Cineversity

So:

i want to have a helicopter fly along a path, but I want it to tilt forward and backwards as it accelerates and decelerates, as if the angle is causing the momentum.  I have attached a helicopter symbol that moves a long a path. 

Im not sure how to go about this:  maybe somehow measure the acceleration and linearly map it to an X rotation?

Hi SethO,

The forces working on a helicopter are quite a few. If we just ignore most of the “secondary” influences, I would sketch the main parts as follow. The point where the blades of the rotor meet, are nearly equal as if one would have a hook there. The set of of the blades and their functions are also ignored here for a moment. So, given that the main weight is the helicopter body with the engine inside, we have a hook point above the center of gravity, which results in the movements you describe. Again, ignoring secondary forces, we can build this easily in Dynamics with a connector. The size of the sphere.1 stands here for the inertia, so increasing this size increases the “pendulum” movement. (File …DYhc_01) IF you place an object way below the Sphere.1 ,  as a child of the Sphere, you could place a spring between this object and Sphere.1 to create a little bit of secondary influences.
A friction field might help as well.

Just to share an alternative, I have set up one with MoGraph as well, but no Dynamics here, just Delay Effector work. (File …MGhc_01). It uses the movement like a Matrix Object and the Delay Effector Combination Spring and Even to fake the helicopter behavior.

Scene files:
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/JA4UsIpssDrxOlgPwwK9T5yT4HuDwdRs9qScWADT3QH

However, given the flight path in your scene will maybe not be possible. I would work more manually.

All the best

P.S.: here is a sketch with the Character tools.

Scene file:

https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/2iFW3ixHdavcO67AW2Kbn6bf0F69ndiVhwIFQ8Ght4I

Ah, amazing!!  The dynamic solution is surprisingly responsive.  And I see the espresso node math as well and how that could work.  Thank you very much.

You’re very welcome, SethO.

The Xpresso solution might have some limitations, but it is a starting point.   The problem that I found with it, that the direction where the helicopter came from needs more care.

The simplest version seems to be the Joint-Dynamic. Perhaps let it run one time through when it feels OK, while the Cappicino writes the key-frames. With this done, the fine-tuning could be done (Reduced Modification Curve, just to point to an nice tool for this.

I hope the sketches above can inspire you to find something that fits to your needs.

My best wishes