[Feature request] Physics property values in range

warmanw

What if we set a range for properties, and the moment we release slider it assigns a random number between the range, and sticks to that until we touch the slider again 🙂

This behaviour is very helpful for a group of floating objects that are not connected to each other rather following a parent object in a random delay

Or maybe fake fluid simulation

Right now if the bones are in the same flat hierarchy editing constraints for each of them is not an easy job especially when we forget after sometime what was the logic of offsetting the parameters.

Nate

warmanw What if we set a range for properties, and the moment we release slider it assigns a random number between the range, and sticks to that until we touch the slider again

I don't understand. When you release the mouse, the slider value doesn't change at all.

Currently there is a reasonable range for each slider that is much less than the minimum and maximum possible values. The idea is that most usage will fall in this reasonable range and the slider gives you an indicator of that value, but doesn't limit you.

Are you saying you want to increase the "reasonable range"? What values do you propose?

warmanw Another far fetched idea, when multiple constraints are selected we have another button near the slider that will open a curve view where we can edit the values from parent to child

I know doing this is pretty common, but I don't think we'll have a way of making it easier in 4.2. Since it can be solved by a little more clicking, we'd rather focus on other features (like constraints and draw order folders) and release 4.2 before adding relatively minor quality of life features.

warmanw

Another far fetched idea, when multiple constraints are selected we have another button near the slider that will open a curve view where we can edit the values from parent to child(or select order), that way we can ease out the inertia up to the furthest child, so we have most inertia at the root and slowly fading it out

warmanw

So about the ranges, we have sliders as they are now, but then we can split those sliders like we do in photoshop, when we split it that means after mouse button release spine assigns some random value in that range, with that feature I can select 20 bones and give range of 60-80 inertia then be sure they follow little random otherwise they would behave exactly the same and I would need to manually adjust 20 constraints and the sad part is that it is very hard to randomly distribute inertia manually.

Nate

I see. That's a weird feature. 😃 Mostly the reason I say that is it seems quite specific to one particular use case. Most of the time you want to pick the value. Having UI to define a range so a value can picked for you seems a pretty complex solution.

Easiest is to use an online random number generator to pick a number in a range, then plug it in. This does take some effort, but it's not that much. Back in the old days animators used to have to draw each entire frame by hand, 12 frames per seconds! Uphill both ways!

It might make sense to have a "wizard" that could configure physics constraints like this. Taper a value based on bone hierarchy, randomize values, etc. Since this can all be done now with a little elbow grease, it won't make it into 4.2. We must resist scope creep! The first version of a feature should be the minimum viable product, then we add to it over time, lest we'll never manage to finish things.