Maya Tools - Project Marker Bundles on Mesh - On Multiple Frames

Feature

Users wish to project a Marker's Bundle onto a mesh, across multiple frames.

Usually with mmSolver it's better to project on a single frame, and solve another transform, or sometimes it's better to solve the bundle's animated translate values. Nevertheless some users still want to project (ray-cast) onto a mesh on multiple frames.

There is currently no tool to do this.

The single frame tool is documented here: https://david-cattermole.github.io/mayaMatchMoveSolver/tools_markertools.html#project-marker-on-mesh-ray-cast

Example Function This function, when run in the Maya Script Editor, with mmSolver installed, will perform "Project Marker on Mesh" for each frame in the "inner" Maya frame range bar (not the "outer" frame range).

import mmSolver.utils.time
import mmSolver.api as mmapi
import mmSolver.tools.raycastmarker.tool as raycast_marker

BND_ATTRS = ['translateX', 'translateY', 'translateZ']

def main():
    cur_frame = maya.cmds.currentTime(query=True)
    frame_range = mmSolver.utils.time.get_maya_timeline_range_inner()
    sel = maya.cmds.ls(selection=True, long=True) or []
    for f in range(frame_range.start, frame_range.end + 1):
        maya.cmds.currentTime(f, edit=True, update=True)
        maya.cmds.select(sel, replace=True)
        raycast_marker.main()
        out_nodes = maya.cmds.ls(selection=True, long=True) or []
        bnd_nodes = [n for n in out_nodes if mmapi.get_object_type(n) == mmapi.OBJECT_TYPE_BUNDLE]
        if len(bnd_nodes):
            maya.cmds.setKeyframe(bnd_nodes, attribute=BND_ATTRS)
    maya.cmds.currentTime(cur_frame, edit=True, update=True)
    return

main()

Usage Steps

Select at least one Marker node.
(Optional) Add-select one or more meshes to force specific meshes to be considered.
- If no meshes are selected, all meshes in the scene are considered.
Run tool.
The bundles for all selected Markers will be keyframed for each frame that could project/ray-cast on to a mesh.

Software Versions

Maya version: All supported.
Operating System (OS): All supported

david-cattermole / mayaMatchMoveSolver