Cloth constraint: problem with fixed vertices

[charlo020]

Hello to all,

I'm having trouble with a transform constraint on some vertices of my sail. I have a boat that rolls and pitches on an ocean, and a sail cloth object (derived from a polygon plane) is attached to two masts.

What happens is this: as soon as the 'every frame' calculation starts, in the first few frames the fixated vertices tend to go away from the masts. I thougth they became completely rigid with the transform constraint (I didn't use the 'soft' option).

The fixed vertices seem to behind with the dynamics a couple of frames.

Could anyone help me with this one? Thanks!

[drblacksnake]

I don't really know why d'You get those results, but try cloth manipulators instead constraint. Figure out how they work and after parent their curves under masts.
I hope this would be helpful.

[charlo020]

Thanks drBlacksnake, I think it will work. The drag manipulator can be keyframed, so I should be able to tweak and fix my sail to the mast during the animation.

[bighans]

i've had problems with transform constraints as well...
the problem was that i wasn't rewinding to before my designated start time before running the simulation.

my start time was frame 1 and until i went back to frame 0 the transforms didn't work.....

just a thought , i know its a simple mistake but sometimes the most simple mistakes are the ones we over look!

[charlo020]

Thanks bighans, I noticed the thing you say about two weeks ago, but it didn't solve my problem. Still I don't understand why the vertices aren't stuck rigidly to the parent mesh. Well, some day I will figure it out. Usually I work with Max, where this feature is quite straightforward. However I'm a beginner in Maya, so I can't compare the two yet, and there must be something simple I overlook.