Hi,
I need to know if it is possble to only deform the location of objects inside the lattice, I don’t want it to deform the form of the objects itself. Does someone know if this possible?
Sadly I believe this is impossible. I tried lots of stuff with lattices and empties and lattices and armatures but neither seem to deform with the lattice, making it impossible to parent meshes to a part of a deformed mess. Hooks did not follow their vertices regardless of the order of modifiers. It is worth noting that lattices do not change the position of the modified object.
Sorry, if anyone else can figure it out that would be great as I can see many cool uses for this effect.
I also tried the trick to deform and thus dislocate a tiny invisible object parented to the mesh I do not want to deform. It seems very strange that the mesh does not follow his parent.
Anyway thank you for the time you took looking for a solution, very kind!
I still hope there might be a way, maybe I need to ask again in the scripting section…I also believe there would be plenty of use for it if it where possible.
I think it goes with vertex parenting:
1. Make Lattice.
2. Make a mesh that has a Lattice modifier.
3. Select one vertex of the mesh, and make a vertex group of it.
4. Add new object, and give it a “Child of” -constrait, with the mesh you made in point 2 as a parent, and select the group you made in point 3 to its vertex parent group.
I hope this is what you meant with your question?
Yes, that really works! :yes:
There is no way I would have been able to find this solution on my own.
Besides your steps I only had to put the channel buttons in the constraint window for rotation and scale to ‘off’ , and leave the location channel buttons on.
Thank you very much for your time and helping me solve this problem.
Ah, using vgroups instead of hooks. Very clever. I’m sure this will be very useful. Thanks SnifiX!
I am new to Blender and am trying to find a way to inflate a piece of geometry without distorting the mesh. For example I have a model that has many limbs like a tree and I want to expand their location without expanding the mesh. Dose the method you describe work in this way? Or am I not reading this correctly?
Thanks
So you want to dismember the tree?
I want the mesh to stay as one object but change the location of the limbs. It is a complicated mesh that is in the proper scale from the front view (looks perfect) but from the side view it is flattened. Not flattened in the sense that the limbs are skinny but that the space between each limb is less then it should be. The mesh should take up the same amount of space in both axises, but as it is, it looks like someone sat on it. I made the mesh from a microscope scan that processes individual layers of information. The only problem is that because each layer is a flat image, there is a loss in one dimension. I don’t no how to explain it. In fact it doesn’t make sense to me as I explain.
what I need to figure out is if I can expand it. Not uniformly like a box selection would do but as if you were inflating it like a balloon. That way it could maintain its underlying curvature. That should be easy with a lattice with multiple control points but how to maintain its geometry.
Isn’t their a way to deform object, like say if an animator wanted to show the wind blowing on trees, he/she might deform without needing to manipulate each branch? It might sound like a stupid question, but maybe its possible.
Sounds like a job for the lattice. If you disagree can you upload your blend?
You can apply lattices you know…
so would you apply the lattice to the bones? I don’t know enough to know how to do this but I am assuming it has something to do with vertex groups.
Confused Blend please?
I figured out away to use the Decimate modifier on this mesh so its a reasonable size. Now you can see that the limbs are not squashed but its shape in the y axis is. I also attached pictures in case anyone else wants to see.
Attachments
simplified mesh.blend (389 KB)
@Balm, you’re right, it looks like someone sat on it. If you use any scaling technique to expand it along the y axis, the branches will end up looking like boards, since they are nicely rounded in the original mesh.
This would include using the scale tool or using lattices to reshape the entire mesh. I think your quickest alternative at this point might be to run an armature through the main branches, parent the tree to the armature, apply bone heat, and simply pose the tree the way you want it.