Pluck
An extension of magnetic 1.5 - pluck 1.1 is the first tool that allows you to quickly paint feathers on a mesh surface. Once attached - the feathers will automatically retain their position/orientation as the underlying surface is animated. Besides attaching feathers one by one - you now have the option to paint a whole row of feathers at a time. Further - the feathers are automatically rotated so that they follow the path that is drawn on the mesh surface. Please see the readme.txt file included in the .zip file for a detailed explanation of the interface and tool functionality.
** important fix in 1.1 ** the scripted rotation value calculated for an attached feather is now mathematically accurate with respect to the underlying surface animation.
Here is the interface of pluck 1.1
Here is a render of attaching 80 feathers to a sphere. It took less than 5 minutes to achieve this effect.
Advantages of using pluck:
1. ability to precisely place as many or as few feathers as needed.
2. since this tool is attaching individual nurbs surfaces - you can vary the texture maps as needed.
3. likewise - you can quickly adjust the orientation/bend/curl/dimensions of a single feather or a group of feathers at the same time.
Disadvantages of using pluck:
1. two script controllers are created for every attached feather. so - your interaction with the time slider will slow down as more and more feathers are attached. I am working on a way to limit this effect - but currently this is the one main disadvantage.