Pipeworks
Straight pipe sections are automatically added in between each spline point.
Any middle points will create a dynamically created pipe bend that deforms to match the underlying spline.
Bend points can also be scaled either with a uniform value or per-point
Some Pipeworks classes have also been set up with dynamically scaling ceiling anchors. These anchors are uniformly scattered along the spline segments and do a line trace upwards to detect a valid anchoring point for placement
Placing pipe systems by hand one mesh at a time is a massive time-sink, and is very limiting when you want to reroute the pipe's layout after placement.
To get around this, I set up a fully automated spline-based solution to placing complex pipe systems.
The Pipeworks class is built upon a custom C++ class called ‘Snapping Splines’, which is similar to Snapping Actors, but is built explicitly with splines in mind.
The user edits a spline in the scene to indicate the pipe layout.
On the back-end, it automatically builds out the mesh placements and tangent math to properly build out the pipe assembly from the user edited spline.
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Featured in the Firmament Tech Art Tools Kickstarter update
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1252280491/firmament/posts/3526175
