while testing the dataless Mutable pipeline in Unreal Engine 5.7, I noticed that the Skeletal Mesh Parameter node exposes a fixed number of mesh section pins, based on the reference mesh used in the parameter definition.
How is this workflow intended to support meshes that have different numbers of materials or mesh sections?
Does the system expect artists to always provide meshes with an identical section/material layout, or is there a recommended method for handling meshes with varying section counts?
Any clarification on the intended usage would be very helpful. Thank you.
Yeah this is actually a problem with the current dataless workflow as we use the reference objects pins to handle the structure of the graph for compilation.
Does the system expect artists always to provide meshes with an identical section/material layout, or is there a recommended method for handling meshes with varying section counts?
Even in the previous graph setup, if you were using DataTables, you would run into this issue as well, because you need to reference a mesh for the output pins of them. Currently, the dataless graphs are experimental, and we’re still figuring out all the use cases we need for scalability.
A potential workaround is to make a dummy object that matches the “maximum” affordance of your mesh structures and then use mesh or mesh section switches to pass in either, empty/dummy data or your additional mesh sections to add to or extend your base mesh.