Is there a way to avoid pinching in Sweep/Skin SOP?

[magneto]

Hi,

 

A pic would describe it better:

 

 

I would rather have something that looks like OCD B-Splines rather than Linear blend:

 

 

Is there a way to do this in Houdini? I searched the forums and spent a lot of time but couldn't find a solution.

 

 

Thanks

[rayman]

You can try to create VDB, smooth points and project them to VDB.

[magneto]

Thanks rayman. Do you mean creating an SDF from VDB? I tried the Smooth SOP but it smoothed everything out.

 

Also the actual curve is a little more complex that might project to the incorrect section of the VDB.

[kgoossens]

What about using measure to find the curvature and smooth using that attribute? Then project.

[rayman]

Thanks rayman. Do you mean creating an SDF from VDB? I tried the Smooth SOP but it smoothed everything out.

 

Also the actual curve is a little more complex that might project to the incorrect section of the VDB.

Yes, I mean SDF. Also as Kim mentioned, it is better to isolate problematic areas before smoothing -this will help alot. (:

[magneto]

Thanks both. I tried measuing the curvature using the Measure SOP but the results is this:

 

 

The min/max fields clip the values so I found the max value first and then used that.

 

Is this what you guys meant?

[kgoossens]

Like this is more what I meant.

 

 

[michaelb-01]

Delta mush deformer? I've not used this but it looks interesting and could maybe help?? (e.g. 

)

[magneto]

Thanks guys.

 

@Kim: What values do you use in the measure SOP for the curvature? A really high max value so the value is not clamped?

 

When I use the default 1000, I get color values in 7-10k using your pow code. Do you normalize them using the max curvature? I don't see that in your network though.

[kgoossens]

Hi Ryan,

 

No, they are not normalized, I just made a simple example to demonstrate how you could use the curvature measurement so you can find the pinching on the surface.

[magneto]

Thanks Kim. Another issue is when you group those points, the Smooth SOP only accepts primitives, and if you only want to smooth the curves without the skin, you can't. Because converting those points into primitives groups the whole curves. The pinched corners basically look like this:

 

[kgoossens]

You could smooth the whole object and use the curvature attribute to control a blend between the smoothed and the original. 

[magneto]

Thanks Kim, that's pretty smart The only other issue I have found is I need to smooth a lot either using a high number of iterations or a value like 2 for Cutoff Frequency, which shrinks the object greatly. If I blend only the pinched points, they will shrink significantly.

 

Do you think PolyWire might be an alternative to this since it seems to create a better surface. Though with large radii, it also exhibits similar issues.

[kgoossens]

Have you tried a cutoff of 2.5 or above? Then you won't need as much iterations to get good smoothing.

 

Another thing you could try is to smooth the normals on the spine curve like that you'll get an averaged orientation of the circles int the corners. But you'd have to compensate for the thickness though but probably less then when you are smoothing the object.

[magneto]

Thanks Kim, higher values than 2.5 seem to work better. Still a lot to compensate afterwards.

 

By normals do you mean smoothing the normals of the original curve that's swept? I just tried it but Sweep seems to discard it, Copy SOP got affected by it. It didn't make a difference in the pinched areas though.

 

Thanks again.

[kgoossens]

Yes like you smoothing the normals of the original curve. I've added an example with compensation as well.

[kgoossens]

Yes like you smoothing the normals of the original curve. I've added an example with compensation as well.

SharpInterpollation.hip

[magneto]

Thanks Kim you are the master of curves and SOPs

[kgoossens]

Hehe, Thanks... I wish.

[acey195]

Maybe not "the" but "a" certainly...