Feeding external data into deformer graph

There's two primary ways to feed external data into a deformer graph (aside from data accessible from skinned meshes via component bindings). The first is to use the Set Variable methods provided by the Optimus Deformer Instance class:

The "In Variable Name" param must match the name of a variable inside the deformer graph exactly.

This allows you to modify deformer graph values on demand, such as the strength of effects, stiffness/damping values, forces, etc.

The second way to feed data into deformer graphs is by creating custom Animation Attributes and using control rig to embed the struct data into your skinned mesh, which can then be accessed by deformer graph using built in nodes. This can be useful in cases where you have lots of data coming in whose values change frequently, you can send it all at once every animation tick instead of relying on blueprint Set Variable calls. For an example on how to set this up, refer to the Epic content examples project.