Hi everyone,
I’m a brand new Unity 3D user, and I’m working on a fish simulator using Maya models and a simple UnityGUI interface. My main obstacle at this point is realistic fin movement. Since Unity doesn’t support cloth simulation or physics-based animation, I’ve been looking for alternative ways to get the underwater rippling-fin effect. I found the soft-body effects on the Unity wiki, and I would love to use them for my project.
I’m able to apply the effects to a stationery sphere or cube. However, I can’t seem to apply them to parts of my model that belong to a bound mesh (like my fins). Can the soft-body technique be used on geometry that is bound to a skeleton? Or only freestanding geometry?
Thank you very much for your help. These discussion boards have already helped me so much as I’m learning Unity! I can provide more information (or project files) if needed.
Best,
-Catherine
Interesting challenge, although I have no idea how one would accomplish softbody physics on something as complex as a fish body.
There was a project however (was it called “Red Herring”? I can’t remember…) a long while back that might give you some ideas if you can find the original thread. Basically a fish model was rigged with a string of bones interconnected with springy joints, sort of how you’d do a rag doll. The fish’s head (the root bone) was animated through script to pivot back and forth as it followed a flocking script. Although the project itself wasn’t what you’re looking for, it might yield some ideas. I did something similar a year or so ago with a shark model and I was very happy with the end result.
I think the question that needs to be asked is, do you want it to look realistic or do you want it to be scientifically accurate?
Hello,
Thank you for the reply! I’ll check out the thread you mentioned. It looks like there are several ways of achieving the effect I want (I’m mostly concerned with the fins looking real, not quite as much with scientific accuracy). I’m still looking around for solutions, so I’ll keep you posted on what I find out.
Meanwhile, if anyone has suggestions, I’d love to hear more…has anyone managed to implement the soft body scripts on bound geometry, like fins?
-Catherine