• I have made a simple profile mesh (an edge loop) which I've animated along a path using 'Follow Path'.
• It has a number of Shape Keys, and as it moves along the path, it changes shape.
• I would like to capture a copy of the full state of the mesh, in place, at each frame of its animation.

This would be, if you like, a sort of 'physical onion skinning'. Dupliframes capture the transformations of the mesh at each frame, including tilts and scales derived from the path, varying those along the path, so come very close. But they don't capture the Shape Keys. If I alter the shape, it changes in all the duplicates,irrespective of keyed frames.

I'm attempting this in the hope of modeling with the resulting copies: creating a mechanism for lofting between varying profiles along a curve with a reasonable degree of accuracy, and ease of workflow.. so if there's an alternative route to that, please comment.