Popular Post rich_lord Posted February 14, 2016 Popular Post Share Posted February 14, 2016 Hello, I've been finally getting around to learning Houdini constraints and motors. Here's a first set of tests that I've ran. They are all quite simple beginnings, but I've learnt alot, particularly about ways to generate constraints in SOPS and then apply to DOPS, which seems really powerful. Im also using this to have a little peek at mantra, and learn how to set up really simple scenes. Heres the hip files for anyone else trying to work this stuff out. They are a bit disorganised, and alot of them contain ROPS that will need to be rerendered. hip_file hip_file hip_file hip_file hip_file 16 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Izat Posted February 16, 2016 Share Posted February 16, 2016 Looking really interesting, keep doing it 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
br1 Posted February 17, 2016 Share Posted February 17, 2016 Very nice tests ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted February 20, 2016 Author Share Posted February 20, 2016 I've done some more tests with motors. This time trying to create a bunch of them procedurally at once. Getting all the name attributes to line up was a little tricky on some of them, but I understand all this so much better after doing this. Getting the axis of the motors to do what I want was also a bit tricky, but I've mostly cracked it now. I've put all 5 hips that make up this video on my tumblr here - http://richardlord.tumblr.com/post/139634705771/hipfile-hipfile-hipfile-hipfile-hipfile. The sims will need to be re-rendered into the ROPs for you to see anything. Thanks! Hope you enjoy! 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mestela Posted February 20, 2016 Share Posted February 20, 2016 Cool. You'll have to dive into the FEM/solid stuff next, all manner of silly fun to be had there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted February 20, 2016 Author Share Posted February 20, 2016 Thanks matt - I would love to! I haven't even made a single FEM object yet. I'm crossing my fingers that all the dynamics stuff plays really nicely together. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted February 20, 2016 Share Posted February 20, 2016 (edited) Fantastic stuff Richard , i'm also a big fan of your 12 robots in a box animation ! You're stuff remind me the era of the MEL Bot war, where we build bots in Mel inside Maya and do virtual fight beetween them. That would be fun to build this kind of things with Houdini. SESI should do something like this ... a Houdini FX license for the winner ! http://www.melbotwars.com/index_lo.html Edited February 20, 2016 by sebkaine 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted February 20, 2016 Author Share Posted February 20, 2016 That would be very cool if SESI did that sebkaine. I bet we would all learn so much from each others setups too. Just in general I would love to see strange RBD creatures that people have created in Houdini. I wonder if it could be an FX challenge or something? I had never seen MEL Bot war before. I have used maya for 10 years, and still wouldn't know where to start doing something like that in MEL. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted February 21, 2016 Share Posted February 21, 2016 (edited) well actually the main part was using rigid bodies like you'r setup, MEL was use to implement some sort of inteligence. but it was using the old RBD system in maya which is now prehistoric. Well if i had to do a fighting robot in maya i will probably start with nParticles / nHair / nConstrain, but that wil be far less impressive than you're stuff in H. I really love what disney do with the microbot in big hero 6, this idea of having small simple piece that propagate and aggregate intelligently would be a great challenge ! there is a publication about this : microbot.pdf Edited February 21, 2016 by sebkaine 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mandrake0 Posted February 21, 2016 Share Posted February 21, 2016 sebkaine it would be a intressting challange.... the contest part of sesi website is pretty empty... even a houdini indie as a win would be nice... :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted March 16, 2016 Author Share Posted March 16, 2016 (edited) In case this is useful for anyone, I recently had a few misunderstandings about how pin constraints work in rotation mode. Heres a simple file with a bunch of basic constraints setup with packed primitive, and regular rbd objects. Both SESI and a helpful chap over in this thread recommended the conetwist constraint instead - which works well in the tests ive ran so far. It makes a good hinge joint, and you can layer on a world aligned rotational spring constraint if you want to make it springy. Here's an example of a few useful setups. The examples colored red are an example of what not to do.... Its a gif so click on the piccie to see the constraints in action. (its not very exciting) hip file Edited March 16, 2016 by rich_lord 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted March 18, 2016 Author Share Posted March 18, 2016 Here's another test. Im experimenting with making chains of rbds and adding different forces to the motors at regular intervals. I got some pretty nice movement! I posted the hip files for the scene here - http://richardlord.tumblr.com/post/141237935366/hipfile-hipfile-hipfile-hipfile 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted March 4, 2017 Author Share Posted March 4, 2017 Getting servos working has been bugging me for a long time. I want to set exact rotation values for them rather than just setting motor forces. I finally got them working for both packed and unpacked geo. you can get the hip from here :- http://richardlord.tumblr.com/post/157323581986/hipfile-got-servos-working-using-both-normal-geo 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted March 7, 2017 Author Share Posted March 7, 2017 Recently I wanted to make constraints based on impacts. I finally managed it. Here's the basics of the system. It uses a couple of ForeEach SOPs to step through and delete any constraint between the same two rbd's. Phew! This one was really tricky to work out. The hip file is available here 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Noobini Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 Thanks very much for these...NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jason Posted March 8, 2017 Share Posted March 8, 2017 These are seriously very cool experiments to watch. Thanks for these! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted March 13, 2017 Author Share Posted March 13, 2017 Very Pain! I assumed creating constraints at the position of the impact would be easy. NOPE! You have to transform each impact point into the rest position(Easy) AND the rest orientation(NOPE!). Luckily i'd done this about 100 years ago and I vaguely remembered how. Here's how to do it. You can get the file here 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted April 4, 2017 Author Share Posted April 4, 2017 (edited) I made some renders using the constraints on impacts setup I made. The sims are pretty crappy, but the basics of the system seems to work solidly enough. It would just be a matter of tweaking all the settings to get a smoother result. Each pair of RBDs gets no more than 1 constraint. I think it might work better if I allowed a few more, as the RBDs can spin around on this constraint, which looks a bit unstable. I posted the hip files for this over here: http://richardlord.tumblr.com/post/159194692191/crappy-sims-of-a-system-that-builds-constraints-at Edited April 4, 2017 by rich_lord 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted April 6, 2017 Author Share Posted April 6, 2017 I have a hip file I use a bunch which contains some of the common tricks I always need, but constantly forget how to do. I thought i'd share it. Mostly its VEX/VOPS stuff to manipulate point transforms, a lot of it revolves around creating and using the orient attribute. I'll update it as I go I imagine. When I discover something new, I plan to throw it in here to prevent it eroding from my brain. Must give a shout out to mestela - http://www.tokeru.com/cgwiki/index.php?title=HoudiniVex , f1480187 and anim, who have helped me understand these things a bunch (even if they don't realize it). Thanks chaps! http://richardlord.tumblr.com/post/159277887181/ive-started-collecting-a-bunch-of-tricks-i-use-a 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rich_lord Posted April 25, 2017 Author Share Posted April 25, 2017 (edited) I love springs, but never attempted to make them in Houdini. I spent a few days making a SOP asset to do it. There's 4 types. 2 with hooks on the ends, 1 terminating in central lines, and another that has no end. There's also ramps for adjusting the radius and the distribution of the coils. All you need to do is feed it two points and it should just work........ The interface is not that great, some parameters dont do anything for certain spring types. Its not the fastest, its mostly made in VEX, and there are no uv's. All the stretching and scaling is also done in VEX that gets slow once there's tons of points. I put the hip here - http://richardlord.tumblr.com/post/159989136826/i-made-a-quick-spring-asset-because-i-love-springs Edited April 25, 2017 by rich_lord 7 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.