crowd simulation

[TheUsualAlex]

Has anyone done much crowd simulation in Houdini for movie fx that could be comparable to LotR?


Ermm... Never mind about this post.

[MG]

TheUsualAlex, on Jul 30 2002, 07:23 PM, said:

Has anyone done much crowd simulation in Houdini for movie fx that could be comparable to LotR?


Ermm... Never mind about this post.

The crowd simulation in LotR was done via a custom program, Massive, that operated via a special artificial intelligence network system (applied to all character entities). I don't think Houdini can handle this, unless you make a similair-like system yourself (perhaps as a standalone program outside Houdini).

Though, you can achieve realistic crowd simulation in different ways. I'd imagine AI-controlled crowds can be pretty unpredictable...

[anakin78z]

I'm pretty sure I saw a presentation where Rythm & Hues talked about animating crowds of mice for cats & dogs using houdini. I think they wrote some custom ops for houdini... Something about the interact sop not being cool enough... their test footage looked really cool, where they had two crowds(well, triangles) run into each other, and they did a nice job avoiding objects and each other. Not quite as much action as LOTR, but they had the whole field of vision thing going, and actions based on certain situations.

I think at least... It's been a while. My mind has since turned to strawberry pudding.

Mmm... pudding.

Jens

[mir]

u'r right...the interact POP is not cool enough...
a basic flocking system should have attributes for cohesion,allignment and seperation behaviour ...combined with field of vision
the interact POP does not have any attributes for allignment behaviour and field of vision...thus its lacking one of the most important features of a basic flocking system.
i think the only way u can get it done is by writing your own SOP or POP
(one of my current ongoing projects...I'll keep u guys posted on the progress)

[plan9]

right jens, also, for sum of all fears caleb howard did some impressive AI sims for the stadium scene. correct me if im wrong, but i think he was also responsible for the meeses as well

so ya, with some serious know how, you can make crowd simulations!!

[betty]

hi mir
are you using VOPs to make a spiced up interactPOP? does VOPs give you the ability to build these missing features that you mention, ie; allingment behaviour, field of vision etc...?
i'm pretty caught up with things at the moment but slowly getting into POPs when given the chance and haven't had time to even look at POPs with VOPs ( though i have done the VOPs tutorials for shaders which was great )

[mir]

hey betty...
yeah im using VOPs to create a spicedup interactSOP...im making a SOP cuz it offers u more functions than a POP ( for eg. the import function is only applicable in SOPs)...VOPs or VEX does give u the ability to come up with these missing features.
right now i've managed to come up with this flock_SOP that implements the field of vision and allignment behaviour...as soon as i get it down perfect i'll start working on the cohesion and seperation behaviour...and after that object avoidance and avoiding a moving particle (like small fish swimming away from a shark)....so lets see wat happens!!

[sirogi]

nevermind seeing! it already sounds pretty cool!

if it has the "Ong" seal it can only be good he he he


thx Steven, one more thing to scratch off the "would-love-to-but-REALLY-haven't got time" list

[stevenong]

sirogi, on Oct 22 2002, 09:23 PM, said:

nevermind seeing! it already sounds pretty cool!

if it has the "Ong" seal it can only be good he he he


thx Steven, one more thing to scratch off the "would-love-to-but-REALLY-haven't got time"  list

Hmmm... when did I give the "Ong" seal?

Did you post to the correct thread, sirogi?

[anakin78z]

Quote

...im making a SOP cuz it offers u more functions than a POP ( for eg. the import function is only applicable in SOPs)...

I've been writing some vex pops recently, and the lack of import or even the ability to have 2 inputs in a vex pop have been really friggin annoying and dissapointing. I guess the solution is to write a sop, but then you're basicly writing the whole particle behaviour, and I was hoping I wouldn't have to, because I'm still using other parts of pops....

Oh well...

I think pops is slowly dying...
Vops is almost better for creating particle behaviour. It gives you the controll you never had in pops.

Zig.

[mir]

u can still use other parts of POPs with your vex SOP...
u can output your pop into the SOP editor , workout your vex_SOP...and then in your pops editor u can use a velocity POP and using the "point" function u can import in the values from the vex_SOP...and from there u can just build up your POP network.
hope this helps

[sirogi]

Quote

I think pops is slowly dying...
Vops is almost better for creating particle behaviour. It gives you the controll you never had in pops.

come to think of it, that's true! since POPs don't use the same paradigm that works for the rest of the package....it compresses the whole network tree into one simulation, and takes all POP operators into account at once, instead of processing it linearly like SOPS and CHOPS....

so going the VOPS way makes total sense! except for times where a certain POP operator has substantial coding into it that it's harder to recreate.....without the HDK...


hey! here's an idea! let VOPS cannibalize POPs! all you need is for some POP-specific VOPS to be added to the list of VOP tiles...


Cheers!