Spline Paths operator

The Spline Paths operator can be used to convert particle trajectories, bindings and relationships into splines.

Multiple operators within the same flow can send particles to the same tySplines object, but you should not send particles from multiple flow objects into the same tySplines object, or else the resulting splines will not display correctly.


Spline Path Object

  • tySplines object: the tySplines object that the particle data will be sent to.

Export

  • Export ID: an ID value that can be used to isolate splines created by this operator during export with an Export Particles operator (in tyCache (splines) mode)

Mode

  • Trajectories: particle positions will be sent to the tySplines object at each step of the simulation, as trajectory data.

  • Siblings: particle sibling data will be sent to the tySplines object.

  • Connect to parent: when enabled, the youngest child of a set of siblings will be connected to the parent.

  • Parent: when enabled, particles will be connected to their parent (if they have one).

  • Target: when enabled, particles will be connected to their target (if they have one).

  • Neighbors: particle neighbor proximity data will be sent to the tySplines object.

  • Particle bindings: particle binding data will be sent to the tySplines object.

  • PhysX bindings: PhysX binding data will be sent to the tySplines object.

Bindings

  • Torn/broken bindings: controls whether data for torn/broken bindings will be included.

  • ID enable: controls whether only bindings matching a certain ID will be included.

  • ID: the ID to match.

  • Equal: bindings will be considered a match if they have the same ID.

  • Not Equal: bindings will be considered a match if they do not have the same ID.

Timing

  • Enable on substeps: controls whether data will be sent to the input tySpline object on simulation substeps.

“Enable on substeps” can usually be left disabled. It is only necessary when particles are moving so fast that they require extra substep samples for things like motion blur. Enabling this setting will increase the amount of RAM required to store tySpline data, relative to the number of substeps required for the simulation.

Target

  • Channel: the target custom float data channel.

Clustering

  • Enable clustering: when enabled, custom float values from the specified channel will be transferred to splines as clustering data.

Clustering data can be used by the tySplines objects to control which spline knots will be welded to each other, if welding is enabled. When enabled, only knots with matching cluster values will be welded.

  • Channel: the clustering custom float data channel.