hello I’m trying to float a boat on ocean sim mesh, the method used is to vertex parent the boat to the 3 vertices of a triangle mesh, then applying a softbody modifier to the triangle, and a collision to the ocean mesh. this causes the triangle to collide with the ocean sim, and the (child) boat follows the triangle.
this worked for a while, but suddenly the boat started deforming to the softbody triangle; if i scale the triangle the boat scales. and during the distorting of the softbody animation the boat twist and deforms.
the boat is standard mesh with no modifiers active
I assume it 's something to do with the vertex parenting but I haven’t been able to figure it out. any help appreciated!
I remember that one, I was working on a sailboat animation for awhile and kind of quit, although it was working well with vertex parenting. If I pick it back up I might try the weight painting cube method. Anyways if memory serves, a couple things that might be messing it up:
I think he mentions that the triangle needs to be originally centered on y axis. Although I can’t really figure out why, maybe I’m wrong on that.
Have you filled the triangle face? select all three verts, f
Are you sure you’re vertex parenting and not just parenting? Object mode, select child, shift select parent, tab to edit mode, ctrl-p.
I have a working blend from that tutorial if you want it for comparison. Let me know. Here’s my half rigged sailboat sailing on it’s vertex parent:
Yes that’s the one, I played around with it and was even able to get a wake going by using the weight painted canvas vertex group as a displacement back on the ocean sim. You don’t know if it’s possible to have a canvas with multiple vertex groups? Or to assign the vertex groups to specific brushes. Because right now I can get the wake displaced, but it is also displacing the main circular shape meant to constrain the boat.
