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render hair via connect object
Posted: 10 June 2017 03:43 PM   [ Ignore ]  
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Hi Dr. Sassi,

This is a sort of continuation of our discussion earlier on rendering splines ( https://www.cineversity.com/forums/viewthread/2383/ )

I’m working on an experiment with splines which relies on a connect object to work as intended, I decided to use hair to render the splines, it’s been working well until the point when I tried using it with a cloner and the connect object. Please check this setup:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/tx6zehcwcwn82o0/help connect.zip?dl=0

I need the connect object because of the effectors I’ll be using in point mode.
But it seems the connect object doesn’t work in any situation I tried.
I’m not that experienced with hair, so I thought maybe it is possible I’ve missed something.

My guess is that this is a dead end, and I’ll have to use one of the other techniques we discussed in my previous post

Cheers,
Nick

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Posted: 10 June 2017 04:12 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 1 ]  
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A working file is in post #11.


Hi Nick,

Please have a look at the file below:

Scene file

https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/Uj2uauu77e1d0cjvy5k7E0pBTgGqcrhBKeOvLVgCTxi?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

What I got, you like to have all splines rendered with Hair.
The splines should follow a deformation [Point] from the Shader effector, with an individual change per spline.

For that I have set up a Plane to specify the “texture” which is then used in the Shader Effector.
Please note that the Effector> Parameter> Transform Space can be set in three ways, I was not certain which one.

I do not use a connector here, but placed the Hair Material on each Spline while in child mode.

It renders fine.

Let me know what I missed, I’m happy to explore it.

All the best

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Dr. Sassi V. Sassmannshausen Ph.D.
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Posted: 10 June 2017 06:02 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 2 ]  
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ok, this is great, I see now that my problem isn’t generally with any effectors set to point mode, but more specifically with the delay effector;
I’ve got quite a complex setup, recently I’ve been trying out using a delay effector set to point mode with falloff, so I had to use connect in order to make it work as intended.
here’s a more elaborate example:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/7hscnkwbecbofoe/help connect 2.zip?dl=0

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Posted: 10 June 2017 07:27 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 3 ]  
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Nick,

Please have a look at these three files:

Scene files
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/8XS7nzscAANwYkXpRyQ9NPrWAJKKlCuxRoaFIrrr3XN?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

One is based on Sketch ‘n’ Toons, and the other one on Hair. The last one just creates geometry and uses a Standard Material.

All of them create a result, but I’m not certain if those meet your target. Sketch ‘n’ Toons doesn’t show up in Physical Render and the Hair suggestion isn’t based on a Cloner Object. Well, the geometry can get heavy after all.

The main question would be, what is the initial idea and target? Perhaps there is a better solution to start with. Perhaps a sketch? The XPresso tags in your scene shows me that I know perhaps not even half of the “story”. Starting at “half the way” limits the bandwidth of the possibilities, at least so far my this is my experience.

My best wishes

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Dr. Sassi V. Sassmannshausen Ph.D.
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Posted: 11 June 2017 02:27 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 4 ]  
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… and again, a P.S.:

Nick, have a look at this “long” workaround. Well, it is pretty simple but it has a few steps.

Your set up is working as before, as first step.

.

The next step is to “harvest” all the points, here done with the Tracer. The only problem is of course, I can’t use the Cloner, the Connect Object has the information. This creates one spline and one segment—not 17 segments. (Tracer’s Connect Object vs Connect Elements doesn’t work here.)

A copy of the spline (child of the Cloner) is copied to have a total of 17 spline, then Object Manager> Object> Connect and Delete. This results in one spline with 17 segments.

The next step is to get that information from the Tracer. This is done by cloning the Empty Polygon (Create> File> Empty Polygon) with the Cloner Object on each point of the Tracer.

The Cloner Object is then used in the XPresso set up to be read out via Iteration 0-1716 (=17*101) to the spline with the 17 segments, to reproduce your original set up.

Now the scene has a spline all by itself and ready to be rendered with a Hair Material.

.

The file is here:

Scene File
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/YZBdE2L2ruljR4u2Jk6b0TsSV6kxFoDjGrAGGP9i4Cw?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy
The MoGraph cache is used to avoid any delay/priority problem, etc.

I hope the provided solutions of this thread allow for some new ideas at least.

Enjoy.

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Dr. Sassi V. Sassmannshausen Ph.D.
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Posted: 11 June 2017 05:08 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 5 ]  
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I really like this innovative point harvesting approach, its definitely a viable solution. It also helps create an object which other cloners and objects can interact with.

I was just wondering, to render hair in phys render it needs to be set to geometry, but is the only way to define hair as geometry, by using the actual “Add Hair” object?
If so, it looks like using this hair material wouldn’t work in phys render anyway, in which case, maybe I’m better off just using sketch n toon which will help keep things versatile.

However if there’s a way to render this hair material in phys render I think its worth doing the point iteration technique..

Thanks for all the excellent examples!

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Posted: 11 June 2017 05:31 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 6 ]  
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You’re very welcome, Nick, thanks for the nice feedback.

I would like to explore one point, as you mentioned that Hair isn’t rendering for you in Physical render.

Please have a look at the file here:

Scene file
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/0irxHpsSq2d44QZ4DFULDTD2l6ZUQBzyvwmSlFBTU48?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

… and compare it with the screen shot:
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/BgUME5oYEuCnY7hffzwhowFQdMdVww184eiqv6eaGas?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

Can you get the same result?

All the best

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Dr. Sassi V. Sassmannshausen Ph.D.
Cinema 4D Mentor since 2004
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Posted: 12 June 2017 08:01 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 7 ]  
Total Posts:  108
Joined  2015-11-30

Thank you for that scenefile, can confirm your scene renders to produce the image.
I haven’t used hair much before so I just assumed it needed to be set to geometry after some clumsy googling.
It actually looks like there was a strange bug with my scene, the hair wasn’t rendering in the editor window, but when I render to picture viewer it shows up fine.
Its strange because in your scene it renders fine in the editor window, but even if I copy the ring object with it’s texture to my scene, it doesn’t render in editor window (actually it does, 1 time out of maybe 10+ attempts.. very strange).

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Posted: 12 June 2017 08:17 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 8 ]  
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Ok, I’ve managed to isolate the cause of the bug, I assume it is a bug because I can’t figure out why it stops all other hair mat objects from rendering..
It looks like the culprit is this tracer, but why?!
check:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ray8640g16gomm4/physHairBreak_CV2_r18_drs_17_HAre_01.zip?dl=0

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Posted: 12 June 2017 07:45 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 9 ]  
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Hi Nick,

First of all, sorry for the delay in answering. Since I get e-mails for new posts, an “spam” based entry in the tutorial” section caused to see all other new Cineversity messages to be judged as spam as well. Sorry.

No idea why that cause is, it renders fine in Picture Viewer. However, great find! Perhaps the attention to detail from you will perhaps lead to a fix of similar things. Fingers crossed.

This needs to go to the Support. IF you would be so kind:

https://www.maxon.net/en-us/support/how-can-we-help/

All the best

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Dr. Sassi V. Sassmannshausen Ph.D.
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Posted: 13 June 2017 12:47 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 10 ]  
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P.S.:

I went into this file, tested many options, and the result isn’t stable. Except for the render in the Picture Viewer, that is always available.

As a “blind test” I normally set up a fresh file, and do so in an older version. By doing so I wasn’t able to reproduce the file you send me, which I could use to see the problem. Since the file has only problems in the Editor View, but not in the Picture Viewer, I “guess” that the file itself is OK.

Please have a look at the “fresh” file.

Scene file
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/1AoFGZmeBBxplpJYQ0MnKq2oBUkOIRAKQ7EKGesjOjS?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

Screenshot
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/HiZlGY9VmTwtjstZSTJyUANlc2QJCqDnbzqiHXD6psS?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

I have to test more, before I send this “behavior” in.

My best wishes.

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Posted: 13 June 2017 02:32 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 11 ]  
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Hi Nick,

I went back to your scene with the Circle.

Instead of Splines, I used “damaged” Polygons to get the Connection Object working. Which allows for a different handling and creates the effect you were after in the file. No idea if that helps your projects or any exploration.

Damaged Polygons: Well, to get a straight spline out of the clones I needed to move the top row of points in front of the lower row. (See Tracer> Attribute Manager> Object> …, have a look at the Structure Manager, point 0-25 were the top row and 26 to 51 was the lower row, now all are lined up in the x direction)
This point sequence allowed me to create the wanted information, but all polygons are useless for anything but providing “home” for the needed information. Pretending to be polygons.

With that, I was able to use the Tracer settings to create separate “clone specific” spline segments. Those will be then go under the control of the Delay Effector/Point deformer with the Falloff based on the Circle. Note, no Connect Object.

Scene file
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/mDpzXab57EcG2eKj9I0cEqJnRuECXxXJ8p0mDzqHDDK?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy
Since it looks identical to the one above, no screenshot.

Screen shot
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/FeTCxaJijAPR0spAZ3mJVvLUNSvqtcLJeYFzGtKFrDe?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

I left the intermediate points to None, maybe a good idea to allow for more details.
Perhaps something worth to explore?
I hope so. Well, since I was so focused to get the Connection Object working, I missed the point to try to get it from the scratch. The scene file I created above reminded me to just do it with Splines. The funny thing is, it worked.

Here is the file:
Scenen file
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/7wLbKMYjeBBb8p0QcX2bMEjWXsdYUVOKO3jOniEc9DP?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

Does it looks like the target you were after, besides my Hue variance in the colors?

Enjoy

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Dr. Sassi V. Sassmannshausen Ph.D.
Cinema 4D Mentor since 2004
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Posted: 14 June 2017 03:46 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 12 ]  
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Hi Dr. Sassi,

I did send that scenefile to support, they said its been forwarded to tech team.
The fresh file you shared is working fine for me, rendering fine in editor viewport, I wonder why?

I am fascinated by the last two scene files you uploaded,
trying to understand the magic behind these mysterious damaged polygons,

Dr. Sassi - 13 June 2017 02:32 AM

Damaged Polygons: Well, to get a straight spline out of the clones I needed to move the top row of points in front of the lower row. (See Tracer> Attribute Manager> Object> …, have a look at the Structure Manager, point 0-25 were the top row and 26 to 51 was the lower row, now all are lined up in the x direction)
This point sequence allowed me to create the wanted information, but all polygons are useless for anything but providing “home” for the needed information. Pretending to be polygons.

With that, I was able to use the Tracer settings to create separate “clone specific” spline segments.

 

Usually if you have a polygon object and you delete the faces, you can still see the points (in point edit mode), but with these objects you cant (or even select them in editor viewport), yet the axis moves to the positions when you select them in the structure manager.
What is this dark magic?!

I’m not sure what you mean regarding “row”, and no idea how this tracer is able to split between clones.. crazy!

By the way, I ended up leaving this project for now because my setup feels too complicated to bake reliably (i’m not even sure how a point based delay effector could be baked, let alone when there are various other heirarchies with their own point effectors interacting/affecting it), I had the motion working well in hardware render, but in physical render a lot of stuff just stopped working, e.g. xpresso was ignored completely. I will send you my scene file if you are curious, but I think now I would like to start fresh, with a setup which I will test more thoroughly in physical render as I work from the ground up. I might try and use dynamic hair based approach this time instead of delay effectors, I am hoping it will easier to bake this way.

But I am still super interested in your latest technique.

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Posted: 14 June 2017 04:01 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 13 ]  
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Hi Nick,

Focusing on the Connect Object, I couldn’t see the last version of the file that I posted.

Here is a one minute clip, explaining the DamagedGoods. [Corrupt Polygons]. However, it works with splines, and I thin that ‘s the important point, as shown in the last file in post #11.

Screen capture
https://www.amazon.com/clouddrive/share/FpJLiKaQVGNTrNG0UFxeYFag4nY4dvwSS1xYblpA3W0?ref_=cd_ph_share_link_copy

The separation is possible as the information comes directly from the Cloner Object. Ones the Connect Object is in the game, things change, and my idea would be then Fracture… But I really like simple set ups much more. wink

If you get back to the project, let me know if there are more questions, I’m happy to look into it.

ENJOY.

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Dr. Sassi V. Sassmannshausen Ph.D.
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