnt render, its just a mesh with fancy lines drawn on it. Has anyone done anything with it thats useful?
thanks,
lightning
Lattice is used to deform objects.
Create an object
Create a lattice
Put object within lattice
Parent object to lattice
Manipulate lattice
The lattice is meant as parent of an object. The deformation of the lattice will be transfered to the child object.
I. e. you can influence a particle stream with it or deform a mesh etc. It’s particular useful for animations.
Have a try and parent a lattice to a mesh or particle emitter, deform the lattice and see what happens. Think you will get the idea.
Also see the blender guide and blender doc (?) for some examples.
Oh. I get it. So this way its easier to adjust the shape. Thanks guys.
It’s not only that…
You can also use Lattices for animation purposes…
The official Blender 2.0 Guide, has a very good example of using Lattice and animation… It describes how you can achieve the “Star Trek warp-acceleration” effect…
Go download it from blender.org and see for yourself…
There are lots of useful things you can do with a Lattice…
You can also use a lattice to control particals. I use it for fire and as I recall, B@rt used it for a tornado 
dante