Gradient with extra handles

[Hoptoad]

I often wish that I could bend the gradient to match a curved surface, like when coloring the inside of a dome or the hood of a car.

Could we have more handles with the gradient?

I'd be happy with three handles, or however many it would take to bend the gradient into an S shape.

Thank you.

[hayasidist]

I often wish that I could bend the gradient to match a curved surface, like when coloring the inside of a dome or the hood of a car.

Could we have more handles with the gradient?

I'd be happy with three handles, or however many it would take to bend the gradient into an S shape.

Thank you.

WIBNI...Control Handles became bezier: P0, P3 the existing handles -- add P1,P2 to create the bend! (and not just for gradients...)

[Greenlaw]

AFAIK, there are two ways to do this.

1. Bones can deform a Gradient Effect. I think the curves need to have the points to support the deformation. For example, in this example, I can't use a simple rectangle, the shape needs to have enough points along the sides to make a smooth S shape.



2. Color Points is another way, and this one doesn't require bones because the colors are directly linked to the points. I have very little experience with this method, but I've seen marvelous examples by sang820 here in the forums. Here's one of his recent demos: https://lostmarble.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 8&start=15

That said, yes, I'd like to see improvements made to Moho's effects system. It's very powerful, but I'd like to see additional controls, like the ability to constrain the widget horizontally and vertically with the Shift key.

[Greenlaw]

After posting the above, I couldn't resist trying out Color Points, so I made a copy of the shape, removed the gradient, and then sampled the colors for each row of points from the original shape using the Color Points tool. Then I bent the shape into a C shape (using Bend tool, so no bones involved)...



I'm wondering if this might be the first time I really used the tool. It's pretty neat, and I can see why Sang uses it routinely. I might start using this feature more myself.

[Greenlaw]

BTW, the shape does not need to be segmented as I did in the above example. I used Weld Crossings to add the points, and if I deleted the line segments, the result should look the same because there is really only one shape in use here.