Scripted Controllers

[RErender]

I am working on a car rig that we created here awhile back. It works well except that Objects must be explicitly named in their respective controllers. This is a problem because copying a rig breaks the controllers. Does anyone have any ideas on making the scripted controlers aware of what object they are on? Seems like it should be possible but so far I am at a loss.

[Morbid Angel]

not into scripting but I passed on your post to a friend who is. See what he says.

[RErender]

cool, thanks Dmitry

Idealy we would be able to copy the rig and it would still work. My thoughts were that if the scripted controller knew what object it was on then it could find the parts it needed to refererence through the rig hierarchy.

[Morbid Angel]

so when you select all, then shift drag (clone make copy) it breaks it?

[RErender]

yep, because the scripted controllers are something like

object1 = $'bmw_front_left_tire'
object2 = $'bmw_front_right_tire'

object1.rotation.z=object2.rotation.z

so when it's copied the parts are "bmw_front_left_tire01" or something and the script no longer works.

[Morbid Angel]

Eric here is what my friend had to say at this point:

Okay, there is a pointer in scripted controller, called "This". It points to object, which it is applied to. Do a search in help for "THIS"

hope that leads to somewhere

[RErender]

Yep, "this" is the answer ( I think, we have a few issues with it to deal with, but it looks promising). I got the same answer on cgtalk.

Thanks for taking the time

[Morbid Angel]

Im curious to know what kind of rig you got. In a sence that I was also making a rig for my bmw long time ago, obviously not as advanced but still... what can it do on automation?

[RErender]

For automation it:

Turns the wheels at the right speed according to the length of the path spline it follows.

Steers the front tires also in accordance to the spline it is on

keeps the wheels on the ground surface using "rayintersect" so it will roll up and down hills, curbs etc.

Rolls the body when accellerating, stopping and turning.

It's not suitable for very tight shots but works great for general traffic

[Morbid Angel]

very nice...did you have issues when parenting rotating dummys to master dummy?
my wheels some times would flip irradicly when both the wheel dummy and master dummy would translate.

[priad]

Do you know it?
http://www.newplugins.com/Products/VS1_5/CarAndTruck/
It work very very fine.

[AtlJimK]

Maybe a dumb question...but

Can we have this once its complete?

Thx

[RErender]

Dmitry - To be honest I am just getting familiar with it so I am not sure of it's limitations, as far as I know there is no flipping problem, why that would be, I am not sure yet.

Priad - Vehicle Sim is very cool, a little too intensive for general work but great for more complex sims.

Atljimk - We are talking about sharing some of our tools and scripts, no idea if this might be included.

[priad]

ok dude.