Wanted: Plugin developer for Kickstarter project to implement soft-body dynamics in DS

zigraphix

creativemodelsbe said:

for drape clothes, i like to see marvelousdesigner input.
not another quick softbody daz fix.

Rigid Body Simulation with physics.

that is what we need in dazstudio.

Well, either help write the spec for this project to include what you want, or start another thread and try to gather support for your desired features.

What's a good way to develop a feature list? We need a document that multiple people can contribute to. Google Docs ok?

ThespiSis

zigraphix said:

creativemodelsbe said:

for drape clothes, i like to see marvelousdesigner input.
not another quick softbody daz fix.

Rigid Body Simulation with physics.

that is what we need in dazstudio.

Well, either help write the spec for this project to include what you want, or start another thread and try to gather support for your desired features.

What's a good way to develop a feature list? We need a document that multiple people can contribute to. Google Docs ok?

I would want at least the controls that are available now in the OptiTex dynamics that allow you to simulate different types of fabrics (Poser has these as well). As well as control over gravity, wind, and internal pressure.

I love the idea of conforming, morphing, then draping. That would allow one to create a garment for a base figure and still have it fit a variety. This would give a range of options for development. One could model the clothing, partner with Martin to create patterned clothing through OptiTex still, or use MD to create patterned clothing--whichever method suited their abilities and preferences.

I know nothing of programming, but I'm more than willing to chime in, offer feedback, test, etc. And Google Docs works for me.

a_s_lord

I'm interested in your project. I am a developer/programmer/analyst with many years experience.
PM me

MetaGanic Designs

there is already a Bullet plugin. And a dev team, beta team, and a spec. And yes, it is not trivial and does require some in-depth knowledge of Studio internals in addition to just programming experience. Bullet SoftBody is actually pretty horrible, at least for the poly counts needed for Studio figures, and PhysX + CUDA is a better solution - which is also already in the works. So a little bit of catch-up required to get to the same point as the existing ones, although probably a month or two of full time effort would get you there.

That being said, a little competition in the area probably wouldn't hurt. And might even spark a kick-in-the-butt to the guys grinding away in their "spare time" on it. ;) It is XMas time, so what else is there to do but stay in out of the cold, and do some coding.

Suggestions, comments and "wild wishes" are of course always welcome to a dev team, so I can get you in touch with them if you want. That is an open invitation to anyone that is interested, not just the original poster. There are always open seats on a Beta team...

zigraphix

The Bullet plugin that I know of (on ShareCG) seems to have been abandoned. Is there another project you're talking about? Is there any information anywhere on the spec? I'd be quite interested in helping to beta test, if there's a live project out there. Especially if the team is interested in usability testing, as well as just bug/crash reporting.

Edited to add: I was asked in a PM for more information about how I think such a plugin should work. As I described earlier in the thread, I think this project needs to combine some of the ease of use that was implemented with Optitex with actually being able to drape ordinary geometry. So the plugin would need to be able to:

- Allow the user to see a list of geometry in the scene
- Select an object to drape
- Select collision object(s)
- Extract the conformed and morphed geometry from the scene (the same way OBJ export or MorphLoader does), along with collision geometry
- Run the softbody physics simulation, with gravity and wind options if possible
- Bring the draped geometry back into the scene as a morph to the original item, and dial the morph,

- Possibly even allowing the user to tie that morph to joint or other morph positions—I don’t know if it’s possible to have a morph driven by a combination of other morphs? But even if the drape can only be dependent on one joint or morph control, it would still be a good way to help clothing designers, increasing the utility of the plugin.

All the pieces ought to be there to help this work. It would combine the best features of the existing DS and Poser solutions. The resulting drape could still be combined with smoothing modifiers in DS, the morph could be saved out for re-use, etc. It wouldn’t be fast enough or convenient enough for animation, I suspect, but I’m not convinced any solution in this price range is likely to be able to provide full cloth simulation for animation.

Hermit Crab

Hi Zigraphics,

I'm new to posting in the forums this year and am not at all well-versed in Bullet Physics - in other words I'm way behind you and others in this thread in the concepts you are discussing.

However I bought Carrara 8.5 and have been playing a bit with soft body physics. I started a thread in the Carrara forum called 'Trying out Physics in Carrara' (sorry - I don't know how to make this a link you can click on but it is still on the top page).

In the thread I have posted three video links showing my slapdash experiments and I have arrived at a way of draping cloth and the beginning of a new (?) way of building clothing that may be useful.

By the end of the experiments shown in my third short video I have a ton of ideas and possible workflows to try out for draping clothes on posed figures for still renders - just by using what can already be done in Carrara.

I also have on Youtube a ten-minute video of Physics cloth used on Genesis for animation but running in Iclone. When I posted that in the commons it received not one comment from anyone. It was largely ignored in the Carrara forum. But it shows a way of animating VERY simple cloth using physics, which I will attempt to do in Carrara when I get a chance.

To stress - my videos are put together from working attempts and are not in any way polished.

Regards
EDIT - I realize that my experiments fall far short of your ideas - I just felt that some of the things you are discussing match some of the things I'm trying out
Spelling

Hermit Crab

Here are the video links for the work in Carrara:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7radMxgLA8Q&list=UU8QKWA-6DAMb6bT5m2hXJDg&feature=c4-overview

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIB2fouHgn0&feature=c4-overview&list=UU8QKWA-6DAMb6bT5m2hXJDg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkLebfIzJaU

and this is the link for the animation in Iclone:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ALZHi9me2s&list=UU8QKWA-6DAMb6bT5m2hXJDg&feature=c4-overview

zigraphix

There are some other threads around showing what people have been able to do with Bullet Physics and cloth draping in Carrara. I think it's encouraging, and I keep hoping eventually we'll have something like this for DAZ Studio. Although if Genesis support and Content Manager integration into Carrara continue to improve, I might eventually switch. (I'm not very fond of the Carrara user interface, though, which is why I haven't made the switch yet.)

Hermit Crab

Thanks for the reply Zigraphix.

I carried out a quick search through past forum discussions to get a feel for what has been said and done already. Clearly draping clothes has been attempted in Carrara and been found wanting. And it has been attempted by those with more expertise than I have.

However, when I can find time, I still have some things to try out following on from the test pieces I showed in my videos.

I can understand that taking a purchased item of clothing such as a man's tunic or a woman's dress and applying a soft body modifier alone would lead to poor quality draping. (I'm talking about doing this in Carrara). But I am impressed that parts of my test meshes can be 'exempted' from the soft body calculations (thereby remaining stiff) and also that a draped mesh can be exported from any point on the draping timeline.

These two features of the modifier are perhaps more relevant to clothes creation as follows: For example, to make a skirt take a flat disc mesh as shown in my videos. Make the centre solid by attaching the centre vertices. Let the cloth drape using physics. It will hang from the 'solid' vertices and collide with the posed limbs. Export the mesh. Make any modifications in a modeller to improve it if required. Then bring it back into the scene as solid clothing for a still render after deleting the original disc mesh. It is a bit of work but the cloth in my last video had good folds which I for one would not have been able to model.

That is the simplest scenario.

A more complex scenario would be to model a dress with, say, short puff sleeves, and being fairly close-fitting down to the waist from where it flares out.

During the draping process, the whole upper half could be exempted from the physics calculation (ie made stiff). The lower half could be modelled as a disc, which I've shown can drape effectively.

After the calculation, export the (lower-half draped) dress as an object. Re-import and apply a soft body modifier to the new object. This time stiffen the whole lower half and most of the upper, except the sleeves. Then carry out another drape (of the sleeves).

The main problem is in the posing. I am thinking this one through also but feel that my post here is already long enough.

Regarding owning Carrara, it seems to be on sale right now and version 9 is coming sometime. I find Carrara's interface somewhat dull but the program does so much that I am getting to be very fond of it.

PS Apologies if my posts have side-tracked from the purpose of the thread. My intention is to carry on with this when I get a chance but I guess that people would rather see proven results before any more lengthy posts from me.