Curves from Strands
To allow Ornatrix to communicate with other parts of Maya's pipeline it is often necessary to convert guides or hair created in Ornatrix into Maya NURBS curves. This can be done using the Curves from Strands operator. Curves generated by Ornatrix will continue to be driven using the operator stack allowing for non-destructive updates as well as simulation.
Convert Hair to Curves
To convert hair or guides to curves:- Select the hair or guides shape inside Maya
- Click the Curves from Strands button on the Ornatrix Shelf
The shape object will be converted to curves.
Separating and Copying Curves
NURBS curves generated by this operator are linked to their source Ornatrix strands and their transform (as opposed to having their own individual transforms). This is done to keep the scene and its DAG hierarchy simple while also retaining proper procedural history for the resulting curves. This also means that copying or moving the resulting NURBS curves will force Maya to copy Ornatrix operator stack which is not desirable. To bypass this we added two options for separating resulting curves: Separate Selected Curves and Copy Selected Curves.
To use these options you first need to select one or more resulting NURBS curves in Maya's Outliner. It is useful to select some curves inside the viewport first and note their name, before re-selecting them in Outliner. Merely selecting the curves inside viewport will not work.
Once the curves are selected in the Outliner go to the Attribute Editor and switch to CurvesFromStrands* tab. Here you will see the two buttons which will allow you to separate or copy the curves.
Separate Selected Curves
Pressing this button will move the selected curves under their own separate transforms within the Outliner. This will allow you to re-parent these curves anywhere inside the scene. This option still retains the connection to Ornatrix strands, so modifying the strands will still update these curves.
Copy Selected Curves
Pressing this button will duplicate the selected curved under their own separate transforms and also break their connection to Ornatrix strands. Use this option to make a duplicate set of selected curves which can act separately from Ornatrix inside the scene.