Animating Spline to coiled helix problem

[eoinedward]

Hi there folks,

I am having a problem.

I need to animate a straight spline (contained within a tube) so when the tube retracts the straight spline is allowed to deploy from the tube and takes the form of a specific coiled helix shape. The coiled shape, in reality, is a metal coil with shape memory so as the straight spline emerges from the tube it animates to the specific shape.

I can't use an animated extrude/lofts as the spline must not advance from the tube. The tube must retract 'exposing' the spline which then changes shape.

I have tried adding Spline Influence and Spline Relax modifiers to the original coil/helix spline and a Dummy object to control the influence position. The tube is linked to the dummy object to control the movement. The Spline Relax modifier is applied with high settings that straightens out the coiled shape.

It works OK but the rendered spine geometry glitches quite badly and controlling the movement is hard.

I also tested the above technique using Spline Morph instead of Spline Relax and it helped a bit but controlling the timing of the shape in time with the tube is proving hard and the resulting animation is not looking as realistic as I would like.

Any other approaches/techniques I could consider to make it more realistic? 

Thanks in advance.

Eoin

[leeminardi]

You might find some helpful tips in the following Screencasts I made in response to similar questions. If not please post a couple of images of what you are trying to achieve and perhaps a Max file.

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/community/screencast/c343daad-9851-43e7-b130-1abe637ef1bc

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/community/screencast/a8e59010-d754-491a-a552-d45b2d9d1413