Modeling

Unlike most of the examples, I built this specifically to show how a deformer can be constructed with simple visual guides. So the good news is that it’s all nicely commented. This example shows the structure of a deformation, some tricks for making viewport guides, and the taper function itself (originally published by Alan Barr, it’s quite simple).

The down side is that I didn’t want to get into matrix transforms for the example, so this implementation is only on the object’s local Y axis. This limits it’s production value (not that there’s a great need for another taper deformer.) It’s an example, not a tool – adding in the transforms to make the taper axis arbitrary isn’t too difficult, but as I was making this I realized it was going to make the entire thing unreadable and that I was out of time – I have paying work I need to get to. ^_^ So here it is, as-is. Cheers – AM

File (softimage 2013 ~270kb): Example_TaperDeform

Update

Had a little time and I hated leaving this in a state that wasn’t that useful, so I added in the additional kinds of control I usually have in production compounds (in this case, mainly the optional ability to deform on an arbitrary axis as supplied by a control object like a null, and minor cosmetics.)

A taper deformer isn’t high-tech feeling and exciting, but it’s useful in everyday practice, and more to the point this is a structure that can be used for many useful kinds of deformations. For instance, once I had the taper structure it was pretty simple to replace the internal “taper” formula with one to do a twist:

I’ll share out the twist version eventually, in the meantime here’s the full taper compound (if you look inside you’ll see what I was getting at by the arbitrary axis adding a lot of seeming complexity, but it’s really not complex, ICE just tends to look that way when there are a lot of different things all connected.)

File (softimage 2013, 379kb): example_TaperDeform2