Shape extrusion scaling

[_Aka_]

Hi

OK. I will only consider the "Light" solution.


But I am not sure exactly the approach you are suggesting?

Are you suggesting:

A) I make separate CG for each range of the spline that has different attributes, or

B) Make one CG but have non-connected graphs within this CG that generate unique extrusions per range?



It seems like A) would be easier as I wouldn't have to construct the graph on the fly and the Input are explicit to set the Shape on.

Can "Templates" be used for this? (I haven't looked into them yet)



B) Might have to all be done with programmatic creation of the whole sub-graph in code like you do in the InfiniteTrack example? Or can Template also be use to load each sub-graph for processing a range with unique attributes?



So for efficiency sake, which is better: A) many CG's or B) many sub-graphs within one CG?

Solution A is the simpler to set up, whether you use tempaltes or not. Their is no real performance difference between both solutions. You can use CGEditorUtility.LoadTemplate to load tempaltes via the API, but this is an editor only method.

 

To clarify further, I'm trying to do two different things which may confuse my explanation:

1) Change 'shapes' at CPs

2) Change 'materials' at CPs



These may require different techniques to be done efficiently?



From our discussions on the other thread, changing 'shapes' can be done in a single CG by programing the Curve of the Variable Mixed Shapes (as long as Optimize of Shape Extrusion is off AND the first CP of all the shapes are aligned (thank you for this fix)). This is straight forward for me to do I think. No separate CG or sub-graphs with different ranges needed.



It would be nice to do the same with materials. In your reply on the other thread you also said, "The Input Spline Shape module for uses the Meta CG Options component to compute the U coordinate of the shape's points"  The Input Spline Shape can change the materials along its spline (the railroad track example) with Meta CG Options.  Can an Input Spline Path be made to do the same? This is solution that would be simple without having to resort to multiple CG's or sub-graphs.




Thanks for your quick relies and help in this matter so we can finalize the architecture using Curvy.

Change of materials/UV coordinates are implemented only for extrusion shapes. There is no equivalent for extrusions paths, thus the need to have a separate extrusion for each variation in materials along the extrusion path.
Making an equivalent feature for extrusion paths is already listed as a wanted feature, but no short term plans have been made to implement them yet.

Any idea what technique the Audi Quattro Coaster used?

No, sorry.

Let me know if I missed some of your questions.
Have a nice day