IntroductionWelcome| 00:04 | Hi! My name is Steve Nelle.
| | 00:06 | I'd like to welcome you to 3ds Max
2011 Getting Stated with Reactor.
| | 00:10 | Using one of the most popular 3D
packages in the world today, we are going
| | 00:14 | be taking a detailed look into
Reactor's robust set of tools, and in this
| | 00:18 | Getting Started title,
| | 00:20 | we are going to be learning this
terrific tool set pretty much from scratch.
| | 00:23 | We will be delving into both rigid body
and soft body dynamics, doing everything
| | 00:29 | from breaking things apart to creating
believable collisions where one object
| | 00:33 | can automatically detect and react to another.
| | 00:36 | We will also be taking a look at the
impressive cloth system in Reactor, capable
| | 00:40 | of creating true-life movement in
anything from a living room curtain to a
| | 00:44 | character's wardrobe.
| | 00:47 | Reactor also offers a really cool
constraining system that we will be
| | 00:50 | working with, setting the scene up
where one object can drive or be in
| | 00:54 | control of another.
| | 00:55 | In addition to that, we will look into
creating fluid type effects, where objects
| | 01:00 | can realistically react to coming into
contact with water-like surfaces, and we
| | 01:06 | will be doing all this in project format,
| | 01:09 | going through a series of exercises
each designed to teach you what you need
| | 01:12 | to know in order to get up and running
with the Reactor utility as soon as possible.
| | 01:17 | So, we've got a lot to cover.
| | 01:19 | Let's gets going with 3ds Max
2011 Getting Started with Reactor.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| How to use this course| 00:00 | As an intermediate to advanced title
in 3ds Max, I will be approaching things
| | 00:05 | from the standpoint that you already
have a working knowledge of the software.
| | 00:08 | If we start getting into a concept or
technique that you need a little brushing
| | 00:12 | up on, you can always refer to the
Essential Training titles for 3ds Max in the
| | 00:16 | lynda.com Online Training
Library for whatever you might need.
| | 00:20 | I would also strongly suggest that you
be sure to use a three-button mouse while
| | 00:23 | working through the videos.
| | 00:25 | Max uses all three buttons extensively,
and it will be important that you do also.
| | 00:29 | Now if you are exploring this title
simply as a way to sharpen your skills,
| | 00:33 | you will be happy to know that all
the chapters and subjects have been
| | 00:37 | structured so that you can quickly
jump to only the topics of interest that
| | 00:41 | you're looking to tap in to.
| | 00:42 | With that said though, I think the
best way to tackle a material is simply to
| | 00:46 | hit it right from the beginning.
With both advice and inside tricks picked up
| | 00:50 | over the years and sprinkled
throughout the title, you'll definitely get the
| | 00:54 | most out of the material by
watching things through from front to back.
| | 00:58 | There's quite a bit of stuff here, so no
matter what your level of experience, I
| | 01:02 | think you will be able to find something
that will help you in taking your personal
| | 01:05 | projects to the next level.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using the exercise files| 00:00 | Throughout the Getting Started with
Reactor title, I'll be working in 3ds Max
| | 00:04 | 2011 using assets that I have created
especially for the videos you will be watching.
| | 00:09 | If you're a Premium member of the
lynda.com Online Training Library, you have
| | 00:13 | unlimited access to the exercise
files used throughout this title.
| | 00:17 | If you're instead a Monthly or Annual
subscriber to lynda.com and don't have
| | 00:21 | access to the exercise files, you'll
still be able to follow along from scratch
| | 00:26 | or by creating your own assets.
| | 00:28 | As you explore the resource
material provided in the Exercise Files
| | 00:31 | folder, you'll find that different chapter
folders will contain different types of material.
| | 00:37 | Some chapters simply provide the
beginning file, and, on occasion, the completed
| | 00:41 | file for our lesson, so you can compare
your work with what's have been done on screen.
| | 00:45 | You see that, for example, in chapter 1,
with the introduction-to-Reactor assets.
| | 00:50 | The other chapters in this title, which
are all project based, provide not just
| | 00:54 | the start-from-here scene file, where
applicable, but also incrementally saved
| | 00:58 | out versions of the project, where you can jump
right in at any point along the creation process.
| | 01:06 | In all cases, make sure to
familiarize yourself with what's being provided
| | 01:09 | for your use. And you'll find that in
every situation the chapter numbers and
| | 01:14 | the exercise files will correspond
with the chapter numbers found in the
| | 01:18 | table of contents, which should make
it real easy for you to find the assets
| | 01:23 | that are looking for.
| | 01:25 | What I'd suggest is copy the entire
Exercise Files folder over to your
| | 01:29 | computer's desktop. That will give
you quick and easy access without having
| | 01:33 | to track things down.
| | 01:35 | You'll also want make sure to build a
map path in 3ds Max over to your exercise
| | 01:39 | files folder on your desktop.
| | 01:41 | You can easily do that by going
to the Customize pulldown menu and
| | 01:44 | choosing Configure User Paths.
In the dialog, up at the top, click on the
| | 01:50 | tab that reads External Files.
| | 01:52 | You'll then want to click on the
Add button on the right-hand side.
| | 01:56 | From here, you'll navigate the
Exercise Files folder on your desktop.
| | 02:00 | Once it's opened, in the lower right-hand
corner click on the Add Sub Paths button.
| | 02:05 | Then click Use Path.
| | 02:08 | With the new addresses now
listed, you can then click OK.
| | 02:12 | That will simply make sure that when
you open a file that's been put together
| | 02:15 | using one or more bitmap images that
Max doesn't throw up a warning message
| | 02:19 | saying that it can't find those
specific resources. That will get us going.
| | 02:24 | Let's go see what we can do.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
1. Introduction to ReactorUnderstanding how Reactor works| 00:00 | In order to best get a handle on just
exactly what Reactor is--or better put,
| | 00:04 | what it specifically does--it's
important that you first understand the term
| | 00:09 | dynamic simulation.
| | 00:11 | A dynamic simulation can best be
described as a process that allows the motion
| | 00:15 | of one or more objects in a
three-dimensional scene to be automatically
| | 00:19 | determined based on the physical
properties that you assign to those objects.
| | 00:24 | In other words, a dynamic simulation
plugs physics into the equation, using
| | 00:28 | real-life properties like weight and
friction and elasticity to determine
| | 00:33 | just exactly how something moves or
how it would react coming into contact
| | 00:37 | with something else.
| | 00:38 | So it's a much different way of
creating animation for a scene, allowing math
| | 00:43 | and a whole bunch of behind-the-scene
calculations that work off the objects
| | 00:46 | properties that you assign to
determine the way that things move and interact
| | 00:51 | within your 3D scene.
| | 00:52 | Reactor's comprehensive set of tools
gives you as an animator the ability to
| | 00:57 | create a wide range of complex
physical simulations inside 3ds Max.
| | 01:02 | Surfaces can be made to look and
respond as if they're either rock hard,
| | 01:06 | super soft, or anything that
one could imagine in between.
| | 01:11 | The utility is capable of simulating
realistic cloth, even fluid-based effects.
| | 01:16 | So there's a ton of different things
that Reactor can help you with in creating
| | 01:19 | believable special effects for your scenes.
| | 01:22 | Within that framework though, it's
important to know that setting up a Reactor
| | 01:25 | simulation does require that you
understand a few specific things as to how the
| | 01:30 | utility is programmed to work.
| | 01:32 | For example, the game of Reactor is
played with basically two different states
| | 01:37 | or classification types for objects
that are run through a simulation.
| | 01:41 | Geometry can be identified as either
what is referred to as rigid body or
| | 01:46 | deformable body--with the
difference between the two object types being
| | 01:50 | pretty self-explanatory.
| | 01:52 | Rigid body objects are
just that. They're rigid.
| | 01:55 | Their shapes don't change
over the course of an animation.
| | 01:59 | So in other words, their geometry
remains fixed and non-deforming irrespective
| | 02:04 | of what they might come into contact with.
| | 02:06 | An example of a rigid body object
might be a rock or similarly hard surface
| | 02:10 | like a floor or wall.
| | 02:11 | Reactor's second object type, a
deformable body object, on the other hand, can
| | 02:17 | change shape during a simulation--
| | 02:19 | that deformation being accomplished by
the position of the object's vertices
| | 02:23 | automatically changing
position at various points in time.
| | 02:27 | An example of a deformable body object
might be an under-inflated rubber ball, or
| | 02:31 | maybe something like a piece
of cloth or a clump of putty.
| | 02:34 | With deformable objects coming into
contact with something else in the scene,
| | 02:39 | might indeed change its shape in some manner.
| | 02:42 | Now something else to be aware of when
working with deformable body objects:
| | 02:46 | in order for the deformable body object
that properly deform or distort during a
| | 02:50 | simulation, it must first have a
special type of modifier applied to it,
| | 02:55 | the modifier being determined by the
specific type of deformation that you're
| | 02:59 | wanting Reactor to simulate: a soft
3D surface, a thin piece of cloth or a
| | 03:05 | long flexible rope.
| | 03:06 | We'll get into all that in more
detail in our upcoming videos.
| | 03:10 | For now, in a general sense, just
realize that you'll be identifying your
| | 03:14 | simulation objects in one of two
ways: either as rigid- or soft body.
| | 03:19 | In building a foundation as to how
Reactor goes about its business, it's also
| | 03:24 | important to understand that Reactor
works by organizing the objects in your
| | 03:28 | scene that will be used in a
simulation in something it calls a collection,
| | 03:32 | with the specific type of collection
you use being determined by how you want
| | 03:36 | that or those objects to react to
respond to the other objects in your scene.
| | 03:41 | So objects in a simulation are
placed into a collection, with the type of
| | 03:45 | collection chosen determining just how
those objects will specifically look or act.
| | 03:51 | Let's say that we want all three of the
objects in our scene to respond as if being rigid.
| | 03:55 | According to the way Reactor wants us
to work, we'll have to add each of these
| | 03:59 | objects to a collection that
would read or interpret them as rigid.
| | 04:03 | Does that make sense? So, let's do it.
| | 04:05 | Now we are going to be going into all of
this in step-by-step detail coming up shortly.
| | 04:09 | So, for now, we'll just quickly set things up.
| | 04:12 | After selecting all the objects, over
in the left-hand screen, I've positioned
| | 04:16 | what is called the Reactor toolbar.
| | 04:18 | At the very top of the toolbar, I'll
click on the icon that looks like three cubes.
| | 04:22 | It's called Rigid Body Collection.
| | 04:24 | Now once an object has made its way
into a collection, the specific physical
| | 04:28 | properties that will determine how
that object will respond during the
| | 04:32 | simulation can then be added in.
| | 04:33 | Things like the object's weight, how
much resistance that object would exhibit
| | 04:38 | should it be dragged across another surface,
even how elastic or how bouncy the
| | 04:44 | object will be will all be defined
as measurable physical characteristics.
| | 04:49 | Let's say that we want the two boxes
to fall on the floor, collide with each
| | 04:53 | other, then continue traveling
in whatever direction they might.
| | 04:56 | That would require us to identify
certain physical properties for each object.
| | 05:01 | Let's see if we can't add a little
weight, or what is referred to in Reactor as
| | 05:04 | mass, to the middle yellow box.
| | 05:07 | Once selecting the box, we can
return to the Reactor toolbar in the left,
| | 05:10 | heading a little further down.
| | 05:12 | We're looking for a
button called Property Editor.
| | 05:15 | When you find it, go ahead and click.
| | 05:18 | When the dialog opens up, up at the
top under Physical Properties, we'll
| | 05:22 | change the Mass to 25.
| | 05:24 | That's all we need to do.
| | 05:26 | Now, while running a simulation,
objects can be defined as not just movable or
| | 05:31 | locked into a fixed-scene position.
| | 05:33 | They can even be constrained to other
objects so that one object's position can
| | 05:38 | be glued down to a certain location on
another object, like a shirt on a hanger
| | 05:43 | or a hook on a fishing line.
| | 05:45 | There are all kinds of
different things that can be configured.
| | 05:48 | One of the other really cool things
about Reactor is how quick it generates its
| | 05:52 | previews--its speed in making and
displaying as calculations in other words.
| | 05:57 | While some 3D software simulation
engines require lengthy calculation times
| | 06:01 | before your results can be viewed and evaluated,
| | 06:03 | Reactor's Preview window works in near
real-time speed--meaning that feedback
| | 06:09 | is almost immediate, which saves not
just time but makes the entire process
| | 06:13 | much more interactive.
| | 06:15 | Let's see how our simulation looks.
| | 06:17 | Back on the Reactor toolbar on the left,
a little further down, you will find a
| | 06:21 | button that reads Preview
Animation. Go ahead and click on that.
| | 06:25 | This brings up Reactor's Preview window.
| | 06:27 | To play things back, we simply have
to type the P key on our keyboard.
| | 06:32 | To reset the action, you type R.
Then to play again, you'll tap the P key.
| | 06:39 | When you're happy with your results,
you can then commit to what you've created
| | 06:42 | by generating the actual
keyframes that bakes everything together.
| | 06:46 | That, like almost everything else
in Reactor, can be done from several
| | 06:49 | locations in the interface.
| | 06:51 | For our demonstration here though, we'll
continue hanging out on the toolbar on the left.
| | 06:55 | Down at the bottom, we'll
click on Create Animation.
| | 07:00 | After a short calculation,
our keyframes have been made.
| | 07:04 | We can then play the Timeline
to see the actual animation.
| | 07:12 | You can also at this point, with those
keyframes having been made, scrub the
| | 07:16 | Timeline back and forth to review your work.
| | 07:22 | So, that will give you a quick overview
as to how the Reactor workflow operates.
| | 07:26 | Coming up in the next video, we'll
take a look at where exactly in the 3ds
| | 07:29 | interface the Reactor
controls and commands are found.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Accessing the Reactor commands and controls| 00:00 | The Reactor controls and commands can
be accessed in a handful of ways: Through
| | 00:06 | the Animation pulldown menu at the
top of the interface, dropping down to
| | 00:10 | Reactor, then accessing the
commands that are displayed to the right.
| | 00:15 | Over in the Command panel, you can also
access the Helper's tab, clicking then
| | 00:20 | on the dropdown menu that starts with
Standard, choosing halfway down Reactor.
| | 00:27 | There's also a handy Quad menu that you
can quickly access by holding down the
| | 00:31 | Alt and Shift keys then
right-clicking in any viewport,
| | 00:35 | each of the commands you see having
something to do with setting Reactor up.
| | 00:39 | The method of access that many
animators choose to use starts by putting your
| | 00:43 | mouse on the far
right-hand side of the Main toolbar.
| | 00:47 | In the empty area just at the right-hand
side of the Render teapot, you then right-click.
| | 00:52 | When the menu opens up,
halfway down you choose Reactor.
| | 00:56 | Now this brings up the Reactor
toolbar, which many times works best after
| | 01:00 | accessing by docking in one of a
couple different places in the interface:
| | 01:05 | Either up at the top below the Main toolbar,
| | 01:07 | you can get at there by simply dragging
with your mouse then letting go. Or in a
| | 01:12 | location that I'll be using in a large
majority of our videos in this title, over
| | 01:15 | in the left-hand side.
| | 01:17 | Again, to position, you'll simply drag
it in place, then let go of your mouse.
| | 01:21 | We'll come back to the
toolbar options in just a moment.
| | 01:25 | There's also a collection of Reactor
features and options under the Utilities
| | 01:28 | tab in the Command panel.
| | 01:30 | Here you can not just set up the
parameters for both previews and keyframe
| | 01:33 | creation, but there's also various
other settings for simulation optimization
| | 01:39 | and controlling which physics engine in Max
you choose to use when running your simulations.
| | 01:44 | We'll be going back and forth in here
quite a bit as we get to our projects.
| | 01:50 | Over the course of this title, we will
be accessing quite a few of the Reactor
| | 01:53 | commands using the toolbar that we
have now docked over on the far left edge.
| | 01:58 | With that in mind, let's now take a look at
the way things are laid out on the tool strip.
| | 02:02 | The Reactor toolbar is basically
divided into six groups, with the individual
| | 02:07 | groups or categories
separated by small horizontal bars.
| | 02:11 | The topmost group in the toolbar are your
collections, five different types in total.
| | 02:16 | Max refers them as collections because
they will hold or contain a list of the
| | 02:21 | objects that will be evaluated in a
certain way during the simulation.
| | 02:24 | We'll be going over how each
collection works in detail in the next video.
| | 02:29 | The second group, nine in all, contains
your forces, which are elements that can
| | 02:34 | be added to a scene to affect the object or
objects that have been placed into a collection.
| | 02:40 | Next category down, the third section
of the toolbar, are your constraints.
| | 02:44 | Constraints are used in Reactor to
lock down or constrain an object in some
| | 02:49 | way during a simulation, like a nail
holding down a canvas tarp or a hook
| | 02:54 | securing the end of a rope.
| | 02:56 | The fourth group holds the
very-important Reactor modifiers.
| | 03:01 | There's three different ones:
| | 03:02 | Cloth, Soft Body, and Rope--each being
assigned to an object in a collection to
| | 03:08 | determine how that object will
specifically act during the simulation,
| | 03:13 | responding either like a piece of cloth,
a strand of rope, or a geometric object
| | 03:18 | taking on the characteristics
of a softer deformable surface.
| | 03:23 | The fifth group contains just
one icon, but it's a big one.
| | 03:27 | It's called the Property Editor, and
it's where you go to set up your physical
| | 03:30 | properties for an object.
| | 03:32 | You'll be spending a ton of time in here.
| | 03:34 | And finally, the sixth group way at
the bottom contains the solving and
| | 03:38 | calculation utility, the Preview
command, and the control that you'll use when
| | 03:44 | wanting to create the actual keyframes
for your scene once the simulation has
| | 03:48 | been tested, tweaked, and
is ready to be baked in--
| | 03:52 | in other words, when you're formally
ready to commit to what you've done.
| | 03:56 | So that will give you a quick
rundown of how and where your Reactor tools
| | 03:59 | are found.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with Reactor's collection types| 00:00 | In a previous video, we described
creating a collection as a method to
| | 00:05 | identify and organize certain scene
objects to be included in a simulation.
| | 00:10 | We further stated that Reactor offered
several different types of collections,
| | 00:15 | with the collection type chosen
determining just how that specific object, or
| | 00:19 | objects, would respond or react
to being run through a simulation.
| | 00:24 | In this video, we'll take a closer
look at working within the Collection
| | 00:27 | framework using the Reactor toolbar
that we've docked over on the left-hand
| | 00:32 | side of our interface.
| | 00:34 | Let's first identify the five different
types of collections you'll be working
| | 00:37 | with when using Reactor.
| | 00:40 | The first collection on the list, a
Rigid Body Collection, is designed to
| | 00:44 | house objects that will be seen as extremely
hard and non-deforming during a simulation.
| | 00:49 | A concrete floor or a hard dense
piece of wood would be good examples of an
| | 00:53 | object that might be added to a Rigid Body
Collection, anything rock-solid and impenetrable.
| | 00:59 | Just down from that, you've got the Cloth
Collection, meant for surfaces that are
| | 01:04 | intended to have the
characteristics of--you guessed it--cloth.
| | 01:08 | Something like maybe a living room
curtain or a blanket that would drape over a
| | 01:11 | bed would be ideal
candidates for a Cloth Collection.
| | 01:15 | Third in line, the Soft Body
Collection, is again one that's pretty easy to
| | 01:19 | understand simply because of its name.
| | 01:21 | What goes in it are things that are
meant to be soft, a foam rubber cushion or
| | 01:26 | maybe a beanbag for an example:
| | 01:27 | any object that you might want to flex,
bend or squash during a simulation.
| | 01:32 | Rope Collections are designed to be
used with splines or 3ds Max lines in other
| | 01:37 | words, and they are meant to contain
objects that take on more of a rope-like
| | 01:41 | characteristic, which could easily
include not just your standard braided rope
| | 01:46 | or cord for something like a swing or
tether pole, but also for simulating
| | 01:50 | things like chains or
even a character's long hair.
| | 01:54 | Now when creating a spline to be
used in a Rope Collection, you've got to be
| | 01:57 | careful as to the number and layout of
your subobject vertices as they will
| | 02:02 | have a substantial impact as to where and
how realistic your rope type object will bend.
| | 02:08 | So be sure to keep that in mind
when making your original spline lines.
| | 02:13 | Too few or poorly placed verts will no
doubt hamper the believability of your
| | 02:17 | simulated rope like objects.
| | 02:20 | The last Reactor collection is known as
a Deforming Mesh Collection, and it's a
| | 02:24 | slightly different animal in comparison
to all the other collection types as to
| | 02:28 | how it works and what it's
specifically designed to hold.
| | 02:32 | A Def Mesh Collection is a helper object
that's designed to hold what Max refers
| | 02:36 | to as a deforming mesh object, which
in a nutshell is simply any mesh object
| | 02:41 | whose vertices have already been animated.
| | 02:43 | You'll many times see that vertex type
animation on a character--maybe something
| | 02:49 | or someone that's had its skin or
muscles keyframed in one way or another.
| | 02:53 | The cool thing about a Def Mesh
Collection is it gives you the flexibility of
| | 02:57 | having the surface of a deforming mesh
object included in a dynamic SEM, being
| | 03:01 | able to react to other objects in the
simulation, yet at the same time still
| | 03:06 | being able to maintain and not affect
the original keyframing that's been done
| | 03:10 | at its vertex level on its skin.
| | 03:12 | So in other words, Reactor doesn't
recalculate the animation on an already
| | 03:16 | animated object when that object is added to a
simulation using a deforming mesh collection.
| | 03:22 | So those are your five collection types.
| | 03:24 | Let's now talk about how a collection is
created and how something is added to a collection.
| | 03:29 | Creating a collection is
merely a point-and-click process.
| | 03:33 | You select the type of collection
that you want from the Reactor toolbar.
| | 03:36 | Then you simply click on the screen where
you want that collection located in your scene.
| | 03:41 | Now, the actual position on the viewport
where the collection is placed is not important.
| | 03:46 | The icon created, which doesn't render,
merely serves as a placeholder or
| | 03:50 | container on your screen
in which to place objects.
| | 03:53 | So if we render things up, you'll see
how we still have nothing on the screen.
| | 03:58 | Let's go ahead and create
the other four collections.
| | 03:59 | When a collection is selected,
it grows in size and turns white.
| | 04:12 | When not selected and when empty--in
other words, when it contains no objects--
| | 04:16 | its icon will display on the screen in red.
| | 04:20 | An unselected collection that does
contain at least one object will instead
| | 04:23 | show itself in blue.
| | 04:25 | We'll see that in just a moment.
| | 04:27 | The settings and options in the Modify
column are pretty much, for the most part,
| | 04:30 | the same for each type of collection.
| | 04:31 | You'll have a window that displays the
scene objects that have been added to the
| | 04:38 | collection and commands below the window
for adding and removing scene elements.
| | 04:43 | Now, to add something into a collection,
there's a couple different ways you can go.
| | 04:48 | With the Modify column open, you can
easily pick an object out of your scene by
| | 04:52 | simply clicking on the Pick
button, then selecting the object.
| | 04:56 | If that object has been recognized by the
collection, you'll then see its name in the list.
| | 05:01 | You can also select an object or a
series of objects simultaneously from a list.
| | 05:05 | With a couple more teapots now in the
scene, I've reselected my collection.
| | 05:11 | In the Modify column, I'll then drop
down to the Add button, then from the list,
| | 05:15 | choosing my objects to add to the
collection. Or another way to go, objects can
| | 05:25 | automatically be added to a
collection if those scene elements are first
| | 05:28 | selected before the
actual collection is created.
| | 05:31 | So with the new three green spheres,
I'll ahead and select them, and again, I'll
| | 05:36 | click on my Rigid Body Collection.
| | 05:38 | The Collection icon will be
automatically dropped directly in place with the
| | 05:41 | objects in the collection.
| | 05:43 | I'll go ahead and move that
icon a little bit to the side.
| | 05:46 | Back in the commands on the right,
you can see what objects are currently
| | 05:49 | included in any collection by
simply clicking on the Highlight button.
| | 05:53 | Objects included in the collection
will momentarily display in white if
| | 05:56 | using Wireframe mode, or with a bounding box
around them if being viewed in Shaded mode.
| | 06:04 | Objects can also be easily removed
from a collection by simply selecting its
| | 06:07 | name in the list, then
clicking on the Delete button.
| | 06:11 | That name will no longer display and
hitting the Highlight button will show that
| | 06:14 | it's no longer included in that given
collection. And you can quickly disable a
| | 06:19 | collection, removing it from any upcoming
simulations, by simply clicking Disable.
| | 06:24 | If you no longer want a collection
altogether, once the icon has been
| | 06:27 | selected, you can simply hit
the Delete key on your keyboard.
| | 06:31 | The objects originally in that
collection remain in the scene, ready to be put
| | 06:35 | in another collection or left
out of the simulation altogether.
| | 06:39 | Now, there are a couple of other things to
keep in mind when working with collections.
| | 06:43 | First, being added into a collection
is an object's way of making sure to be
| | 06:47 | included in a dynamic simulation,
| | 06:50 | so being thrown into a collection
is pretty much an object's ticket to
| | 06:53 | getting into the game.
| | 06:54 | Any object not in a collection won't be
included or calculated into the simulation.
| | 07:00 | Secondly, collections aren't mix and match.
| | 07:03 | What I mean by that is only objects
that are to behave similarly should be
| | 07:08 | added to the same type collection.
| | 07:10 | A rigid body object for an example
shouldn't be added to the same collection
| | 07:15 | as a soft body object.
| | 07:17 | One is designed to be rigid; the
others are intended to be pliable.
| | 07:20 | You got to keep similar objects
together in their own collections.
| | 07:23 | That's going to be very important to remember.
| | 07:26 | So, rigid body objects go in one
collection, a Rigid Body Collection,
| | 07:30 | and soft body objects go on another
collection, a Soft Body Collection. Make sense?
| | 07:36 | Now a scene can have as many collections
as needed, and any given collection can
| | 07:40 | have as many objects in it as needed.
| | 07:43 | You just can't be mixing
your apples with your oranges.
| | 07:46 | Bottom line: different types of
collections for different types of objects.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with Soft Body Modifier types| 00:00 | When wanting to include a deformable-
type object in a dynamic simulation,
| | 00:05 | Reactor, before allowing that object in
as a legitimate member of a deformable
| | 00:09 | body collection, will insist that that
object first have one of three specific
| | 00:14 | types of modifiers applied to it--
| | 00:17 | that modifier type being determined
by the way in which we are wanting the
| | 00:20 | object to react or specifically
respond during the simulation.
| | 00:25 | In this video, we'll take a look at
those three special modifier options.
| | 00:29 | In the scene that I have on the screen
named Soft Body Modifiers, I have created
| | 00:34 | three different objects wanting each
to respond in a different way as they
| | 00:37 | deform during a dynamic simulation.
| | 00:40 | There's a curtain on the left, a rope
in the middle, and a foam toy over on
| | 00:45 | the right-hand side.
| | 00:47 | Starting with the curtain, if we
create a cloth collection and attempt to add
| | 00:50 | the object to it, you'll notice that
Reactor won't allow it to happen.
| | 00:54 | Now in a previous video, we discovered
that if an object is first selected when
| | 00:58 | a collection is added, that object
will be included in that collection.
| | 01:03 | So let's see how this will work.
| | 01:04 | We'll select our curtain, then head
over to the Reactor toolbar on the left.
| | 01:07 | You will find the Cloth
Collection second one down.
| | 01:10 | Let's go ahead and click on that.
| | 01:12 | Now, something's wrong here.
| | 01:14 | In the past when we had an object
selected, then added the collection, the
| | 01:17 | Collection icon would rest directly
on top of whatever we had selected.
| | 01:21 | You don't see that in our situation here.
| | 01:24 | The Cloth Collection is basically saying,
"I'll accept your curtain geometry, but
| | 01:28 | before I do so, I am going to first
need you to apply the appropriate modifier."
| | 01:32 | So let's go ahead and do that.
| | 01:33 | In the Reactor toolbar, a little
further down, we'll find the Cloth Modifier.
| | 01:37 | The icon will look like a
shirt with a M in its middle.
| | 01:41 | Once we find that button, with the curtain
still selected, we'll go ahead and click.
| | 01:46 | If we now focus our attention over in
the Modify settings, you'll see, indeed, in
| | 01:50 | the stack, the Reactor cloth has been added in.
| | 01:53 | Now that we have the needed modifier in
place on our curtain, we can now go back
| | 01:57 | and try to add that Cloth
Collection one more time.
| | 02:01 | Back up to the icon and we'll click.
| | 02:04 | Okay, there is the Cloth
Collection icon that I was expecting.
| | 02:07 | Why don't we now go back and select the
Curtain and we'll check out the Modifier
| | 02:11 | Settings over on the right?
| | 02:13 | Looking at the Cloth Modifier controls,
| | 02:15 | you'll see that we've got a setting for the
weight of the Curtain. Reactor calls that Mass.
| | 02:20 | Directly below that, Friction would
determine how the Curtain would respond if
| | 02:24 | it rubbed up against
something else in the scene.
| | 02:27 | The Air Resistance setting would control
how the Curtain would respond if coming
| | 02:31 | into contact with a wind force.
| | 02:35 | In the sections called Force model and
Fold Stiffness, these are going to be
| | 02:39 | your controls that would control how
the Curtain would stretch and fold when
| | 02:42 | moving. And a little further down
below, you've got a series of attachment or
| | 02:51 | constraining methods if you wanted to secure
your curtain to something else in the scene.
| | 02:55 | So basically, a handful of controls
that would allow our curtain geometry to
| | 02:59 | specifically react during an
animation as if it was made of cloth.
| | 03:03 | For things like ropes or chains, we've
got another modifier type to work with,
| | 03:07 | something Reactor calls a
Rope Modifier. Let's see
| | 03:11 | if we can't apply that to our rope geometry,
then throw the object into our rope collection.
| | 03:16 | Now I've been using the
Reactor toolbar over in the right.
| | 03:18 | This time I am going to
change gears using the Quad menu.
| | 03:21 | For that, I'll simply hold down
the Shift+Alt keys and right-click.
| | 03:25 | With the rope object selected,
I'll select Rope Modifier up at the
| | 03:28 | upper left-hand quadrant.
| | 03:30 | Now that we have our modifier in place,
let's also add the Rope Collection.
| | 03:34 | That again can be done
using the Shift+Alt+Right-click.
| | 03:40 | With the Rope Modifier, we have
settings for the geometry's weight,
| | 03:43 | thickness, and friction.
| | 03:45 | There is also a Stiffness control
and something called Damping, which
| | 03:50 | determines how quickly an object
settles back into its original position when
| | 03:54 | bent or twisted around.
| | 03:58 | Also, like we saw with the Cloth
Modifier, a little further down in the
| | 04:01 | controls, we've got several different
methods to constrain our rope to another
| | 04:04 | object in our scene.
| | 04:05 | We'll be looking at the specific
options for gluing things together when we
| | 04:09 | get to our projects.
| | 04:10 | Lastly, for the foam toy, it, too, before
making its way into the appropriate soft
| | 04:16 | body collection, we'll need a special modifier--
| | 04:19 | in this case something
referred to as a Soft Body Modifier.
| | 04:24 | With that toy selected, I'll
again Shift+Alt+Right-click.
| | 04:28 | Up in the menu on the top left,
you'll see the Soft Body Modifier.
| | 04:31 | Let's go ahead and apply that.
| | 04:33 | Then to get into a collection, again,
we'll use the Quad menu. Staying up on
| | 04:37 | the top left, but a little further down,
let's click on, this time, Soft Body Collection.
| | 04:43 | Okay, back to selecting the foam toy.
| | 04:45 | With the Soft Body Modifier, you've
got similar settings for measuring and
| | 04:49 | simulating an object's mass,
stiffness and friction.
| | 04:53 | You also have a couple of different
options, or methods, as to how Reactor will go
| | 04:57 | about actually deforming the
object's geometry, using either a mesh-based
| | 05:02 | calculation--which works well when
changing the shape of an object that isn't
| | 05:06 | extremely heavy as far as its mesh weight--
or use instead a type of free-form
| | 05:11 | deformation lattice control to direct
the movement of the underlying mesh.
| | 05:15 | As a rule of thumb, the FFD-based way of
going about doing things will typically
| | 05:20 | be your best option when working with
objects having 200 or more faces. And as
| | 05:26 | with the two modifiers we saw just prior,
the Soft Body Modifier also offers the
| | 05:31 | same constraining controls when wanting
your object locking onto something else
| | 05:35 | in your scene--those controls
being found a little further down.
| | 05:39 | So those are your three soft body
modifiers and a few other things you need to
| | 05:43 | be aware of when wanting to include
deforming mesh surfaces in a simulation.
| | 05:47 | Remember, unlike rigid body objects,
soft body geometry will always need a
| | 05:52 | special modifier applied to it
before being allowed in the game.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using constraints to limit object movement| 00:00 | Constraints can be applied to
simulated objects to restrict or limit their
| | 00:04 | movement, and in Reactor there are
quite a few different methods that you can
| | 00:07 | choose from in order to create those
restrictions in the way things move.
| | 00:11 | You'll find constraints that act like
springs and hinges, even a style that
| | 00:16 | allows one object to be
constrained down to another.
| | 00:20 | Using a file named Constraints, let's take a
look at two constraint types in particular.
| | 00:24 | The scene we're using consist of a
metal pole, a wooden plank that will swing
| | 00:29 | back and forth, a weight on the left-
hand side of the plank that will be used to
| | 00:33 | influence the plank's motion, and a cube
hanging over the right-hand side of the
| | 00:38 | plank that will drop down in our
scene to initiate the movement.
| | 00:42 | Now, in order to pull things off here,
we're going to be using two different
| | 00:45 | kinds of constraints: one called a
hinge constraint that we'll use to have the
| | 00:49 | wooden plank rotate or pivot in relation
to the metal pole, and another referred
| | 00:55 | to as a point-to-point constraint that
will allow us to attach toolbar objects
| | 00:58 | together having those objects react
relative to each other, having a single
| | 01:03 | attachment point in common.
| | 01:06 | The Hinge constraint will be used
to spin the wooden plank, while the
| | 01:10 | point-to-point constraint will secure the
metal weight below the plank to the plank.
| | 01:15 | In order to set this up, our scene
will require two additional elements:
| | 01:20 | a Rigid Body Collection that will hold
all of our objects and a helper container
| | 01:25 | that will be used to hold and
simulate our two constraints.
| | 01:29 | Reactor calls that
container a Constraint Solver.
| | 01:33 | Let's first create a Rigid Body Collection.
| | 01:35 | We'll select all of our
objects using the Ctrl+A shortcut.
| | 01:38 | Then in the Reactor toolbar, on the left-
hand side, up at the top, we'll click on
| | 01:43 | the icon that reads Rigid Body Collection.
| | 01:46 | Once we have the collection in our
scene, we'll activate the Move command and
| | 01:49 | move the icon to the right.
| | 01:52 | Now, let's go ahead and
add in our two constraints.
| | 01:55 | We'll first work on the hinge,
but before the constraint comes into play,
| | 01:59 | we're going to want to select the
two objects in our scene that will be
| | 02:01 | influenced by that constraint.
| | 02:03 | That will be the pole and the plank.
| | 02:05 | Now when you click one, just hold the
Ctrl key down. Then click on the other.
| | 02:10 | Back in the Reactor toolbar on the left,
down at the bottom you'll see an icon
| | 02:13 | that looks like a door hinge.
| | 02:15 | That's your Hinge Constraint.
| | 02:17 | When you find it, go ahead and click.
| | 02:20 | Now, the constraint creates an
invisible axis that attaches to the pole and
| | 02:24 | allows the plank to spin around
it in the direction of the arrow.
| | 02:27 | The next thing we're going to want to
do, over on the right, is identify
| | 02:30 | the parent and child.
| | 02:32 | We're going to want the parent to be
pole and the child to be the plank.
| | 02:36 | Now because of the way we made our
selection, we are already set up correctly.
| | 02:40 | If your object names read different,
click on the name next to Parent, clicking
| | 02:44 | on the parent object--that being the
pole. Then click on the name next to the
| | 02:48 | child, clicking on the child
object, which will be the plank.
| | 02:52 | Once we've done that, we'll go ahead
and create our point-to-point constraint.
| | 02:56 | Now again, the process begins by first
identifying the two objects in the scene
| | 03:00 | that'll be influenced by that constraint.
| | 03:03 | For the point to point, that's going to
be the plank and then the weight, down
| | 03:06 | to its left-hand side.
| | 03:07 | Go ahead and select both of those.
| | 03:10 | This time to create our constraint,
we'll use the handy Quad menu.
| | 03:14 | We can access that by using the
Shift+Alt+Right-click combo. Go ahead.
| | 03:18 | When the menu opens, in the
lower left-hand quadrant choose
| | 03:23 | Point-Point Constraint.
| | 03:26 | Now again, back on the ride we're going
to have to identify the parent and child
| | 03:30 | for this particular constraint.
| | 03:31 | We are going to want the parent to be
the plank and the weight to be the child.
| | 03:36 | So as things currently read, to the right
of parent, I'll click on the name Weight.
| | 03:40 | Now back in the scene, I'll now
click physically on the plank.
| | 03:45 | That should change as what's
going to serve as our parent.
| | 03:48 | Now for our child object,
| | 03:49 | to the right of Child where it says
Plank, go ahead and click. Then back in
| | 03:53 | the scene, we'll go ahead and click on that
little metal weight down to the left-hand side.
| | 03:57 | When we are done, just be
sure things are set up correctly.
| | 04:01 | The plank should be the parent
and the weight should be the child.
| | 04:05 | Once we've done that, we can now
add in our Constraint Container.
| | 04:08 | On the Reactor toolbar,
we'll choose Constraint Solver.
| | 04:11 | It's going to look like a torus knot.
| | 04:14 | We'll click on the button. Then we
can click anywhere within the view.
| | 04:16 | Now once we've done that, over in column
on the right we will go to our Properties.
| | 04:23 | From here, we are going to have to
identify both the Rigid Body Collection and
| | 04:26 | our two constraints.
| | 04:28 | Under RB Collection, click on the None
button. Then click on the Rigid Body icon.
| | 04:32 | For the two constraints, we'll go down
below the window, clicking on the Add button.
| | 04:37 | Then from the list, we can
choose both Hinge and Point-Point.
| | 04:43 | Now, in order for our simulation to run
properly, we'll need to give a few of our
| | 04:47 | objects a little bit of weight.
| | 04:49 | We'll do that by first selecting each
object, then changing their Mass value
| | 04:52 | inside their Property Editor.
| | 04:55 | Let's start with the cube up at the top.
| | 04:57 | We'll select the cube. Then to
activate the Property Editor, I'll simply
| | 05:00 | Shift+Alt+Right-click.
| | 05:04 | In the menu down in the lower-
right, I'll choose Open Property Editor.
| | 05:08 | For the cube, let's give it a mass of
10. Leaving the Property Editor open,
| | 05:13 | let's now click on Plank.
| | 05:14 | In its settings, we'll
also change its mass to 10.
| | 05:19 | Once that's in place, we'll go ahead
in the view and click on the weight.
| | 05:24 | Then back in the Property Editor
for its Mass value, we'll type in 5.
| | 05:29 | Once we're done with that, we can go
ahead and close the Property Editor.
| | 05:33 | Let's go ahead and run our
sim and see how things look.
| | 05:35 | I will hold down Shift+Alt+right-
click--in the menu on the lower-right,
| | 05:41 | choosing Preview Animation.
| | 05:42 | Now before you run this, let's roll
our wheel inside the Preview window so we
| | 05:47 | can zoom in just a bit.
| | 05:49 | Then to begin our play, we'll simply type P.
| | 05:53 | You can see how the Plank is swinging
around, being controlled by the Hinge
| | 05:56 | Constraint, while the weight swinging
around at the bottom of the plank is being
| | 06:01 | constrained at the left-hand edge of the plank.
| | 06:06 | If we wanted to change the behavior of
our objects, we could simply go back in
| | 06:10 | and adjust a few of the Physical Properties.
| | 06:13 | Let's select the plank and
open up its Property Editor.
| | 06:16 | Once open, we'll change its Mass setting to 15.
| | 06:20 | Keeping the Property Editor open,
we'll select the weight in the scene and
| | 06:24 | change its mass to 10.
| | 06:28 | Let's run our preview again.
| | 06:47 | Boy, what a difference that made!
| | 06:49 | Now if your preview seems to stop a
little prematurely, you might need to go
| | 06:53 | into the Constraint Solver and adjust
what is called the Deactivation Threshold.
| | 06:58 | This is what controls just how
long the constraining influence lasts.
| | 07:04 | So we'll close our Preview window and
select the Constraint Container or Solver
| | 07:08 | down to the lower right-hand side of our view.
| | 07:12 | In the Modify column down below
the second window, you'll find the
| | 07:15 | Deactivation Threshold.
| | 07:17 | Let's change that value to one.
Then create another preview.
| | 07:33 | That will give you a little taste as
to how constraints in Reactor work.
| | 07:36 | When you're running a simulation that
needs something in your scene restricted
| | 07:39 | in some way, it will be a constraint
and a Constraint Solver as a holding
| | 07:43 | container that will make it all possible.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Assigning physical properties using the Property Editor| 00:00 | When an object needs its physical
properties specified in order for dynamic
| | 00:04 | simulation to be successful, those
values will be entered and adjusted in
| | 00:08 | something Reactor refers
to as the Property Editor.
| | 00:11 | In this video, we'll take a look at
some of the important controls and settings
| | 00:14 | you'll find inside the Editor.
| | 00:17 | Using a file named Property
Editor, let's see what we can do.
| | 00:20 | Now the editable physical properties on an
object can be accessed in a couple of different ways.
| | 00:25 | Using the pulldown menu at the top of
the interface, you could choose Animation,
| | 00:29 | then head down to Reactor, then over
the right, choosing Open Property Editor.
| | 00:35 | You could also go into the
Utilities tab in the Command panel,
| | 00:38 | clicking on the name Reactor, then
heading down to the tab down at the bottom
| | 00:42 | entitled Properties.
| | 00:44 | There's also the Quad menu that you
can use, accessed by holding down the
| | 00:48 | Alt+Shift keys, then simply
right-clicking on the screen.
| | 00:53 | When the menu opens up, in the lower
right-hand quadrant you choose Open Property
| | 00:57 | Editor. Or as a fourth option,
| | 01:01 | you could utilize the Reactor toolbar
if you have it open like we do here,
| | 01:05 | heading all the way down to the
bottom, then choosing the fourth icon up.
| | 01:09 | Having the dialog now open, your three
primary properties that will control when
| | 01:13 | the object moves around the scene and
how it behaves when coming into contact
| | 01:17 | with other objects are Mass,
Friction and Elasticity.
| | 01:20 | You will find those right at
the top under Physical Properties.
| | 01:24 | Mass is basically an object's weight,
with higher values making the object
| | 01:28 | appear heavier during the simulation.
| | 01:30 | When an object has a Mass of zero--the
default value--that object will remain
| | 01:34 | fixed in space during the simulation,
with other objects in the scene being able
| | 01:39 | to collide with it and
realistically reacting to that collision.
| | 01:43 | Friction affects how an object responds,
movement-wise, to any other surfaces it
| | 01:48 | might come into contact with.
| | 01:49 | Higher amounts of friction will make an
object appear to grab on to those other
| | 01:53 | surfaces, appearing not to
slide as easily over those objects.
| | 01:58 | So, slippery objects would have a low
or no Friction value, while rougher, more
| | 02:02 | grabbing surfaces should be
given a higher Friction amount.
| | 02:07 | Typically, you'll keep this number
between zero and one, although the setting
| | 02:10 | does go as high as 5.
| | 02:12 | The Elasticity setting controls how
bouncy an object is, with higher values
| | 02:17 | creating a bouncier reaction when an
object comes into contact with something
| | 02:21 | else in the simulation.
| | 02:22 | This setting, too, has a maximum value of
5, although like with Friction, you'll
| | 02:26 | usually want to keep your
Elasticity number somewhere between 0 and 1.
| | 02:31 | The Inactive check box is a big one
and that when turned on and applied to
| | 02:35 | a rigid body object,
| | 02:37 | that object will begin the animation in
an inactive state, meaning that for in
| | 02:42 | order for that object to move in some
way during the sim, it must interact with
| | 02:46 | something else in the scene.
| | 02:48 | An example would be something like a
blade on a windmill, that blade sitting in
| | 02:53 | a resting position until either coming
into contact with an object, like maybe
| | 02:57 | an airplane running into it, or being
influenced by an external force, like let's say wind.
| | 03:04 | Unyielding is another very
important control to understand when you're
| | 03:07 | including something in your simulation
that's already been animated or manually
| | 03:12 | keyframed in other words.
| | 03:13 | In the case of an already animated
object, you'll want to make sure that
| | 03:17 | Unyielding is turned on.
| | 03:19 | Doing so will allow other objects in
the simulation to recognize it, being
| | 03:23 | able to collide with it, and being able to feel
and react to being hit by that Unyielding object.
| | 03:29 | What's important to realize though is
that an unyielding object's movement will
| | 03:33 | be exclusively governed by whatever
normal keyframed action has been applied to
| | 03:37 | it prior to making its way into the simulation.
| | 03:41 | So an unyielding object can affect
other objects within a simulation, but its
| | 03:46 | movements and behavior will only be
affected by how it's been manually animated
| | 03:50 | outside of the simulation.
| | 03:52 | An example of an unyielding object
might be something like a bowling ball
| | 03:56 | whose movements toward the pins has
been hand-keyed in, but whose effect on
| | 04:01 | hitting those pins is all
automatically simulated by the calculations made by
| | 04:05 | Reactor's physics engine.
| | 04:07 | So, makes sense. An unyielding object
moves and reacts only by the way of how
| | 04:12 | it's been manually keyed.
| | 04:14 | The Simulation Geometry category
about halfway down is another big one.
| | 04:18 | These settings deal with how the shape
of an object is calculated or represented
| | 04:23 | during a simulation, some options
representing the actual shape of an object
| | 04:27 | more accurately than others--that
accuracy though, coming at the expense of a
| | 04:31 | longer calculation time.
| | 04:33 | The bounding options, Box and Sphere,
place an invisible lower-detail, less-
| | 04:38 | accurate bounding shape around an object,
| | 04:41 | the extents of that fill and shape
being determined by the object's dimensions.
| | 04:46 | Now for basic shapes, like the ball and
box in our scene, the bounding option
| | 04:50 | will work just fine--quicker
calculations, but maybe not quite as accurate.
| | 04:55 | Let's go ahead and make those changes.
| | 04:56 | With the green ball selected, we'll change
its Simulation Geometry to Bounding Sphere.
| | 05:03 | Leaving the Property Editor open,
we can now select the blue cube.
| | 05:06 | For this object, we'll take its
Simulation Geometry to Bounding Box.
| | 05:11 | The default setting for Simulation
Geometry, Mesh Convex Hull, is ideal for more
| | 05:16 | detailed solid objects whose surface
might not be as accurately calculated
| | 05:21 | using just a simple bounding box.
| | 05:23 | An example of that might be the red
ball in the middle of the back row.
| | 05:27 | Because of the variations in its
topology, though taking long to render, Convex
| | 05:31 | Hull would probably be the better way to go.
| | 05:34 | The setting two options down from
that, Concave Mesh, is designed for objects
| | 05:39 | containing some kind of negative space,
which could be either a kind of carved
| | 05:43 | out area on an object or an
open or empty space altogether.
| | 05:47 | Here, an extra level of calculation
takes place to ensure that those open areas
| | 05:51 | are seen and accurately
responsive during the simulation.
| | 05:54 | Both the objects on the far left of our
scene would constitute Concave Mesh objects.
| | 05:59 | Now, we can actually change both of them
at the same time by merely having them
| | 06:02 | both selected when we make the switch-over.
| | 06:05 | I'll window both, then back in the
Property Editor, we'll make the change
| | 06:08 | down to Concave Mesh.
| | 06:11 | Now, the last option under
Simulation Geometry is Proxy.
| | 06:14 | A Proxy object is basically a stand-in
object, using something in your scene--
| | 06:20 | usually another object of the same
shape but with less detail--to calculate the
| | 06:24 | needed simulated movement
for the higher-detailed object.
| | 06:28 | The two objects in the lower right-hand
corner of our screen would serve as good
| | 06:32 | examples of being able to use a stand-in proxy.
| | 06:36 | The pink object has a good deal more geometry
in it than the orange object just to its side.
| | 06:42 | In fact, the difference in
face count is 3,300 versus 440.
| | 06:47 | Because both surfaces are basically the
same shape, we can use the orange object
| | 06:52 | as a proxy stand-in for the pink one.
| | 06:55 | Here's how we'll do that.
| | 06:56 | We'll first select the pink object.
| | 06:58 | Because the negative space up around
its neck, we'll then choose Proxy Convex
| | 07:03 | Hull. Then about an inch below that
to the right of the name Proxy, we'll
| | 07:07 | click on the None button.
| | 07:09 | Now this is our way of signaling to
Max that we are now going to pick that
| | 07:12 | stand-in proxy object.
| | 07:13 | With that button down, we can now
carefully click on the orange one.
| | 07:18 | Once done correctly, you'll now read the
name Orange Proxy Pin to left of the name Proxy.
| | 07:23 | Now, during any upcoming simulations,
the lighter-weight orange object will be
| | 07:27 | substituted for the heavier-weight
pink one, done so for the intention of
| | 07:32 | speeding up the simulation.
| | 07:34 | So there you go with a bunch of
stuff on getting the most out of an
| | 07:36 | object's Property Editor.
| | 07:38 | When next running a simulation, you'll
now know the exact settings to use in
| | 07:41 | order to get both the
quickest and most accurate sim.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Previewing a simulation| 00:00 | One of the advantages that Reactor has
over many of the other dynamic simulators
| | 00:04 | on the market today is the speed
in which it generates its previews.
| | 00:08 | During the normal workflow process,
it's not at all unusual for a simulation to
| | 00:13 | take a healthy amount of time to plow
through all the calculations necessary in
| | 00:17 | order to create an
automatically generated series of movements.
| | 00:21 | Unfortunately, the longer you have
to wait for your results, the less
| | 00:24 | interactive the process feels.
| | 00:26 | In this video, we're going to take a
look at how Reactor has done away with
| | 00:30 | those lengthy waits.
| | 00:31 | I'm using a file named Simulation
Preview to demonstrate how a preview in
| | 00:35 | Reactor is performed.
| | 00:36 | Once a simulation has been set up and
the evaluation process is set to commence,
| | 00:40 | you can access Reactor's
Preview window in one of several ways.
| | 00:44 | Using the Animation pulldown menu at
the top of the screen, you can drop to the
| | 00:48 | bottom, choosing Reactor, then
the command Preview & Animation.
| | 00:52 | You could also access the Preview
Command using the keyboard/mouse shortcut of
| | 00:56 | Alt+Shift+Right-clicking, heading to
the lower right-hand side of the menu
| | 01:01 | when the dialog opens.
| | 01:03 | Another option would be to head over
to the Utilities tab in the Command
| | 01:06 | panel, opening up the Reactor commands, then
sliding into the section entitled Preview Animation.
| | 01:12 | From there, you'd simply click on
Preview in Window. Or as a fourth option,
| | 01:17 | using the Reactor toolbar which we've
positioned over in the left-hand side of
| | 01:20 | our screen, you could go to the bottom of
the commands, then choose the second icon up.
| | 01:25 | After a moment then once the
calculations for your simulation have been made, if
| | 01:29 | no errors are found, the
Preview window will open.
| | 01:32 | The window allows you to view and
interact with your simulation in real time.
| | 01:36 | By default, simulated objects display
using either the Perspective or Camera
| | 01:41 | view from your scene as the
orientation for the Preview window.
| | 01:44 | Your left mouse button can
now be used to rotate the view.
| | 01:47 | The middle mouse button, when
held down, will allow you to pan.
| | 01:52 | If held down and rolled back and forth,
will give you the opportunity to zoom in
| | 01:55 | and out of your view.
| | 01:57 | To start the simulation playback,
a couple of different options.
| | 02:00 | In the Simulation pulldown at the top-
left corner of the window, you could
| | 02:03 | choose Pause/Play, or you can
simply press the P key on your keyboard.
| | 02:08 | Let's go ahead and play things through.
| | 02:12 | To stop the preview, you simply
want to press the P key again.
| | 02:16 | When wanting to reset the animation,
type R. So, P to play and R to reset.
| | 02:23 | If there is something in your scene
that needs changing, you can easily do that
| | 02:26 | and then run the preview again.
| | 02:28 | Now in order to make those scene changes,
you'll first have to close the Preview window.
| | 02:32 | I am going to take the yellow cylinder on the
left-hand of my screen and move it up just a tad.
| | 02:39 | Then I'll go back in and run another preview.
| | 02:43 | Up at the top of the Preview window, there
is another couple options to be aware of.
| | 02:47 | Under Display, you can change the way
the Preview window appears visually,
| | 02:51 | choosing between things like Shaded or
Wireframe, and how the preview was lit.
| | 02:56 | In the Performance category,
Reactor gives you controls for both your
| | 03:00 | simulation's accuracy
and preview playback speed.
| | 03:03 | The substeps setting determines
just how many calculations are made in
| | 03:06 | generating what you see.
The higher the number of substeps, the more
| | 03:10 | accurate the playback.
| | 03:11 | That higher number though does come
at the expense of a longer calculation
| | 03:15 | time for your preview.
| | 03:16 | Under the Max pulldown, Update Max comes
into play when you have any objects in
| | 03:21 | your simulation that over a period
of time assume a resting position.
| | 03:25 | In a situation like that, you'd allow
your preview to run to the frame where
| | 03:29 | the objects are resting, or in a
relaxed state--like a piece of cloth--then
| | 03:33 | you'd click Update Max.
| | 03:34 | We'll be looking at how all that works
when we get into a few of our projects.
| | 03:38 | So that's pretty much what's
happening in creating Reactor previews.
| | 03:41 | Now, a preview is not permanent.
| | 03:44 | It in no way creates
keyframes for your simulation.
| | 03:47 | For the actual baking-in of your keys,
once happy with your preview, you'll move
| | 03:51 | on to a new command.
| | 03:52 | We'll take a look at how you go about
creating those keys in our next video.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating keyframes for a simulation| 00:00 | Once your simulation has gone through
its final adjustments and you are ready to
| | 00:03 | commit to the work that's been done,
you can bake in the animation that Reactor
| | 00:07 | has assisted in making by creating
the all-important keyframes that are
| | 00:11 | necessary in order to go out to final render.
| | 00:14 | This video will show you how that's done.
| | 00:16 | Carrying over the scene that we were
using to create our previews in the last
| | 00:19 | video, I've renamed the file Creating Animation.
| | 00:22 | Ready to go, we can now activate
Reactor's keyframing command in one of a
| | 00:26 | couple different ways.
| | 00:27 | One of those options would be to go to
the Animation pulldown menu at the top of
| | 00:31 | the interface, heading then down to the
bottom, choosing Reactor, then off to the
| | 00:35 | right, choosing Create Animation.
| | 00:38 | We could've also instead decided to
use the handy Quad menu, holding down the
| | 00:42 | Shift+Alt keys and right-
clicking with our mouse.
| | 00:44 | When the dialog opens, we would then
head down to the lower right-hand quadrant.
| | 00:49 | The Reactor toolbar that we've docked
on the left-hand side of our screen
| | 00:53 | also gives us the same command as the
very last icon at the bottom. But this
| | 00:58 | time around I am going to choose to
use the options in the Utilities section
| | 01:01 | of the Command panel. The reason being is
that from there I have the ability of
| | 01:05 | choosing not just the number of frames
in which I want my keyframes to cover,
| | 01:09 | but I also have a couple of final
accuracy settings that I can adjust all
| | 01:13 | depending on my needs.
| | 01:14 | Let's head over to the right.
| | 01:15 | We'll click on Utilities, then
down into the Reactor commands.
| | 01:19 | Let's say, for example, that I only want
the keys that I generate to include the
| | 01:23 | first 90 frames of my animation.
| | 01:25 | To do that, in the Preview & Animation
section, I can change my EndFrame to 90.
| | 01:30 | Now, the other important settings in
this section are covered in the video on
| | 01:33 | controlling simulation accuracy,
| | 01:34 | so I am going to go ahead and skip them here.
| | 01:36 | With that new EndFrame number
typed in, I think we are ready to go.
| | 01:39 | Now, very important: creating
keys is a pretty permanent thing.
| | 01:43 | So before we go any further, I'd
suggest that you always either save or hold
| | 01:47 | your file at this point just in case
you decide that those keys turned out not
| | 01:51 | to be what you want after all.
| | 01:53 | It's a lot easier to simply reopen or
fetch a file than it is to have to go
| | 01:57 | down to the timeline and start uprooting keys.
| | 02:00 | So next step, we'll go to the
Edit pulldown menu at the top-left
| | 02:02 | corner, choosing Hold.
| | 02:05 | Okay, to create the keys, we'll
go back to the right-hand side.
| | 02:08 | Just a couple inches down below EndFrame,
you'll see a button that says Create Animation.
| | 02:13 | If you're ready to go, you can then
click on that command. The Option box
| | 02:18 | that opens, basically asking us one last
time if indeed we want keyframes to be created,
| | 02:23 | in there you can simply click OK.
| | 02:26 | Now after a moment of creating those keys--
and that delay will all be determined
| | 02:30 | by the number of keys that Max has to create--
| | 02:32 | the process will be completed and
we can then close that one open box.
| | 02:37 | Okay, let's now scrub our
timeline and see how things look.
| | 02:47 | So that's pretty nice.
| | 02:48 | Let's go ahead and play things back.
| | 02:55 | Now, I want to show you something.
| | 02:56 | Go ahead and select one of the bricks in
the scene and take a look at your timeline.
| | 03:01 | The way a dynamic simulation works
is by creating a key at every frame for
| | 03:06 | each and every object that moves during the sim.
| | 03:08 | So one of the drawbacks of a sim-type
animation is that it can make for a pretty
| | 03:12 | large file, all depending on the
number of frames that are simulated and how
| | 03:16 | many objects there are in those frames.
| | 03:19 | One of the things that you can do to
minimize some of that bloat is to use a
| | 03:22 | helpful option in Reactor that
analyzes the keys that have been created and
| | 03:27 | carefully eliminates any redundant--
in other words, unnecessary--keys, while
| | 03:32 | still maintaining the integrity and
accuracy of your keyframe movement.
| | 03:36 | It's pretty neat how it works.
| | 03:38 | To get to it, we'll go back to
Utilities section on the right.
| | 03:41 | In that column under the Utilities tab,
you'll find a control called Key Management.
| | 03:46 | The Reduction Threshold setting in
that category determines just how
| | 03:49 | aggressively Reactor will go
about searching for unneeded keys.
| | 03:54 | Keeping that Reduction number set at
0.5 usually does a pretty good job,
| | 03:58 | so we'll leave it there.
| | 03:59 | Right below that, we can now click on Reduce Now.
| | 04:03 | Take a look at that. The Key Management
utility has reduced the number of keys
| | 04:07 | in our scene by over 17,000.
| | 04:10 | That's quite a healthy reduction.
| | 04:12 | Let's go ahead and close the
box, and we'll play things back.
| | 04:22 | So, check that out. The behavior of
simulated objects is almost exactly the same
| | 04:27 | way it was before the reduction.
| | 04:29 | But if you look at the number of keys
down on the Timeline, you'll see that
| | 04:32 | we've been able to reduce
things by, in this case, almost 30%.
| | 04:36 | Now if your animation doesn't end up
looking maybe quite as accurate as it did
| | 04:39 | before the reduction, you can always
retrace your steps and maybe lower your
| | 04:44 | Reduction Threshold not quite so much.
| | 04:47 | So there you go with creating keys for
your simulation once the preview work is done.
| | 04:52 | Just be sure to always remember to
save or hold your work before getting down
| | 04:55 | to setting those keys.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Controlling the accuracy of your simulations| 00:00 | Creating a simulation that looks both
believable and realistic is obviously
| | 00:04 | of primary concern.
| | 00:06 | In order to assist you in making that
happen, Reactor has a series of settings
| | 00:10 | that you can adjust to
fine-tune a simulation's accuracy.
| | 00:13 | When Reactor calculates a simulation, it
works its magic by moving each object in
| | 00:18 | small steps. The smaller the step,
the more accurate the simulation.
| | 00:22 | If when running a sim, you end up with
strange little artifacts or abnormalities
| | 00:26 | with the way things move in your scene
or interact, you can adjust the number of
| | 00:30 | what are called calculation substeps.
| | 00:33 | The number of substeps that a
calculation uses basically is the number of times
| | 00:38 | per keyframe that Reactor will look at,
or evaluate, the scene in doing whatever
| | 00:42 | is necessary to create its animation.
| | 00:44 | The more times Reactor addresses what
needs to be calculated, the more likely
| | 00:48 | the simulation will turn out looking accurate.
| | 00:51 | The substeps setting is found under the
Preview & Animation tab, in the Command
| | 00:55 | panel's Utility column.
| | 00:56 | The command is formally called Substeps/Key,
| | 01:00 | with the number entered representing
the number of times Reactor looks back
| | 01:03 | at the scene at each key interval in
order to generate the scene's simulated action.
| | 01:08 | Reactor defaults the Substeps/Keyframe
accuracy value to 10, meaning that the
| | 01:13 | setting divides each
keyframe into 10 calculations,
| | 01:17 | increasing that substeps value to
let's say 25. So, if a simulation doesn't
| | 01:22 | provide the level of accuracy that
you're looking for, the number of
| | 01:26 | substeps per key should be something
you ought to look at adjusting.
| | 01:29 | Do know though that the setting
does affect your calculation times,
| | 01:33 | so take it up only as high as needed.
Most of the times the default setting
| | 01:37 | of 10 will do the job.
| | 01:38 | Something else you need to be aware
of when using hard body objects in
| | 01:41 | creating collisions is that if your
objects aren't doing a very good job in
| | 01:46 | reacting together, or to each other,
you may need to adjust something called
| | 01:50 | Collision Tolerance.
| | 01:52 | What Collision Tolerance does is
control how close or how far apart
| | 01:56 | side-by-side objects need to be
in order to detect each other.
| | 02:00 | If a Collision Tolerance number is
set too high, objects may unexpectedly
| | 02:04 | explode just moments into a simulation.
| | 02:07 | Let me show you what I mean.
| | 02:09 | This is a file named Collision Tolerance.
| | 02:12 | The scene consists of a bunch of
bricks along with a flat cylinder
| | 02:16 | representing a ground plane.
| | 02:18 | Each of the bricks has
been assigned a mass of 10.
| | 02:21 | Let's go ahead and select all of the
objects, and we'll throw them into a
| | 02:24 | rigid body collection.
| | 02:25 | I'll window around the entire scene, then
Shift+Alt+Right-click to open up the Quad menu.
| | 02:30 | When the dialog opens, in the upper left-hand
quadrant, I'll choose Rigid Body Collection.
| | 02:36 | Okay, let's go ahead and run a preview.
| | 02:46 | What happens? It looks kind of neat,
but it's not exactly what I'm aiming for.
| | 02:50 | What we'll need to do is adjust the
Collision Tolerance value that we're
| | 02:54 | using for our simulation.
| | 02:55 | Right now, it's probably a little bit too high.
| | 02:58 | In the Utility panel's Reactor
commands, we'll open the Havoc 1 World tab.
| | 03:03 | That's where we're going to find the
Collision Tolerance setting. All depending
| | 03:06 | on the gaps between your objects,
| | 03:09 | the smaller the Collision Tolerance, the
closer your simulated objects can be to
| | 03:14 | each other without unexpectedly interacting.
| | 03:17 | Let's set the Collision Tolerance
to 2, and we'll run another preview.
| | 03:27 | Okay, now this is looking much better,
but each brick is still a little bit too sensitive.
| | 03:32 | Let's try a Collision Tolerance value of
1, and we'll preview again.
| | 03:43 | There you go. Things look a good deal better.
| | 03:47 | Now, as with using a higher
Keyframe/Substeps value, a lower Collision
| | 03:51 | Tolerance setting does force Reactor
to look a little closer things resulting
| | 03:55 | in a longer calculation,
| | 03:57 | so make sure to anticipate that
possible delay when adjusting the numbers.
| | 04:01 | Usually though, by the time you get to
adjust in the Collision Tolerance value,
| | 04:05 | you really don't have much choice.
| | 04:06 | You got to take the Collision Tolerance
down far enough to get the results you need.
| | 04:10 | Now Reactor certainly has a ton of
other adjustments that you can tweak in the
| | 04:14 | hopes of affecting the accuracy of your
sim, but I think if you start with the
| | 04:18 | utility's two primary go to controls to
tighten things up--the Keyframe/Substeps
| | 04:23 | in the Collision Tolerance--
| | 04:24 | you are going to be well on your way to
getting the accuracy in your simulation
| | 04:27 | that you are aiming to achieve.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Choosing a physics engine to run your simulations| 00:00 | Reactor gives you the opportunity to
choose between two different physics
| | 00:04 | engines when creating the
calculations necessary for a dynamic simulation.
| | 00:08 | Your choices are found in the
Utilities section of the Command panel.
| | 00:11 | After opening up the Reactor controls,
the option is located right at the top
| | 00:15 | where it reads Choose Solver.
| | 00:17 | You can choose between Havoc 1 and Havoc 3.
| | 00:21 | Both simulation engines were developed
by a company named--you guessed it--Havoc.
| | 00:26 | The company Havoc is known worldwide
for offering some of the fastest and most
| | 00:30 | robust simulation
technology on the market today.
| | 00:33 | In fact, the Havoc's physics solution can be
found in over 200 current videogame titles.
| | 00:38 | As for a general overall comment
regarding the differences between the two
| | 00:41 | engines, simply put, the Havoc 1 engine
will provide for a little broader range
| | 00:46 | of functionality, while the Havoc 3
solution will usually give you a faster and
| | 00:50 | more accurate result.
| | 00:52 | Within that framework though, know that
there are a few limitations as to what
| | 00:56 | engine you can use when calculating
certain types of simulations in 3ds Max.
| | 01:01 | Either engine is capable of creating a
sim that incorporates only rigid bodies.
| | 01:05 | Remember in choosing though, that the
newer Havoc 3 engine will usually give you
| | 01:09 | a competitive advantage with
its precision and quickness.
| | 01:12 | In situations where your simulations
involve either cloth rope or soft body
| | 01:16 | objects, you don't really have much of
a choice as your sim will have to be run
| | 01:21 | through the Havoc 1 engine.
| | 01:22 | It's just the just the way
that things have been configured.
| | 01:24 | Other than that, things are pretty
similar between the two engines, with the
| | 01:28 | Havoc 3 engine offering only a single
additional setting called simulation that
| | 01:32 | allows you to determine
how Reactor computes the sim;
| | 01:35 | Discrete, which checks for collisions,
only at the beginning and end of each
| | 01:39 | simulation step--this setting
is faster, but less accurate;
| | 01:43 | and Continuous, which checks for
collisions constantly throughout each step.
| | 01:47 | Leaving things set to Continuous, the
default selection, will usually do a better
| | 01:52 | job at reducing the chances of
inaccurately reading and simulating a collision.
| | 01:57 | So that's about it.
| | 01:58 | You've now got a couple things to
consider when choosing the appropriate
| | 02:01 | simulation physics engine for your next project.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
2. Project: Breaking Through a Sheet of GlassProject overview| 00:00 | In this project, we are going to be
throwing a rock through a pane of glass,
| | 00:04 | seeing if we can't get the window to break.
| | 00:06 | To model the individual pieces for a
breaking surface, we will be using a
| | 00:10 | specialized tool in Max called Pro
Cutter, which if used properly should make
| | 00:15 | the process of creating our
multiple shard objects a great deal easier.
| | 00:19 | With our project designed to simulate
hard surfaces, we will also be throwing a
| | 00:23 | rigid body collection into the mix,
using that collector as a means by which to
| | 00:28 | physically shatter our sheet of glass.
| | 00:30 | We will also be learning about
something called a Fracture Object, which in
| | 00:34 | explosion-type simulations can be used
to create a greater sense of realism as
| | 00:38 | to the way things break apart.
| | 00:40 | We will be animating, making a handful
of materials, and certainly making a whole
| | 00:44 | bunch of adjustments along the way
to ensure that it all comes together.
| | 00:47 | When all is said and done, we will have a
completed project that will look like this.
| | 00:53 | Let's head into the next video,
and we will get things rolling.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Modeling the broken glass| 00:00 | With our project starting from
scratch, let's go ahead and save our file.
| | 00:04 | We'll name it Breaking Glass.
| | 00:07 | Okay, the first thing we are going to
do is set out to model the window object
| | 00:11 | that will make our shattering sheet of glass.
| | 00:14 | The fact that it's our responsibility
to create those separate glass shards
| | 00:18 | brings up an important issue
about creating an exploding type of
| | 00:21 | dynamic simulation.
| | 00:22 | Reactor does not break apart geometry.
| | 00:26 | In other words, it won't take a
single object and just magically bust it
| | 00:29 | into several pieces.
| | 00:31 | The utility expects us to
do that breaking up for it.
| | 00:35 | So it's going to be our
responsibility to supply by building the individual
| | 00:39 | smaller objects that will appear to be
all glued together in order to create the
| | 00:43 | impression of a single whole object.
| | 00:45 | To help us with our modeling, I found a
reference image that I thought we could use.
| | 00:49 | It looks like this.
| | 00:51 | Now what we are going to do is load
this picture into our front viewport.
| | 00:54 | We'll then utilize the image to trace
the lines that will end up being used to
| | 00:58 | cut a single 3D object into several pieces.
| | 01:02 | Let's see what we can do.
| | 01:03 | We'll start by taking our front view
full screen. Use the Alt+W keyboard
| | 01:06 | shortcut to make that conversion. Then going
into the upper left-hand corner of the viewport,
| | 01:11 | we'll click on the name Wireframe.
| | 01:13 | When the menu opens we'll drop down to
viewport Background, and from there we'll
| | 01:17 | choose viewport Background again.
| | 01:20 | You could've also used the shortcut
key Alt+B to open up the next dialog.
| | 01:24 | In the viewport Background controls,
we'll go to the upper left-hand corner.
| | 01:27 | In the category called Background Source,
| | 01:29 | we'll click on Files.
| | 01:31 | We'll then navigate to the image
we'll load on our background.
| | 01:33 | You can find that in the
exercise files for this chapter.
| | 01:36 | When you get to the folder,
you'll choose Broken Glass.
| | 01:40 | Now staying in the dialog,
we'll drop to the left-hand corner.
| | 01:43 | See the category called Aspect Ratio?
| | 01:46 | Change the option from
Match viewport to Match Bitmap.
| | 01:49 | This will allow us to maintain the
height/width ratios of our image
| | 01:52 | irrespective of the
dimensions of our viewport window.
| | 01:55 | Directly to the right of that, we'll
also want to turn on Lock Zoom/Pan.
| | 01:59 | This will give us the opportunity of being
able to easily zoom in and out of our picture.
| | 02:03 | Once you've made those
changes, go ahead and click OK.
| | 02:06 | We can then simply roll our mouse
wheel so we can see the entire image.
| | 02:09 | Why don't we also hide the grid by typing G?
| | 02:12 | With the reference image now on our
scene, we can draw directly on top of it.
| | 02:16 | What we are going to do here,
and frankly we don't need to be super-accurate, is
| | 02:20 | create a series of lines that in a
general way follow the overall outline of our
| | 02:25 | background broken glass design.
| | 02:27 | The lines that we draw will then be
extruded in a manner that will allow us
| | 02:31 | to then use those lines as a cutting
object to make our glass shard cuts,
| | 02:35 | those cuts being done by a special command
in Max's modeling arsenal called ProCutter.
| | 02:40 | Now to start, because it will be
important that our lines overlap when drawn,
| | 02:45 | let's activate our Snap and
change what we'll snap to to vertex.
| | 02:48 | We'll go up to the top into our main toolbar.
| | 02:51 | Right in the middle of that row of
icons, we can activate the Snap command.
| | 02:54 | Now to change your snapping options,
we'll then right-click on that same icon.
| | 02:58 | In the box, we'll turn off
Grid Points and turn on Vertex.
| | 03:02 | Okay, now it's going to be
simply a matter of drawing some lines.
| | 03:05 | Let's head over the Command
panel and active the Shape commands.
| | 03:08 | From there, we can click on Line.
| | 03:10 | Now what we are going to do is draw
separate lines, each of those lines starting
| | 03:14 | and ending outside of our background design.
| | 03:17 | We'll draw our lines in a pattern that will
simply represent our broken-up piece of glass.
| | 03:21 | So with this Snap command
activated, I'll go ahead and begin drawing.
| | 03:24 | I am going to start in
the lower left-hand corner.
| | 03:26 | I'll simply click outside the image and then
start drawing closer toward the middle.
| | 03:30 | When I get to the middle, I'll click
again and then simply pull outside the image
| | 03:34 | clicking one last time.
| | 03:36 | So this one line will represent a
single piece of our broken-up glass.
| | 03:40 | Now to continue the process, we'll
right-click to get out of the Line command,
| | 03:43 | deselect what we have selected,
then go back into the Line option.
| | 03:47 | Now, this is where the Snap will come in.
| | 03:49 | We'll now snap to the vertices that
we've already placed on that original line,
| | 03:53 | starting again on the outside and
working our way toward the middle.
| | 03:56 | You can see how the process works.
| | 03:59 | We'll simply continue creating
individual lines in a clockwise direction until
| | 04:03 | we get back to where we started.
| | 04:04 | Now again, the only thing you really
need to worry about here is that you snap
| | 04:08 | one vertex to another.
| | 04:10 | The design you actually draw
frankly doesn't make much difference.
| | 04:13 | Now for that last line, continuing
the snap to the vertices, you'll want to
| | 04:16 | complete the piece.
| | 04:18 | Okay, now that we've done that, we can
turn our Snap off and create the object
| | 04:22 | that will use those lines as
a way to get them cut apart.
| | 04:24 | We'll make that object using a simple box.
| | 04:28 | So the Snap goes off and
back to the Command panel we go,
| | 04:31 | this time returning to the
Geometry category and clicking on Box.
| | 04:35 | Now before I start, I am going to
change my wireframe color to green.
| | 04:40 | Okay, now the box I create I am
going to want the same size as my
| | 04:43 | background broken glass image.
| | 04:46 | So starting in the upper left-hand
corner, I'll simply draw diagonally down
| | 04:49 | to the lower-right.
| | 04:50 | Now using one view we won't be able
to see the height measurement on this,
| | 04:54 | so just simply click enough times to make
sure to complete the box-creating command.
| | 04:57 | Once you've done that, you can right-click
to get out of box and return to four views.
| | 05:03 | Okay, focusing where we're looking into
the top view, we'll take our mouse back
| | 05:07 | to the Command panel and change the
amount of the box to make the appropriate
| | 05:10 | thickness for our class object.
| | 05:13 | Again, as you make that change just
simply look at the way the results are
| | 05:16 | going in the top view.
| | 05:17 | I'll settle in with my Height
setting somewhere between 5 and 6.
| | 05:21 | Because of having to make our glass
pane originally look like it's a solid
| | 05:24 | sheet, we are going to also need to
make a second box that we'll use later in
| | 05:28 | the project to switch, using a visibility track,
from a whole sheet of glass to our shard pieces.
| | 05:34 | So next step, let's go to the
Edit pulldown menu, choosing Clone.
| | 05:37 | In the Options, we'll start by
changing it from Instance to Copy.
| | 05:41 | We'll then give it the name Glass Solid.
| | 05:44 | Okay, now that whole sheet of glass won't come
into play until a little later in the project.
| | 05:47 | So with it selected, we'll simply
right-click, choosing Hide Selection.
| | 05:51 | We're also, at this point, pretty
much done with our reference image,
| | 05:54 | so we'll activate the
front view and we'll hide it.
| | 05:56 | With that the viewport now active,
we'll return to the Wireframe name in the
| | 05:59 | upper left-hand corner,
| | 06:01 | going down to viewport Background, then
un-checking where it says Show Background.
| | 06:06 | With that now hidden, let's go and create our
cutting object with the lines that we've drawn.
| | 06:10 | In the front view, staying in the
middle of my green box, I'll window-select
| | 06:14 | all my yellow lines.
| | 06:15 | Then to make them 3D, in the
Modifier List I'll choose Extrude.
| | 06:22 | Then watching my top view, I'll simply
adjust the extrusion amount, so I have a
| | 06:25 | little bit of thickness.
| | 06:27 | I'll take that number to somewhere around 40.
| | 06:29 | Now before we can make our cuts, it's
going to be very important that our cutting
| | 06:32 | lines directly intersect our green box.
| | 06:35 | So in the top view, I'll activate my Move
command, moving things in better position.
| | 06:40 | Again, remember, your yellow cutting lines
must completely intersect your green window box.
| | 06:45 | Once we've done that, we can
activate our perspective view, going back to
| | 06:48 | full screen, and I'll zoom out a little
ways to get myself in better position.
| | 06:53 | Here's where the ProCutter comes in as
our tool to cut our box into several pieces.
| | 06:58 | We'll start by first deselecting
everything, then single-selecting one extruded line.
| | 07:03 | With that one line selected,
we'll head back to the Command panel.
| | 07:07 | When we get there, we'll go back to the
Create column, into the Geometry category.
| | 07:10 | From there, we'll click on Standard
Primitives, heading down to Compound Objects.
| | 07:15 | Okay, on the right-hand side,
the bottom of the column, click on ProCutter.
| | 07:19 | Now here's how this works. About
halfway down, you'll see the ProCutter options.
| | 07:23 | We'll start by clicking on the
top button, Pick Cutter Objects.
| | 07:27 | Once we've done that,
we'll type H on our keyboard.
| | 07:29 | This will bring up a list of all the
objects in our scene that we can add to our
| | 07:33 | single extruded line that we'll cut with.
| | 07:36 | What we'll choose from the list are all
the objects that start with the name Line.
| | 07:39 | Irrespective of the
number, just select them all.
| | 07:42 | Once you've done that, you can go to the
lower right-hand corner and click on Pick.
| | 07:46 | Okay, back on the right side, we've got
a couple of more options to activate.
| | 07:49 | Let's go a little further down.
| | 07:51 | Just below the active button, you'll
see a category called Cutter Tool mode.
| | 07:55 | In there you'll check both options:
Auto Extract Mesh and Explode By Elements.
| | 08:00 | In the next tab down, Cutter
Parameters, and in the section called Cutting
| | 08:04 | Options, you'll also want to
turn on Stock Inside Cutter.
| | 08:09 | Now a little further up at the top,
directly below the button that's currently on,
| | 08:12 | you'll click on the button
that reads Pick Stock Objects.
| | 08:16 | Once you've done that, you can then
carefully click anywhere on the green box surface.
| | 08:21 | Doing so will break the green
box into individual smaller pieces.
| | 08:25 | You'll be able to tell just how well
that's happened by the number of colors you
| | 08:28 | now see on the screen.
| | 08:30 | You should have a separate
color for each glass shard object.
| | 08:34 | Now, ProCutter can be a
little bit touchy at times.
| | 08:37 | So if you clicked on the window
box object and things mysteriously
| | 08:40 | disappeared, undo what you've done and slightly
move your cutting objects just a tad to the side.
| | 08:46 | Then repeat the process.
| | 08:47 | Many times if there is a problem, it's
simply because Max didn't really like the
| | 08:51 | way the geometry was lining up.
| | 08:53 | Most of the time, undoing, moving things
around, and trying again will solve the problem.
| | 08:57 | Now that we've made our cuts, we
can go back in and hide our original
| | 09:01 | yellow cutting lines.
| | 09:02 | Now before going any further, make sure
to get out of that ProCutter command.
| | 09:06 | You can do that by simply right-
clicking on the screen a couple of times.
| | 09:09 | Okay, once that's done, let's return to
four views with Alt+W. In the top view,
| | 09:14 | we'll then zoom out a ways and
select all the yellow cutting surfaces.
| | 09:18 | Now the important ting in this election
is make sure that you don't also select
| | 09:22 | any of those newly created sharded objects.
| | 09:25 | Once you've made that selection, you
can right-click, choosing Hide Selected.
| | 09:30 | So check that out. Our original box has
now very easily, via the ProCutter, been
| | 09:35 | cut into many smaller pieces.
| | 09:37 | To verify how will the cuts have come
out, why don't we in the Perspective view
| | 09:40 | individually select pieces,
move them to the side, and then undo.
| | 09:43 | Now we are also going to want to
create a frame for our sheet of glass.
| | 09:48 | To do that, let's take our
front view back full screen.
| | 09:50 | For this I am going to be using a rectangle.
| | 09:52 | Before creating though, I am going to go
back and turn my Snap on so I can snap
| | 09:56 | to the extents of my sharded pieces.
| | 09:58 | Now once I've got that Snap activated,
I'll go back to the Command panel, getting
| | 10:02 | into the Shapes column.
| | 10:03 | Down to rectangle I go. Then I'll
simply draw from the upper left-hand to the
| | 10:07 | lower right-hand corner of the sharded objects.
| | 10:10 | Once that's done, we'll
immediately turn Snap off.
| | 10:13 | This time around, I'll simply use the S shortcut.
| | 10:15 | To give a width to my soon-to-be
created frame, I am going to take my rectangle,
| | 10:19 | first converting it down to an editable spline.
| | 10:22 | In the Modifier stack, I'll then open up
the editable spline entry, heading down
| | 10:26 | to the Spline level.
| | 10:28 | Once I activate that, I'll go back
in my view and select that rectangle.
| | 10:31 | What we are going to do
here is outline this shape.
| | 10:34 | The Outline command is going to be
found back on the right several inches down.
| | 10:39 | Once clicking on the Outline button, I'll
put my mouse back on my selected spline.
| | 10:45 | When the cursor changes, I'll simply hold my
mouse button down and I'll pull over to the side.
| | 10:48 | I am going to make the distance
between my two lines about a quarter inch.
| | 10:53 | Once I've got that, I'll return to the top
of the stack, clicking on Editable Spline.
| | 10:57 | Then I'll return to four views.
| | 11:00 | Now, what I am going to do here is apply
the Bevel Modifier to give this some depth.
| | 11:04 | In the Modifier list, I'll choose Bevel.
| | 11:06 | In the Bevel settings, we go little further
down in the category called Bevel Values.
| | 11:10 | I'll then adjust my Level 1 Height,
looking in the top view for that thickness.
| | 11:15 | I might even zoom in a ways in the
top you view to get a better look.
| | 11:18 | Now for my Bevel, back on the
right-hand side I'll activate Level 2.
| | 11:22 | Then I'll adjust the Height up
while I look in the top view to see the
| | 11:25 | thickness of that Bevel.
| | 11:26 | When I am happy with that, I'll drop
down to Outline, giving it a negative number.
| | 11:34 | When you're happy with results,
why don't we name this object Frame?
| | 11:40 | You'll also then want to go back to
the top view and better center that frame
| | 11:44 | on those glass pieces.
| | 11:45 | Once that's done, why don't we reactivate
the Perspective view, taking that full screen.
| | 11:51 | In the Perspective view, I'll then
better position myself in anticipation of
| | 11:54 | then creating a camera.
| | 11:56 | Once I've got myself in a relatively
good position, I'll then create my camera
| | 12:00 | using the keyboard shortcut command C.
Now after typing that, look in the upper
| | 12:04 | left-hand corner and verify that
automatically the Perspective view has
| | 12:08 | changed over to Camera.
| | 12:09 | Why don't we now adjust the resolution
setting to fit our widescreen layout?
| | 12:14 | To do that, I'll move to the upper
right-hand corner of the main toolbar,
| | 12:17 | clicking on Render Setup.
| | 12:19 | You could also simply type
the keyboard shortcut F10.
| | 12:22 | In the Options, being that I am using a
widescreen layout for my recording, I'll
| | 12:26 | change the Output size from Custom down to HDTV.
| | 12:31 | For my Width and Height, I'll then simply
type 900 in for the Width and press Enter.
| | 12:36 | That'll give me a good size that when I
render I'll fill the majority of my screen.
| | 12:40 | Okay, back in the viewport,
let's also activate our Safe Frame.
| | 12:43 | We'll do that by going to the upper left-
hand corner of our viewport, clicking on Camera.
| | 12:47 | From the menu that opens up about
halfway down, we'll choose Show Safe Frames.
| | 12:52 | By the way, as you can see, we could
have also used the keyboard shortcut
| | 12:55 | Shift+F. Once we've done that, we can
now better position ourselves within the
| | 12:59 | view using the Camera Navigation
controls in the lower-right corner.
| | 13:03 | To finish up, I'll then type G to hide my grid.
| | 13:06 | Okay, that'll do it for here. In our
next video, we'll start adding the needed
| | 13:10 | physical properties to our objects.
| | 13:12 | Let's go ahead and save this out as
Breaking Glass01, so we can take it with us.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adding the simulation's physical properties| 00:00 | With the majority of objects now
modeled for our scene, we can now begin
| | 00:04 | inputting the physical properties for
each scene element that will be necessary
| | 00:07 | for our dynamic simulation to run properly.
| | 00:10 | Using a file named Breaking Glass01
that was saved up in the previous video,
| | 00:14 | let's see what we can do.
| | 00:15 | Now why don't we start by first
renaming the individual pieces of geometry
| | 00:19 | that'll make up our multiple glass objects?
| | 00:22 | We can quickly do that using
Max's Rename Objects command.
| | 00:25 | Why don't we use the Select by Name
command by typing H to make our selection?
| | 00:30 | In the list, starting at the top you'll
select all the names that begin with the word Line.
| | 00:35 | Then we'll go to the Tools pulldown,
menu, choosing the command Rename Objects.
| | 00:39 | In the dialog up at the top next to
Base Name, let's type in 'Glass Shards'.
| | 00:44 | Then further down next to where it
says Numbered, we'll check the box.
| | 00:48 | Okay, once doing so, we can then click
the big Rename button down at the bottom.
| | 00:52 | Let's now close that window and type H again.
| | 00:55 | There we go, all of our Broken Glass
objects now being named Glass Shards.
| | 01:00 | Now with all of those objects still
selected, hold down Shift and Alt and right-click.
| | 01:05 | From the Reactor Quad menu lower right-
hand quadrant, choose Open Property Editor.
| | 01:11 | For the properties for our glass
shard objects, let's get each a Mass of 5.
| | 01:15 | We'll also want to activate the
check box just the left of Inactive.
| | 01:19 | This is done because we don't want
these objects to move until they coming into
| | 01:22 | contact with something else in the simulation.
| | 01:24 | Okay, with those changes in
place, let's now select the frame.
| | 01:28 | For its mass, let's give it a value of 10.
| | 01:30 | Wanting this object also not to move
until the proper time and the simulation,
| | 01:34 | we'll also want to activate Inactive here.
| | 01:37 | Everything else in the Physical
Properties can stay the way it is.
| | 01:41 | Okay, that takes care of the physical
properties for the things we've made.
| | 01:44 | Let's save our file up as Breaking
Glass02, and we'll head into our next video
| | 01:48 | where we'll create and animate the
rock object that will use to break our
| | 01:52 | glass window.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Animating the breaking object| 00:00 | In this video, we are going to build and
animate the rock object that we'll use to
| | 00:04 | break our glass window pane.
| | 00:06 | We'll be continuing with the file named
Breaking Glass02, which has been carried
| | 00:10 | forward from the last video.
| | 00:11 | Our rock object, the geometry we'll use to
break the glass, will be made out of a simple sphere.
| | 00:17 | Let's create that sphere in the front
view, so we can both properly size and line
| | 00:21 | up what we've made with the
breaks in our shard glass pieces.
| | 00:24 | We'll make the conversion of the
front view simply using Alt+W. Okay, once
| | 00:29 | in place, we'll get to the Command panel on
the right, clicking on the Sphere command.
| | 00:33 | Positioning our mouse back on the view
where the glass shard pieces intersect or
| | 00:36 | come together, we'll then
draw out our sphere object.
| | 00:39 | Now why don't we make this
somewhere around a Radius of about 100?
| | 00:44 | Once we've got that in
place, we'll name it Rock.
| | 00:50 | Okay, let's now go ahead and get
ourselves back to our four-view orientation.
| | 00:54 | Once we are there, we'll take our new Rock
object positioning to the front side of our glass.
| | 00:59 | Let's now go in for a closer look.
| | 01:01 | We'll do that by first taking your
camera view to a perspective window by typing
| | 01:04 | P. We can then use the Zoom Extend
Selected command, typing Z. To break up the
| | 01:09 | shape of our rock a little,
let's now add a Noise Modifier.
| | 01:12 | In the Modifier, list we'll drop
down to the Ns, choosing Noise.
| | 01:16 | For the settings, let's turn Fractal on
and then change the Strength to 35 in
| | 01:20 | all three locations.
| | 01:21 | To change the shape of what's been
created with the Noise algorithm, let's now go
| | 01:25 | to Seed changing the value to 3.
| | 01:27 | Once we've done that, we'll right-click on
the object, converting it to an editable poly.
| | 01:31 | That will simply bake the Noise
Modifier in, getting it out of our way visually.
| | 01:36 | Okay, let's now animate the
rock crashing through the glass.
| | 01:39 | We'll take our Perspective
view back to Camera by typing C.
| | 01:43 | Using the Move command, we'll then move
the rock so it's outside of the camera
| | 01:46 | view on the right-hand side.
| | 01:48 | Now, this is one of the reasons that I
activated the Safe Frame in a previous video.
| | 01:52 | I want to make sure that what I see in the
view is what I'll get in my final render.
| | 01:56 | In fact, just for safety's sake,
let's click on that Teapot Render icon.
| | 02:00 | Okay, once we are in place, we
can then activate the Auto Key.
| | 02:03 | Either click on the button or use the
keyboard shortcut, Command+N. Now the speed
| | 02:08 | at which the rock will crash through
the window is in large part determined by
| | 02:11 | the number of frames in which we move to and
the length that we move our ball. Let's do this.
| | 02:15 | Let's move to frame 35 on our timeline.
| | 02:18 | I'll then activate the top view, zooming out
a ways so I can see the ball in that window.
| | 02:23 | Now, we are at frame 35 with Auto Key on.
| | 02:26 | Let's now move the ball to the
opposite side of the window frame.
| | 02:29 | Once I've done that, I'll take my
attention back to the Camera view, moving the
| | 02:33 | rock even further, so it's off the
screen, as far as what the camera can see.
| | 02:37 | When I do that, I'll want to make sure
to lock down to a single axis as I move.
| | 02:41 | When you have it in what you think is
the right place, go ahead and render the
| | 02:44 | Camera view to make sure the
rock is indeed out of the window.
| | 02:47 | Okay, let's go ahead and scrub the
Timeline between the first 35 frames and
| | 02:51 | see how that looks.
| | 02:52 | Now, we probably ought to add a
little roll to the ball to make it look as
| | 02:55 | if it's been thrown.
| | 02:56 | That rotational value will want to be set
at the same frame in which we ended our move.
| | 03:00 | That's going to be frame 35.
| | 03:02 | Now to make sure we locked down on
frame 35, let's use our Key mode Toggle.
| | 03:06 | You'll find that just the left of
where you see the frame number, in the lower
| | 03:09 | right-hand corner of the interface.
| | 03:11 | Go ahead and turn that on, then click the
right-hand side arrow on the Time slider.
| | 03:15 | This moves you then not one frame
at a time, but one key, having you land
| | 03:19 | directly on frame 35.
| | 03:21 | Now for our rotation, we probably are
going to need to take our Camera view
| | 03:24 | back to Perspective.
| | 03:25 | So with that viewport active, let's again type P.
| | 03:28 | They we'll zoom out of ways by rolling
our mouse wheel so we can see our rock.
| | 03:32 | Once we are there, we'll activate the
Rotate command, then rotate the rock as if
| | 03:35 | rolling forward, restricting
ourselves down at the red ring on our gizmo.
| | 03:39 | Now you don't have to go too far around;
| | 03:40 | we just want to create some gradual,
subtle movement to make things look a
| | 03:43 | little more realistic.
| | 03:45 | Once you've done that, again scrub
the Timeline to see how that looks.
| | 03:48 | If you are happy with the results, take
your Perspective view back to Camera by
| | 03:51 | typing C. Okay with that in place, we
can now concentrate on the Physical
| | 03:55 | Properties for our rock during the simulation.
| | 03:58 | This time around to get to the
Property Editor, we'll use Utilities column.
| | 04:02 | We'll activate that, heading
down to the Reactor commands.
| | 04:04 | Now, make sure before you do that
that you turn the Auto Key button off.
| | 04:08 | In the Properties section, down at the
bottom, we'll change the Mass of the rock to 25.
| | 04:12 | Because of the indentations that we
made in our rock with the Noise Modifier,
| | 04:16 | we'll change the object's Simulation
Geometry to Concave Mesh, just to make sure
| | 04:20 | our surface irregularities
are calculated correctly.
| | 04:23 | Several inches above that, we'll also want
to make sure Unyielding has been turned on.
| | 04:28 | That'll make sure that the other
objects in our scene react to making
| | 04:31 | contact with the rock
| | 04:33 | but that we can still use the original
manual key framing movement on the rock
| | 04:37 | during the simulation.
| | 04:38 | Now if you are a little unsure what I
meant by this last statement, be sure to
| | 04:41 | check out the video on the first
chapter that deals with assigning physical
| | 04:45 | properties to an object.
| | 04:46 | That will do it for the stuff
that we need to hand animate.
| | 04:49 | The rest of our key framing will be
automatically generated from the dynamic
| | 04:52 | simulation that will be running shortly.
| | 04:54 | First though, we'll need to get
everything into the appropriate type of collection.
| | 04:58 | We'll do that in the next video.
| | 04:59 | Let's go ahead and save our scene up
as Breaking Glass03, so we can take it
| | 05:03 | with us.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating the Rigid Body Collection| 00:00 | Now that we have our objects built and
their Physical Properties in place, we can
| | 00:04 | focus on adding our scene elements
into the appropriate type of collection.
| | 00:08 | We'll do all that using the file named
Breaking Glass03, which is a carryover
| | 00:12 | from the previous video.
| | 00:14 | Our goal here, throwing a rock through
a glass window, requires all of our scene
| | 00:18 | objects to remain rigid and non-deforming.
| | 00:21 | There's no soft pliable surfaces in this one,
| | 00:23 | so our search for the appropriate type
of collection to use for our simulation
| | 00:27 | ought to be driving us right in the
direction of using a rigid body collector.
| | 00:31 | Let's go ahead and get things set up.
| | 00:32 | Let's start by selecting only the frame.
| | 00:34 | Using the Reactor toolbar that's been
positioned on the left-hand side of our
| | 00:38 | interface, we'll go to the top icon,
clicking on Rigid Body Collection.
| | 00:42 | In the Collector commands on the right-
hand side, you'll notice that frame has
| | 00:45 | already been added in.
| | 00:46 | The reason being is it was selected when that
Rigid Body Collection was indeed created.
| | 00:51 | Now for the rock, let's choose the Pick command.
| | 00:53 | Over on the right, three
quarters of the way down, we'll click on Pick.
| | 00:56 | Now this requires us to then make a
selection from our scene. In the front view,
| | 00:59 | we'll click on the green rock.
| | 01:01 | That, too, has now been
added to our RB collection.
| | 01:04 | For those shards, we'll use the Add option.
| | 01:06 | Go ahead and click on that button.
| | 01:08 | Now from here, we can pick from a list.
| | 01:10 | Go to the top, dragging all the way
down from the first shard down to the
| | 01:13 | last. And when you've made that
selection in the lower right-hand corner, you
| | 01:17 | can then click Select.
| | 01:19 | Glancing to the right, you now notice
these have also been added to the collection.
| | 01:22 | With our scene objects now in place,
we're ready to run our simulation.
| | 01:26 | We'll do that in our next video.
| | 01:27 | Why don't we go ahead and save our
file out as Breaking Glass04 and we can
| | 01:31 | move on?
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Previewing the simulation| 00:00 | With our Rigid Body Collection now as
the official address for all of our scene
| | 00:04 | objects that will be
running through our simulation,
| | 00:07 | we can now proceed with a preview
to see how things are turning out.
| | 00:10 | We'll do that using the Breaking Glass04 file
that we saved up at the end of our last video.
| | 00:16 | Before we run any previews, let's take a
moment and talk about the options that
| | 00:19 | we have as far as choosing a
physics engine for our simulation.
| | 00:23 | In our first chapter in the video on
choosing the correct physics engine we
| | 00:27 | established the fact that when running a
rigid body simulation that either Havok
| | 00:31 | simulation engine 1 or
3 was up for the task.
| | 00:36 | After doing little
experimentation, I've concluded that for this
| | 00:39 | particular project the Havok 1
engine is going to give us the most
| | 00:42 | accurate and most reliable results.
| | 00:45 | For that reason, even though the
manuals will tell you that the newer Havok 3
| | 00:49 | engine is both faster and usually
yields a more accurate simulation when
| | 00:52 | running rigid bodies,
| | 00:54 | we're going to be sticking with
the older original Havok 1 physics
| | 00:57 | engine solution here.
| | 00:59 | Let's do a quick preview
and see how things look.
| | 01:02 | Using the Reactor toolbar we have
positioned on the left-hand side of our
| | 01:05 | screen, we'll drop down to the bottom
of our icons, choosing Preview Animation.
| | 01:11 | Before running this thing
through, remember your mouse options.
| | 01:15 | You can use the left mouse button to orbit.
| | 01:17 | You can use the middle mouse
button to both pan and zoom.
| | 01:23 | To get things rolling, we'll type P, for Play.
| | 01:30 | Let's watch that again, by first
resetting with R, then P again.
| | 01:43 | About three-quarters the way down,
let's open up the Havok 1 World tab.
| | 01:49 | Then for our Collision
Tolerance, let's lower that to about 2.
| | 01:54 | You may recall the Collision
Tolerance controls how close or how far apart
| | 01:58 | neighboring objects need to be in order
to detect or start feeling each other.
| | 02:02 | Let's see if that change makes any difference.
| | 02:05 | This time to run the preview, we'll
stay on the right-hand side, opening up the
| | 02:08 | Preview & Animation tab.
| | 02:11 | From here, we'll simply
click on Preview in Window.
| | 02:15 | Let's type P again.
| | 02:21 | Let's try moving our rock a little
and see how that changes the outcome.
| | 02:24 | We'll close the window, then make
that positional move in the front view.
| | 02:34 | Once we've done that, we'll preview again.
| | 02:38 | Positioned now a little more off to the
side, you can see how the rock is having
| | 02:41 | more of an impact on the frame.
| | 02:52 | Let's close the Preview Window, taking
our rock back to its original position.
| | 02:59 | Another accuracy tweak we might try of
getting of unpredictable results with our
| | 03:02 | sim is experimenting with increasing
the number of Substeps. Let's try that.
| | 03:07 | Back in the Utilities panel on the
right, that setting is a little bit above
| | 03:10 | the Preview button.
| | 03:11 | Let's take our Substeps/Key to 15.
| | 03:14 | This will increase the number of
calculations made at each keyframe.
| | 03:19 | With that number in place,
we'll then preview again.
| | 03:30 | Not much of a change there, with only a
slight difference--probably not worth the
| | 03:34 | added calculation time.
| | 03:36 | Let's take that Substeps/Key value
back to the default number of 10.
| | 03:42 | Now I don't know if you noticed down on
the Havok 1 World section, but we also
| | 03:46 | have controls for gravity.
| | 03:48 | These are kind of fun to play with.
| | 03:49 | Let's take the Z gravity to -100,
and we'll then run another sim.
| | 04:01 | So here you find the following
pieces falling not quite so aggressively.
| | 04:05 | Now, if you are wanting no gravitational
influence, we could take that Z value to 0.
| | 04:09 | Let's try that. Run things through again and
you can see the difference there.
| | 04:18 | The Gravity controls can even
be set in a positive direction.
| | 04:22 | Let's close the Preview window, setting
gravity in the Z direction to 300, and once
| | 04:28 | that number is in place previewing again.
| | 04:34 | Take a look at that. This time instead of the pieces
falling downwards, they are actually spiraling up.
| | 04:38 | Why don't we take the Z-based gravity
back to -300, and we'll try X at a thousand.
| | 04:44 | This should have the impact of pulling or
shattering objects to the side. Let's try that.
| | 04:51 | So there you go, the spinning pieces
now not just falling downward but also
| | 04:55 | being pushed fairly aggressively to the right.
| | 04:58 | Running a sim, you notice that you're
breaking apart objects need a little extra
| | 05:01 | glue applied to them in order to hold
together just a little bit longer before
| | 05:05 | they start going in their own directions.
| | 05:07 | You can apply something called a
fracture to those breaking-apart surfaces.
| | 05:12 | We'll take a look at how
that's done in the next video.
| | 05:14 | Let's go ahead and save our file up
as Breaking Glass05, and we'll take it
| | 05:18 | with us.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adding a fracture helper to improve realism| 00:00 | When creating rigid body simulations
where objects will come into contact with
| | 00:04 | other objects and as a result change
position, you'll find situations where
| | 00:08 | maybe a little extra binding agent needs
to be added in the mix in order to make
| | 00:12 | those breaking-apart sequences more realistic.
| | 00:15 | If that occurs, a special Reactor
helper object called a fracture can assist in
| | 00:20 | holding things together.
| | 00:21 | Let's see how adding a fracture or
to our shards of glass changes the way
| | 00:25 | that things break apart.
| | 00:26 | We'll do that using the Breaking Glass05 file,
which we brought with us from the last video.
| | 00:31 | We are going to want our fracture
helper to include all of our glass objects,
| | 00:35 | so let's first make that selection.
| | 00:37 | We can easily do that using the select
by name list by typing H. From the dialog
| | 00:42 | starting at the top, we'll select
all the objects named Glass Shards.
| | 00:48 | Let's now head to the Reactor toolbar
on the left-hand side of our screen.
| | 00:52 | The Fracture Helper, an icon named
fracture, can be found about three quarters
| | 00:56 | the way down the list.
| | 00:58 | It's the button that looks like a cube
with a zigzag line running through it.
| | 01:01 | Once you find that command, go ahead and click.
| | 01:05 | With the fracture now having been added
to our broken shard objects, let's head
| | 01:09 | to the Modify column.
| | 01:12 | The fracture provides an additional
set of controls as to how objects in the
| | 01:16 | fracture break apart.
| | 01:18 | The Energy Loss value is probably
the most influential fracture setting.
| | 01:23 | What it controls is the amount of
extra kinetic energy that is lost during a
| | 01:27 | collision due to the breaking
apart of the fracture bonds.
| | 01:30 | Put another way, energy loss kind of
dampens a collision with higher Energy Loss
| | 01:35 | values causing things to
hold together that much longer.
| | 01:38 | So, brittle objects would have a lower
Energy Loss, while something like maybe
| | 01:42 | rupturing concrete would appear more
realistic in the way it breaks apart by
| | 01:46 | using a higher Energy Loss value.
| | 01:49 | Let's see what changes the fracture might
have made to the way our glass breaks apart.
| | 01:53 | To run a preview, let's this
time use our Quad menu.
| | 01:56 | That's Shift+Alt+Right-click.
| | 02:00 | Then we can simply press P for Playback.
| | 02:06 | With the addition of the Fracture
Helper being now included in the
| | 02:09 | calculation, you'll notice the way
that things have slowed down dramatically
| | 02:13 | within that Preview window.
| | 02:15 | To temporarily change that,
we'll adjust our Substeps value.
| | 02:19 | In the Performance pulldown menu,
in that little column, we'll take our Substeps to 4.
| | 02:24 | Let's now play through again.
| | 02:28 | You can see how the glass shards
appear to be holding on to each other just
| | 02:32 | a little bit longer.
| | 02:33 | Let's experiment with a different Energy
Loss value and we'll see how that looks.
| | 02:41 | Back on the right-hand side, let's
change the Energy Loss to let's say 0.1.
| | 02:44 | Once you've done that, let's Preview again.
| | 02:58 | With the lower setting, you can see
that the additional glue laid on by the
| | 03:01 | fracture doesn't have quite
as much impact this go-round.
| | 03:05 | Let's see what an Energy Loss
value of 0.5 would look like.
| | 03:23 | You can see that with each change in
the Energy Loss value we're getting a
| | 03:26 | little bit of a different result.
| | 03:29 | How does that compare to
not using the Fracture Helper?
| | 03:32 | Let's do this. After closing the
Preview window on back on the right-hand side,
| | 03:35 | we've got a check mark we can
activate called Disable. Let's do that.
| | 03:40 | You'll find that control way down at the bottom.
| | 03:53 | I've got to be honest: because of the
extremely lightweight of our glass pane, we
| | 03:57 | really don't need that
extra level of fracture binding.
| | 03:59 | So in this case, why don't we simply
leave the fracture being disabled?
| | 04:04 | Now, if you wanted, as an alternative you
can always go in the scene, select it, and
| | 04:07 | delete it from the sim.
| | 04:09 | Either way, removed or disabled, it
will have no impact on our results.
| | 04:14 | So that will give you a little
background on using Fracture Helpers with a
| | 04:18 | Rigid Body Simulation.
| | 04:20 | If things seem to be exploding apart
too quick or with what seems to be not
| | 04:23 | enough resistance, make sure that
you consider using a fracture to help
| | 04:27 | alleviate that problem.
| | 04:29 | Let's go ahead and save our scene up as
Breaking Glass06, and we'll take it with
| | 04:33 | us into our next video where we'll
start adding a few materials to our scene.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Building the scene's materials| 00:00 | With our simulation now nearing
final output, let's see what we can do
| | 00:03 | about adding a few skins.
| | 00:05 | I'll be working with the Breaking
Glass06 scene file carried forward from
| | 00:09 | the previous video.
| | 00:10 | Why don't we start with our rock?
| | 00:13 | I'll select that, then head into the
Material Editor by typing M. With 3ds Max
| | 00:17 | shipping with a ton of ready-to-go
materials right off the shelf, let's
| | 00:21 | activate the Get Material command on the
horizontal icons and head to the Material Library.
| | 00:26 | With things being listed in
alphabetical order, let's drop down to the Stone
| | 00:29 | Materials and see what we can find.
| | 00:31 | Why don't we choose the
one named Stones_Altaqua?
| | 00:41 | To get the material from the
browser back into the Editor, we'll simply
| | 00:44 | double-click on the thumbnail icon.
| | 00:47 | Because we've pre-selected the rock, we
can now use the Assign to Selection icon
| | 00:53 | you'll find on the horizontal row of
icons third from the left-hand side.
| | 00:58 | For the frame for our glass, why
don't we see if we can't find a nice-
| | 01:01 | looking dark rich wood?
| | 01:03 | For that one I'll choose Wood Bubing.
| | 01:06 | This pre-made selection is designed to
make it look like a wood called the Bubinga.
| | 01:11 | With a clean sample slot selected, let's
go ahead and double-click on that thumbnail.
| | 01:17 | Once we've done that, we'll type H for
the Select by name list, we'll choose
| | 01:20 | the frame little more than halfway down, and we
can then again use the Assign to Selection Command.
| | 01:28 | As for the pieces of shard glass, the
most realistic representations for glass
| | 01:33 | in Max come from the terrific mental
ray materials that ship with the program.
| | 01:37 | To get to them though, we are going to
have to first switch rendering engines,
| | 01:41 | moving from 3ds Max's default Scan Line
Renderer over to the Mental Ray engine.
| | 01:46 | To do that, we'll first
close our browse, then hit F10--
| | 01:51 | F10 being the command to
open up Render Setup dialog.
| | 01:55 | Now for the changeover, we'll have to
drop down to the bottom of our Settings.
| | 02:01 | On arrival, you'll then
open up the Assign Render tab.
| | 02:04 | Then using the little button on the
right-hand side that looks like three dots,
| | 02:07 | you'll click directly across from Production.
| | 02:10 | From the Choose Renderer engine, we'll
now simply select mental ray Renderer.
| | 02:16 | That not just converts us over to a
higher end way of rendering, but it also
| | 02:20 | was the trick we needed to use to
open up the mental ray materials.
| | 02:24 | Closing that window, let's go back in
the Editor, selecting new sample slide.
| | 02:29 | Once done, we can drop back to the
Get Material button, clicking on it.
| | 02:33 | In the browser, let's go over to the top
and first close the regular Material Library.
| | 02:38 | Once that's been done, we can drop in
the Materials category, specifically the
| | 02:42 | mental ray materials.
| | 02:44 | From the selections, let's choose Arch & Design.
| | 02:49 | The Arch & Design material has a bunch of
really cool templates that we can take advantage of.
| | 02:54 | In the entry that reads Select a
template, let's open that up and from there
| | 02:58 | choose Glass (Thin Geometry).
| | 03:02 | Once that's been loaded, let's go
back in our scene, selecting all of our
| | 03:05 | glass shard pieces.
| | 03:06 | We can, again, use the handy H
shortcut key to make that happen.
| | 03:13 | With those selected, we
can then apply our material.
| | 03:16 | Now, for a little more realism in
our glass surface, let's also do this.
| | 03:21 | We'll head a little further down,
looking for the Index Of Refraction setting.
| | 03:27 | When you find that, let's type in 0.9.
And to crank up the appearance of the
| | 03:35 | material's believability even more,
let's drop even further down, opening up a
| | 03:39 | section called Advanced Rendering Options.
| | 03:44 | In there, you'll find a category called
Advanced Transparency Options. Where it
| | 03:49 | says Glass/Translucency treat
objects as, we'll change that over to Solid.
| | 03:53 | That will make sure that both sides of
our surface render, as opposed to simply one.
| | 03:59 | In the chapter video where we modeled
our glass shard objects, you'll remember
| | 04:03 | that we created a second piece of
glass that was meant to remain whole.
| | 04:07 | That object, too, will need
this new glass material.
| | 04:10 | So back in one of the views,
right-click, choosing Unhide by Name.
| | 04:17 | From the list, let's then choose Glass Solid.
| | 04:21 | Now that it's in view, let's go
ahead and select that surface.
| | 04:27 | With it selected, we'll turn our
attention back to the Materials Editor, applying
| | 04:30 | that newly created glass surface.
| | 04:32 | Once you've done that, we'll go
back in the viewports, hiding, once again,
| | 04:36 | that solid glass object.
| | 04:40 | With the Camera view selected,
let's go ahead and render things up.
| | 04:46 | Rendered up against a solid black
background, it's very difficult to see any
| | 04:50 | detail whatsoever in our glass
shard objects. So let's do this.
| | 04:54 | We are going to change the color of
our background to kind of a lighter gray.
| | 04:58 | To make that change, we'll go to an icon
at the top of the Rendered Frame window.
| | 05:02 | It's called Environment and
Effects dialog. Go ahead and click there.
| | 05:05 | That color of our background is being
controlled by the color swatch in the
| | 05:09 | upper left-hand corner.
| | 05:10 | Let's go ahead and click on that swatch.
| | 05:14 | In the color selector, using the
ramps on the right, we'll drop down to
| | 05:17 | Value, typing in 150.
| | 05:20 | Once that's in place, we'll
close the window and render again.
| | 05:27 | That'll do it for our materials.
| | 05:29 | Let's save our file up as Breaking
Glass07, and we'll move into the next video,
| | 05:33 | where we'll create the actual
keyframes for our simulation.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating the keyframed animation| 00:00 | With the movement of our simulated
objects now in place, let's go ahead and
| | 00:04 | create the actual keys for our sim.
| | 00:06 | We'll do that using the Breaking Glass07 file
that we saved up at the end of our last video.
| | 00:12 | Before creating our keys, let's check
out some of the numbers that we've been
| | 00:15 | using for our animation over in
the Command panel's Utilities column.
| | 00:21 | Let's do this. Why don't we start by adding a
couple of extra frames to the end of our file?
| | 00:25 | We've been running things using
simply the default 100 frames.
| | 00:30 | In the Previews & Animation section,
let's change our in End Frame time to 125.
| | 00:39 | Once we've done that, we're also going
to want to change our total length time
| | 00:42 | down in our timeline.
| | 00:43 | Couple of ways we could do this.
| | 00:45 | We could always simply right-click on
any of the playback arrows down on the
| | 00:48 | lower-right corner, from the dialog about
halfway down on the left changing the End Time.
| | 00:54 | But instead, let's do this. Hold down
the Ctrl+Alt and right mouse buttons. Then
| | 01:00 | position your mouse on the
right-hand side of the Timeline.
| | 01:04 | When you're in that position with
the keys down and the right mouse
| | 01:06 | button depressed, drag your mouse
to the left until you see the number
| | 01:10 | 125 on the Timeline.
| | 01:12 | This is simply a shortcut way of
being able to expand your length of time.
| | 01:17 | Back in the Utilities column, just
so we can ratchet up the level of our
| | 01:20 | precision or accuracy a little bit higher,
let's change our Substeps/Key to let's say 13.
| | 01:28 | During our previews, we were getting
pretty darn good results using a value of 10.
| | 01:32 | Taking things up to 13, we'll just
fine-tune things just a little bit more.
| | 01:36 | I think that gets us ready to go.
| | 01:38 | Now, like in all circumstances, before
creating keys--keys being pretty permanent
| | 01:42 | in nature--we want to go ahead
and hold at this point in time.
| | 01:46 | We'll go to the Edit
pulldown menu, choosing Hold.
| | 01:48 | You could have also easily
used the Ctrl+8 shortcut.
| | 01:52 | That gets us ready to go. Let's use the
Quad menu this time to create our keys.
| | 01:56 | We'll Shift+Alt+Right-click.
| | 01:57 | Then in the menu, we'll drop to the lower
right-hand quadrant, choosing Create Animation.
| | 02:04 | When Max's warning comes up saying are
you sure this is exactly what you want to
| | 02:08 | do, creating those keys, we'll simply say OK.
| | 02:12 | Once the calculations have been
made, we can close any open boxes and
| | 02:16 | play things through.
| | 02:17 | Now when you do, you are going to want
to make sure that Camera view is active
| | 02:20 | before beginning your play.
| | 02:23 | When you play things back, just so you
know, that little bobbling-around blue box
| | 02:27 | that you see was that disabled
fracture that we took out of play.
| | 02:31 | You could always, if it's kind of gets
in your way, select that fracture and
| | 02:34 | right-click > hide it.
| | 02:35 | I'll do that, then play things again.
| | 02:42 | Now I am kind of interested to
see how the glass turned out.
| | 03:02 | Let's move to a frame where things have kind
of broken apart and render our Camera view.
| | 03:06 | Seeing things for the first time, I
think it was a good idea the way we changed
| | 03:16 | both the Index Of Refraction and the
two-sided option on that glass material.
| | 03:21 | Let's try a different frame.
| | 03:35 | Why don't we take that Camera view
full screen so we can get a closer look?
| | 04:01 | Okay, that's looking pretty good,
but there's one more thing that we are
| | 04:04 | going to need to do.
| | 04:05 | Our glass pane doesn't start off as
being broken when the animation begins, or
| | 04:10 | at least it shouldn't.
| | 04:12 | So as a final step we are going to
have to set up a visibility track where we
| | 04:15 | can unhide that original second box
that we created and flip, at the point of
| | 04:20 | contact, rock to window, one object out
for another--actually several objects,
| | 04:24 | those being the individual shards
of broken glass. So let's do this.
| | 04:28 | We'll save our scene out as Breaking
Glass08, and we'll move into the final video
| | 04:33 | for our project, where we'll set up
that all-important visibility track.
| | 04:37 | Let's go ahead and do that.
| | 04:39 | I'll see you in the next video.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Setting up the visibility track for the glass| 00:00 | The only thing left to do is set up
the visibility track that will have our
| | 00:04 | animation seeing the solid sheet of
glass in the beginning before the thrown
| | 00:08 | rock hits, then the individual
exploding shards of glass once the rock makes
| | 00:13 | contact with the glass pane.
| | 00:15 | We will set that up using the
Breaking Glass08 file, saved as we wrapped up
| | 00:20 | the previous video.
| | 00:22 | Let's scrub our timeline around the
time the glass breaks, and we'll see if we
| | 00:25 | can tell at what specific frame the
rock makes contact with the window.
| | 00:34 | So, it will be frame 11 where we set up the
switch with what's visible and what's not.
| | 00:39 | Let's go ahead and
unhide our solid glass object.
| | 00:42 | To do that, we will right-
click, choosing Unhide by name.
| | 00:45 | We named it Glass Solid.
| | 00:48 | Now that we have got it in the field
to play, we will go ahead and select
| | 00:51 | that glass solid object.
| | 00:53 | Visibility tracks are
configured in the Dope Sheet.
| | 00:57 | With the object selected, we will now
right-click, and then from the menu at the
| | 01:00 | bottom, we will choose Dope Sheet.
| | 01:05 | So we can more easily work,
| | 01:06 | I will now expand that viewing area.
| | 01:14 | Once we are in better position, we will
see the object name, Glass Solid, at the
| | 01:18 | bottom of the list on the left.
| | 01:19 | On that name, open up the
Plus sign to the left-hand side.
| | 01:24 | Now, click directly on the
text that reads Glass Solid.
| | 01:28 | This is our way of telling Max
what we now want to work on.
| | 01:31 | The visibility tracks are added
from the pulldown menu at the top.
| | 01:37 | You'll choose Tracks > Visibility Track > Add.
| | 01:41 | Once that's done, you'll see an added
entry now directly below Glass Solid.
| | 01:45 | Click on that name.
| | 01:46 | It reads Visibility.
| | 01:47 | What we are now going to want to do
is change the type of controller that's
| | 01:51 | controlling the way the visibility track works.
| | 01:53 | We are going to be using an on/off
controller, which will set up our Visibility
| | 01:57 | to work kind of like a light switch toggle.
| | 02:00 | Our visibility will either be on or off.
| | 02:02 | With that Visibility name selected,
we will now go back to the pulldown
| | 02:06 | menu, this time choosing
the Controller category.
| | 02:08 | When we get inside, we will
choose the top entry Assign.
| | 02:13 | From the dialog list, we will go
about three quarters the way down,
| | 02:15 | double-clicking on On/Off.
| | 02:19 | That gives us our On/Off controller.
| | 02:21 | Now, here is the way it works.
| | 02:22 | You see the blue line.
| | 02:24 | Any frame on which that blue line
lies, that flame will be visible within
| | 02:28 | the field of action.
| | 02:29 | Any time we have a frame where the blue
line is not on top of it, at that point
| | 02:33 | that object would be invisible.
| | 02:35 | The way that you turn the
visibility line on and off is by adding keys.
| | 02:38 | There is a command to help you do that.
| | 02:40 | Up on the toolbar, it looks like a
squiggly line with a Plus sign right above it.
| | 02:44 | Go and click that button.
| | 02:45 | Here is what's going to happen.
| | 02:47 | We want our solid glass object to
stay visible until that 11th fame.
| | 02:52 | So, with Add key on, put your mouse on
top of the blue line right around frame 11.
| | 02:57 | When you are there, go ahead and click.
| | 02:58 | Now, it doesn't have to be exact, because
after the fact we can move things around.
| | 03:02 | Go to the line and click.
| | 03:04 | Once you've done that, look
down at the bottom of Dope Sheet.
| | 03:08 | Right around the middle, you'll see
the frame at which you have created
| | 03:11 | that newly created key.
| | 03:12 | In this case, I am a little
bit off being at Frame 14.
| | 03:14 | I will highlight that 14 number and
instead type an 11, then press Enter.
| | 03:19 | Here is what we have done here.
| | 03:21 | This solid sheet of glass will remain
visible over the first 11 frames of our animation.
| | 03:26 | After that, you see the blue line being gone;
| | 03:28 | it will then disappear.
| | 03:29 | We are now going to want to do the
exact opposite for all the glass shards.
| | 03:34 | For that, let's minimize the Dope Sheet,
and we will select those shard objects.
| | 03:39 | Back in the viewport, the easiest way to go is
the select by name command. So, let's type H.
| | 03:44 | From the list, we will now
select all the Glass Shard objects.
| | 03:49 | Once that's done, we can go ahead and
maximize the Dope Sheet that we have
| | 03:52 | tucked away in the lower left-hand corner.
| | 03:56 | These green and red squares you see are
all the keys that were created when we
| | 04:00 | generated our simulation.
| | 04:01 | What we will now need to do, just like
we did on the original solid object, is
| | 04:05 | open each of the Glass Shards.
| | 04:07 | We can do that by clicking on the Plus
sign to the left of each of those names.
| | 04:11 | I am going to start off at the
bottom of the list, working my way up.
| | 04:20 | Once I've done that, I will reposition
myself so I can see all seven shard objects.
| | 04:25 | Now to add the visibility tracks, we
will want to select each name, holding down
| | 04:29 | the Ctrl key as we make the next selection.
| | 04:34 | Now, we can add each object's
visibility track all at the same time.
| | 04:38 | We'll hit back to the Tracks
pulldown, choosing Visibility > Add.
| | 04:45 | Here again, we are going to want to
change over to the On/Off controller.
| | 04:48 | So, select one visibility track. Then hold
down the Ctrl key, getting the other six.
| | 04:54 | Back to the pulldown menu, this time
using Controller, we will choose Assign.
| | 05:00 | And in the dialog, we will find then
double-click on On/Off. There you go.
| | 05:05 | In one fell swoop, we have visibility tracks
for all seven of our broken window objects.
| | 05:10 | What we will now do is correctly set the
visibility for one of the shard objects,
| | 05:14 | then copy and pastes that
information to each of the others.
| | 05:17 | Let's look at the one on the top.
| | 05:19 | Now, with our shards, we are going to
do exactly the opposite of what we did
| | 05:23 | with the solid glass.
| | 05:24 | This will start off being invisible.
| | 05:26 | It won't be until the actual contact with
the rock is made where these will turn on.
| | 05:30 | So, to turn the visibility track off to
start, using the Add key button, we will
| | 05:34 | click anywhere before frame 0.
| | 05:38 | As you can see, once we have
clicked, the blue line has disappeared.
| | 05:41 | We can now go as close as
possible to frame 11 and click again.
| | 05:46 | What that does is reinitiate the blue line;
| | 05:48 | therefore, anything after
that will then be visible.
| | 05:52 | In my case, I got lucky and I hit it
right at frame 11, so there's no reason to
| | 05:55 | go down to the bottom and make any changes.
| | 05:57 | What I will now want to do is to activate a
command on the toolbar called Select Time.
| | 06:02 | You'll find it directly
below the Options pulldown menu.
| | 06:05 | Once you click on that, working
in the visibility track, you will hold
| | 06:10 | your left mouse down, dragging all the way
from one side to the other of the Dope Sheet.
| | 06:15 | Go ahead and do so.
| | 06:19 | This simply tells Max the length of
time that we are not wanting to copy from
| | 06:23 | one object to another.
| | 06:24 | Once you've done that, a little
farther to the right on the toolbar, you
| | 06:27 | will find Copy Time.
| | 06:30 | When you locate the icon, go ahead and click.
| | 06:33 | This will store that
information on Max's clipboard.
| | 06:36 | Now, it's simply a matter of
selecting all the other visibility tracks.
| | 06:40 | We will click on one, then hold down the Ctrl
key to make the remainder of our selection.
| | 06:44 | Don't leave something out, so be extra
careful that you go all the way down to
| | 06:53 | the bottom of that list.
| | 06:55 | Once you're done with that, directly to the
right of Copy Time, you will find Paste Time.
| | 07:01 | When your mouse is in position, click on that.
| | 07:04 | In the options that open, leave it set to
Paste Absolute and click OK. There you go.
| | 07:10 | The correct visibility track is now
transferred over to all your Shard objects.
| | 07:15 | Let's close the Dope Sheet and scrub
the timeline and see how things look.
| | 07:29 | So that turned out looking good.
| | 07:30 | We have got the solid sheet of glass
hanging around until frame 11, then right
| | 07:34 | at the point of contact, it turning off,
visibility-wise, with all the glass shard
| | 07:38 | pieces than being visible.
| | 07:40 | Why don't we go and render a couple of
important frames out and see how things look?
| | 07:48 | So, in the beginning of our animation at
frame 0, we have got the solid sheet of glass.
| | 07:53 | Let's now move to frame where
things should be broken apart.
| | 08:03 | And here, I've rendered frame 16.
| | 08:05 | You can see the solid sheet having
disappeared while each shard is very much visible.
| | 08:12 | There you go. That will wrap the project up.
| | 08:16 | If we now took a few minutes and
rendered this baby out, our final movie would
| | 08:19 | turn out looking like this.
| | 08:21 | You can find the movie called Breaking Glass
in the Exercise files chapter for this folder.
| | 08:26 | So that's going to do it for creating a
dynamic simulation that incorporates a
| | 08:30 | rigid body collection.
| | 08:31 | We used a pretty neat trick to break
up the glass, had a chance to add a few
| | 08:35 | materials into the mix, and worked a
visibility track into play so we could
| | 08:39 | hide one thing and unhide
a whole bunch of others.
| | 08:42 | I hope you enjoyed the project.
| | 08:44 | I'll save the scene out as Breaking
Glass Completed, if you'd like to look
| | 08:47 | it over.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
3. Project: Creating a Soft Body Animated MazeProject overview| 00:00 | In this project, we are going see if we
can't get a few Soft Body objects to run
| | 00:04 | through an animated maze. Allowing the
timeline to play through a few times, we
| | 00:09 | will be able to see exactly what's happening.
| | 00:11 | The scene consists of a series of
revolving paddles and a slanted wooden ramp
| | 00:16 | down at floor level.
| | 00:17 | There's also been a handful of
stationary pegs situated at various locations in
| | 00:21 | the scene to give our Soft Body
objects a few more things to interact with.
| | 00:25 | Here's what going happen.
| | 00:27 | We are going to be dropping a few
objects from overhead down on to the maze.
| | 00:31 | Those objects, being deformable surfaces,
will bend and twist as they make their
| | 00:36 | way down to ground level.
| | 00:38 | Once hitting the ramp, taking in their
direction of travel in whichever way it goes.
| | 00:42 | The project will require us to set up
physical properties and the appropriate
| | 00:47 | collections for both rigid-
body and Soft Body objects.
| | 00:50 | We will also have a chance to discuss
and play around with the settings on
| | 00:54 | Reactors Soft Body Modifier,
a necessary add on to any deformable surface that
| | 01:00 | plans on being included in
a 3ds Max dynamics simulation.
| | 01:04 | When we are done with making a few
adjustments and creating our final keys, our
| | 01:08 | project will end up looking like this.
| | 01:15 | Looks like it ought to be fun.
| | 01:17 | We will get things going in the next video.
| | 01:19 | Let's go check it out.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Setting up the scene's rigid bodies| 00:00 | The scene elements for our Soft Body maze
project have been set up and are ready to go.
| | 00:05 | The file has been named Soft Body
Maze and can be found in the appropriate
| | 00:09 | chapter folder in the exercise files.
| | 00:12 | In this video, we're going to be
concentrating on setting up the Object
| | 00:15 | Properties and adding the correct
collection type for our rigid body objects.
| | 00:19 | Everything you currently see in view
will end up as being part of our simulation,
| | 00:24 | so each object will have to be
assigned a certain set of physical properties.
| | 00:29 | Let's switch over to working with
the left view full screen, and we'll
| | 00:32 | begin setting things up.
| | 00:34 | We can make that viewport change
using the Alt+W keyboard shortcut.
| | 00:40 | The yellow wireframe objects
are scene's stationary pegs.
| | 00:45 | Each will look and act the
same during the simulation.
| | 00:48 | Because of that, we can set the
Properties up for each all at the same time.
| | 00:53 | To select them, let's use a handy
selection tool in Max that lets you select
| | 00:57 | things by the wireframe color.
| | 01:00 | You'll find the command in the Edit
pulldown menu in the upper left-hand corner.
| | 01:03 | You'll choose Edit > Select By > Color.
| | 01:08 | We can now position the mouse on
top of any yellow object and click.
| | 01:14 | After making your selection, we
can access Reactor's Property Editor.
| | 01:18 | This time around, we'll use the
Reactor toolbar positioned on the left-hand
| | 01:21 | side of our screen.
| | 01:30 | Because none of the pegs will move
during the simulation, we can leave our
| | 01:34 | object's Mass, or weight setting
in other words, at the default 0.
| | 01:38 | For the Simulation Geometry option,
because of the peg's shape, we'll leave that
| | 01:43 | set to Mesh Convex Hull.
| | 01:46 | Once verifying those settings, you can
go ahead and close the Property Editor.
| | 01:50 | Let's now go to work on
the spinning pink paddles.
| | 01:53 | To select those, we'll do it one at a
time, holding down the Ctrl key once we
| | 01:57 | make our first selection.
| | 02:04 | This time, to gain access to the
Property Editor, we'll use the handy
| | 02:07 | Shift+Alt+Right-click keyboard shortcut.
| | 02:10 | From the Quad menu in the lower right-hand
quadrant, we'll choose Open Property Editor.
| | 02:16 | For the paddles, we'll again leave the
Mass setting at 0 and the Simulation
| | 02:20 | Geometry set to Mesh Convex Hull.
| | 02:23 | Because each of the paddles in our
scene is animated, we're going to want to
| | 02:26 | make sure to turn on Unyielding.
| | 02:31 | Now, we can go to work on the dark blue floor.
| | 02:33 | We can select that in the view with
this time activating the Property Editor
| | 02:37 | over the Utilities column in the Command panel.
| | 02:45 | For the floor, we'll leave the Mass set
to 0 and because of its basic shape, we
| | 02:50 | can change the Simulation
Geometry to Bounding Box.
| | 02:55 | The last object we'll need to worry
about at this point is the light blue ramp.
| | 03:00 | For this shape, we can leave the
Mass set to 0, but we want to change the
| | 03:04 | Simulation Geometry to Concave Mesh.
| | 03:07 | Now, that's going to be a very important
step, so make sure you use the correct setting.
| | 03:15 | With the physical property set up,
we can now start thinking about a
| | 03:18 | collection for these guys.
| | 03:20 | Being that they'll serve as our
simulation's non-deforming rigid objects, we can
| | 03:24 | through them all into a rigid body collection.
| | 03:26 | We'll select everything in our scene
below the bright green ball, and we'll head
| | 03:30 | to the toolbar on the left.
| | 03:33 | Way at the top of the toolbar,
we'll find our Rigid Body Collection.
| | 03:42 | When you've located the
command, go ahead and click.
| | 03:45 | The objects have now been
placed into an RB collection.
| | 03:48 | Let's go ahead and move that
Rigid Body icon over to the right.
| | 03:50 | That will do it for our rigid bodies.
| | 03:55 | Let's save our scene up as Soft Body
Maze 01, and we'll move into the next video
| | 03:59 | where we'll start focusing
on our soft body surfaces.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adding the soft bodies into the simulation| 00:00 | With the rigid body elements of
our scene now in place, we can start
| | 00:04 | concentrating on the Soft
Body objects on our simulation.
| | 00:07 | We'll be using a file name Soft Body
Maze01 that was saved and carried forward
| | 00:11 | from the previous video.
| | 00:13 | Our project's deformable objects are
both found at the top of our screen.
| | 00:18 | Let's zoom in a little
closer, and we'll talk things over.
| | 00:22 | In the introductory chapter of our title,
we established the fact that deformable
| | 00:26 | body objects, in order to be included in
a Reactor dynamic simulation, work just a
| | 00:31 | little bit differently
than rigid body objects do--
| | 00:34 | that difference being that, an order
for an object to appear soft and pliable,
| | 00:39 | it must be placed in not just a
different type of Reactor collection, but it
| | 00:43 | will also need a special type of
modifier applied to it in order to be put into
| | 00:47 | that collection--that modifier
being called a Soft Body Modifier.
| | 00:52 | Let's begin by working on the green ball.
| | 00:55 | Now the Soft Body Modifier can
be found and applied from a couple
| | 00:58 | different places in Max.
| | 00:59 | With the object selected, one of
those locations would be the Animation
| | 01:03 | pulldown menu at the top,
| | 01:05 | going down to Reactor, then
choosing Apply Modifier, then Soft Body.
| | 01:16 | We won't choose that direction here.
| | 01:20 | You can also find the
modifier in the Quad menu, using the
| | 01:23 | Shift+Alt+Right-click shortcut--
| | 01:27 | again, a direction will choose not to take.
| | 01:30 | Now if you are more custom to gaining
access to the modifier through the Reactor
| | 01:33 | toolbar, you can head closer to the
bottom, looking for an icon that resembles a
| | 01:38 | basketball with an M on
its lower right-hand side.
| | 01:41 | That's going to be the
option we're going to use here.
| | 01:48 | We'll head down the toolbar, finding the
basketball, then clicking with our mouse.
| | 01:52 | In the Modify column, you'll see not
just the entry in the stack, but the
| | 01:57 | Modifier options down below.
| | 02:00 | Now in order for the ball to show up in
our simulation, we're now going to need
| | 02:04 | to add the appropriate collection.
| | 02:06 | In this case, that's going
to be a Soft Body Collection.
| | 02:09 | To create that collection this
time, we'll use the Quad menu.
| | 02:13 | Let's hold down Shift+Alt, then right-click.
| | 02:17 | Okay, there it is up on the left-hand
side. We'll choose Soft Body Collection.
| | 02:26 | Let's head back to using four views,
and we will run a preview to see how
| | 02:29 | things look so far.
| | 02:31 | Doing a preview at this point will
also give us a chance to make sure that we
| | 02:34 | haven't somehow left
something out of our sim object-wise.
| | 02:38 | Let's go ahead and activate the preview.
| | 02:39 | Again, I'll use the Quad menu.
| | 02:46 | Now, from here, to play things back, we'll
simply type P. Because of the number of
| | 02:51 | calculations that are taking place, we
may very well need to lower the number of
| | 02:55 | substeps per keyframe that
we're using for our simulation.
| | 02:58 | Now you can do that a couple of different ways:
| | 03:00 | one more temporarily and
one a little more permanent.
| | 03:26 | In the Preview window, let's go up to
Performance, and we'll change to 5 substeps.
| | 03:32 | We'll now reset our preview, typing R,
then playing things back with the P command.
| | 03:51 | Things are still a little bit on the
slow side, so let's change that substeps
| | 03:55 | down a little lower still.
| | 03:56 | Back under Performance, let's
this time try 2 substeps levels.
| | 04:01 | Resetting and then playing back.
| | 04:03 | So in the simulation, you see the ball
ricocheting off of a few paddles and pegs
| | 04:08 | then landing finally on the angled ramp.
| | 04:15 | Let's close the Preview window,
and start working on our orange rubber bat.
| | 04:22 | As another soft deformable surface, we'll
again need to add the Soft Body Modifier.
| | 04:27 | Let's go ahead and do that.
| | 04:32 | And to make sure it makes it into our
simulation, we'll select the Soft Body
| | 04:36 | Collection and then add the bat in.
| | 04:43 | Once you've made the assignment, verify the
name Rubber Bat over the right-hand column.
| | 04:47 | Let's now create another preview.
| | 04:53 | Now we know we're going to have to
turn our performance down a little bit, so
| | 04:55 | let's right away change our substeps value to 2.
| | 05:01 | Once we've done that,
we'll go ahead and play things back.
| | 05:09 | Okay, now we obviously have a problem here.
| | 05:11 | Let's stop, close our
window, and think things over.
| | 05:15 | In troubleshooting a soft-body
simulation, one of the first things we ought to
| | 05:19 | consider when getting such a dismally
slow preview is just exactly how our two
| | 05:24 | soft body modifiers are being calculated.
| | 05:27 | Let's start with taking a look at the ball.
| | 05:32 | Over in the Modifier column, as we've
previously discussed, Soft Body Modifiers
| | 05:36 | offer two very distinct and very
different methods of calculating the way a Soft
| | 05:41 | Body object deforms.
| | 05:43 | The first modifier
method is known as Mesh-Based,
| | 05:46 | meaning that the calculation for the
object's deformation is derived specifically
| | 05:51 | from the detail in the underline
mesh surface--hence the name Mesh-Based.
| | 05:56 | Calculating a simulation based on an
object's geometry typically works best
| | 06:00 | when the deforming surface
consists of 200 faces or less.
| | 06:04 | Checking the weight on the ball, we'll
see that it indeed falls within that
| | 06:07 | 200-count threshold.
| | 06:09 | To verify that, we'll right-click on
the ball and choose Object Properties.
| | 06:14 | Up at the top, in the left-hand side,
you'll notice the face count being at 180.
| | 06:18 | Now that rubber foam bat, I'm willing to bet ya,
is a different story face count-wise.
| | 06:23 | Let's check it out.
| | 06:25 | We'll select the bat, then again
right-click, choosing Object Properties.
| | 06:29 | Yeah, just as I suspected.
Look at its face count: 1,120.
| | 06:35 | So if we are given an opportunity to
calculate things differently with a Soft
| | 06:38 | Body Modifier, we might indeed want to
at least consider doing so with an object
| | 06:43 | that has as many faces as our bat.
| | 06:45 | Looking directly below the Mesh-Based
option, you'll come across the second
| | 06:49 | method of calculation
for the Soft Body Modifier,
| | 06:52 | that being something called FFD-Based.
| | 06:55 | Using an FFD-Based configuration means
that any object deformation calculations
| | 07:00 | made will be based on or will come
from a freeform-deformation-type modifier
| | 07:05 | that's been applied to that object.
| | 07:07 | And that setup usually allows Max a
more efficient way of calculating the
| | 07:11 | deformation for a higher face-
count object. So let's do that.
| | 07:15 | With the bat far exceeding
the suggested 200 face limit for
| | 07:18 | mesh-based calculations,
| | 07:20 | in the Modify column we'll change
the bats calculation to FFD-Based.
| | 07:27 | Once that option has been changed, we
can then drop below the Soft Body Modifier
| | 07:31 | in the stack and add in an FFD modifier.
| | 07:34 | When the warning comes up,
we can go ahead and say Yes.
| | 07:40 | In the Modifier List, we'll use the
box style of FFD, which will give us a
| | 07:44 | little more freedom in determining the number
of control lines in our deforming lattice cage.
| | 07:49 | Once we've applied that FFD, because of
the shape of our bat, let's change the
| | 07:53 | lattice layout to 10x3x3.
| | 07:56 | We can do that in the Dimensions
category, clicking on the Set Number of Points,
| | 08:01 | and from here we'll simply enter our numbers.
| | 08:04 | We use a Length of 10, and we'll
change both the Width and the Height to 3.
| | 08:13 | Let's now make another
preview and see how things turn out.
| | 08:20 | With each and every vertex on both the
bat and the ball being animated, as you
| | 08:23 | can see, the preview still lags quite a bit.
| | 08:33 | Now that we've optimized the Soft Body
Modifier as best as we can, we can now go
| | 08:37 | back in and consider lowering, once and
for all, the substep calculation value.
| | 08:42 | Doing so will cost us a little bit of
accuracy at this point, but it will allow us to
| | 08:46 | pick up some speed playback-wise.
| | 08:48 | In our Preview window, let's see
how things would playback using a
| | 08:51 | substeps value of 3.
| | 08:58 | So that's a little better
improvement on the way that we're able to see
| | 09:01 | things being played back.
| | 09:02 | The Soft Body Modifier has a few
additional controls that we can now tweak in
| | 09:06 | order to change the way our ball and bat deform.
| | 09:09 | We'll take a look at those
adjustments in the next video.
| | 09:12 | Before we do that though, let's save
our file up as Soft Body Maze02, so we
| | 09:16 | can take it with us.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with the Soft Body Modifier settings| 00:00 | When used in conjunction with a Soft
Body Collection, the Soft Body Modifier
| | 00:04 | offers a powerful set of controls
that allow you to change the way a soft,
| | 00:08 | pliable object flexes and bends.
| | 00:11 | That's exactly what we're going to
need to do on our project's bat and ball:
| | 00:15 | tweak the numbers a bit to get
just the look that we're aiming for.
| | 00:18 | To do all that, we'll be using the Soft
Body Maize02 scene file that was saved
| | 00:23 | at the end of our last video.
| | 00:24 | Why don't we start by first fiddling
around with the Soft Body Modifier settings
| | 00:28 | that we have controlling our ball.
| | 00:30 | We'll select the ball in the view,
then head over to the Modifier column.
| | 00:33 | Irrespective of whether you've decided
on using a mesh-based or FFD-based method
| | 00:41 | to calculate your deformations, the Soft
Body Modifier offers four primary property
| | 00:46 | controls in order to change the way
your Soft Body object responds to coming
| | 00:50 | into contact with something else in your scene.
| | 00:52 | The one right at the top of the
Properties tab, the Mass setting, affects an
| | 00:56 | object's behavior at the time in
which it collides with another surface.
| | 01:00 | For this particular sim, changing that
number around quite honestly doesn't do a
| | 01:04 | heck of a lot to alter our outcome.
| | 01:06 | So with that in mind, we'll leave this
setting at its default value of 1 kilogram.
| | 01:11 | What will make a difference as to how
things look is the Stiffness setting,
| | 01:15 | which is used to control just how stiff or
how rigid an object appears during a sim.
| | 01:19 | Now you don't need a huge variance
in the value in order to noticeably
| | 01:23 | affect the turnout.
| | 01:24 | So we'll keep the number low,
changing the Stiffness from 0.2 to 0.6.
| | 01:30 | Before we do our previews, as a way of
speeding things up being that right now
| | 01:34 | we're only looking to adjust
the responsiveness of the ball,
| | 01:37 | let's temporarily remove the
rubber bat from our simulation.
| | 01:41 | We can do that by selecting the
Soft Body Collection icon on the scene,
| | 01:44 | then on the right-hand column
choosing Rubber Bat in the list.
| | 01:51 | Once we've made that selection, we
can go ahead and click on the Delete.
| | 01:56 | Doing this won't delete the
wireframe bat from a scene;
| | 01:59 | it's meant to only remove it
from the Soft Body Collection.
| | 02:02 | Let's check things out with a preview.
| | 02:07 | Once the Preview window is opened, let's go
up to Performance, changing our substeps to 3.
| | 02:14 | Now we can go ahead and play
things back, typing P on the keyboard.
| | 02:23 | Now, that's awfully bouncy.
| | 02:36 | Let's take the ball's
Stiffness back to around 0.4.
| | 02:41 | And with the changes made, we
can now run another Preview.
| | 02:58 | Back on the right, Damping determines
how long it takes for a pliable surface to
| | 03:02 | return to its original shape,
| | 03:04 | lower numbers having the affect to the object
taking longer to return to its initial look.
| | 03:10 | To show you how damping would affect our ball,
let's the value to 0 and see what happens.
| | 03:25 | With the ball maintaining its original
shape pretty much from start to finish,
| | 03:28 | you can see how it really bounces
around from one object to the next.
| | 03:43 | Let's see how a Damping value of 0.4 would look.
| | 03:48 | Before we run our next preview, let's
first change the substep value over in
| | 03:52 | the Utilities column.
| | 03:54 | By typing the number in there, we'll
permanently lock things down into that lower value.
| | 04:00 | Once we're in the column, we'll head
up to the Preview and Animation section.
| | 04:03 | Then to the right of
Substeps/Key we'll type in 3.
| | 04:09 | While we're over here, let's go ahead
and use the Preview in Window command
| | 04:15 | directly below that.
| | 04:20 | So with our Damping control set to 0.4, you
can see things look a little more realistic.
| | 04:41 | Back to the Modifier column settings
on the right, Friction will determine
| | 04:44 | how our ball will either slide or grab onto
a surface that it comes into contact with.
| | 04:49 | Let's take that number down to
0.1 and see how things turn out.
| | 04:58 | With less Friction and grab, you can
see how the ball continues to slide right
| | 05:02 | off the side of our scene.
| | 05:03 | Why don't we also try Friction value at
the opposite end of the spectrum? Like 1.
| | 05:09 | And we'll see how that
looks as a point of comparison.
| | 05:12 | Boy, what a difference that made!
| | 05:24 | Once it's done colliding with the
other objects in the scene, it pretty much
| | 05:27 | stops dead in its tracks.
| | 05:29 | After all of our fussing around, things
will probably look best if we simply keep
| | 05:33 | our default setting on our Friction at 0.5,
| | 05:35 | so let's go ahead and take that back.
| | 05:44 | For the bat, let's see what we can do with that.
| | 05:47 | Like we did when working with the ball,
let's again temporarily remove from the
| | 05:51 | sim the object that we're not using.
| | 05:53 | So we'll go back and select the Soft Body icon.
| | 05:56 | Then back on the right, we'll
select ball, then click Delete.
| | 05:59 | Now to pick the bat up, we'll click on
Pick and then directly in the scene, we'll
| | 06:03 | click on the orange bat.
| | 06:05 | When you're done with all this, go back
on the right-hand side and verify in the
| | 06:08 | window that it only reads Rubber Bat.
| | 06:10 | Let's run a preview on this.
| | 06:14 | So on playing things back,
the bat drops pretty quickly.
| | 06:18 | Let's close our Preview window, select
that bat in our scene, and head on over
| | 06:21 | to the Modifier column.
| | 06:26 | In the settings, let's start by changing
the Stiffness to 0.7, then running a preview.
| | 06:37 | This obviously creates a problem.
| | 06:39 | The evaluation with the Substep/Key
set at 3 is using too few calculations to
| | 06:44 | offer a credible preview.
| | 06:46 | So here's a situation where we'll
have to take the substep number back up.
| | 06:51 | We can do that temporarily by changing
the Performance directly inside our window.
| | 06:56 | When the menu opens, we'll
change from 3 down the 6 substeps.
| | 07:00 | Let's run our preview again.
| | 07:21 | So isn't that something?
That's all it took.
| | 07:25 | Let's also crank the Friction up a bit.
| | 07:26 | We'll take the value to 0.75.
| | 07:33 | Getting back in the Preview window and
changing our subsets back to 6, we're run another sim.
| | 07:37 | Now with the higher Friction number,
you can see that our bat is definitely
| | 07:43 | holding on longer to the
surface as it comes into contact with.
| | 07:47 | But I think the way things turned out,
that's going be the look we're aiming for.
| | 07:51 | So that'll do it for our
Soft Body Modifier tweaks.
| | 07:54 | Let's save things up as Soft Body
Maize03, and we'll head into our final project
| | 07:58 | video, where we'll make a few
concluding adjustments and create our keys.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Making the final adjustments and creating the keyframes| 00:00 | With a majority of our project now in
place, we can focus on making a few final
| | 00:04 | adjustments and creating the all-
important keyframes for our simulation.
| | 00:08 | We'll do all that using the Soft Body
Maze 03 file that we've saved at the end
| | 00:12 | of the previous video.
| | 00:14 | Now in order to help speed up our most
recent previews, we've been isolating
| | 00:18 | our Soft Body objects one by one as we went
about adjusting each object's Soft Body Modifier.
| | 00:23 | When we last saved our work in progress,
our ball had been removed from our Soft
| | 00:28 | Body Collection so we could
concentrate on fine-tuning the animation on our
| | 00:32 | deforming rubber bat.
| | 00:34 | With that in mind, let's kick things
off here by getting our checkerboard ball
| | 00:38 | back in our Soft Body Collection.
| | 00:40 | We'll select the Soft Body icon in the view,
then head over into the right-hand column.
| | 00:45 | From there, we'll drop below the
second window and click on Pick.
| | 00:49 | Now, we can simply move our mouse back
inside the view, clicking on the green ball.
| | 00:54 | Before moving on, let's glance back to
the right-hand side and verify that in
| | 00:58 | the second window we read
both rubber bat and ball.
| | 01:01 | Let's run one more quick preview to
make sure that both deforming objects are
| | 01:06 | indeed being recognized
inside our Soft Body Collection.
| | 01:14 | Because of the performance issues that
we saw on our bat, let's go back into the
| | 01:17 | Performance, changing the Substeps to 6.
| | 01:24 | We can then type P to play things back.
| | 01:29 | Because of the added calculations from
both deforming objects now being part of
| | 01:33 | the equation, we won't worry about
taking our playback all the way to the end.
| | 01:37 | As long as we know that both Soft
Body objects have made it into the
| | 01:41 | party, we'll be just fine.
| | 01:45 | Before we get to creating our actual
keys for our simulation, let's head on
| | 01:49 | back into the Utilities column and
make one final adjustment to our Substeps
| | 01:52 | per Keyframe setting.
| | 01:54 | Being that we're now done with our
previews and wanting as high an accuracy
| | 01:58 | level as realistically possible
while still being conscientious about the
| | 02:02 | length of time it takes to create our keys,
| | 02:04 | let's go ahead and take our Substeps
number back to its original setting of 10.
| | 02:08 | I think it will be okay with that.
| | 02:12 | We should also probably consider taking
our Sim's Collision Tolerance down some,
| | 02:16 | just to make 100% sure that all of our
surface contact points at the time of
| | 02:21 | collision are as close as possible
to the actual wireframe geometry.
| | 02:25 | That setting can be found in
the Havok 1 tab directly below.
| | 02:32 | For the Collision Tolerance, let's
take that number down to let's say 1.
| | 02:39 | Back in the Preview and Animation
section, our in-frame time also looks to be a
| | 02:43 | little shy of our timeline length.
| | 02:45 | Let's go ahead and match those up,
taking the in-frame number to 200.
| | 02:53 | I think we're ready to go.
| | 02:55 | Like you should always plan on doing before
creating the actual keys for any simulation,
| | 02:59 | let's hold our file at this point, just
in case we're not happy with the results.
| | 03:03 | That will do it. Back in the right-
hand column, let's go ahead and lean on the
| | 03:10 | Create Animation button.
| | 03:12 | We can say OK when the Option box opens.
| | 03:16 | You've got a ton of calculations being made
behind the scenes as these keys are being created,
| | 03:20 | so have a little patience here
as things take their course.
| | 03:23 | Now that that's wrapped up, let's go ahead and
tap our playback arrow and see how things look.
| | 03:31 | So, looking pretty good. Our Soft Body
objects are realistically deforming as
| | 03:35 | they're falling through the maze,
and our rigid body collection has stayed
| | 03:39 | intact with all our rigid body
surfaces doing what they were designed to do.
| | 03:43 | Now, at this point, if we render things out,
our project would turn out looking like this.
| | 03:48 | If you'd like to take a look at the
movie for yourself, it's called Soft Body
| | 03:52 | Maze, and it could be found in the
exercise files for this chapter.
| | 03:56 | So that's going to do it, creating a
soft body dynamic simulation for an
| | 03:59 | animated maze from top to bottom.
| | 04:01 | I'll go ahead and save our finished
project up as Soft Body Maze Completed, if
| | 04:06 | you'd like to look at over.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
4. Project: Using a Cloth Collection to Affect the Behavior of a CurtainProject overview| 00:00 | In this project, we're going to be using a
Reactor Cloth collection on a set of curtains,
| | 00:06 | having the curtains open from each side
of a sliding door in order to not just
| | 00:10 | let in some light, but to also
give us a little peek at our backyard.
| | 00:14 | The project, which I think you'll find
both fun and challenging, will give us an
| | 00:18 | opportunity to get little more up close
and personal with a handful of important
| | 00:22 | controls and settings when
working with cloth surfaces in 3ds Max.
| | 00:26 | We'll be using a Reactor Cloth Modifier in
order to control both of our curtain surfaces,
| | 00:32 | experimenting with the various settings
in the Modifier in the hopes of making
| | 00:36 | our curtains flex and fold
as realistic as possible.
| | 00:39 | We'll also be constraining each
curtain to a set of rigid body objects, which
| | 00:43 | will assist us in animating
the curtains pulling open--
| | 00:47 | that technique requiring us not just to
make the correct vertex attachments, but
| | 00:51 | to also animate the position
of our rigid body curtain pulls.
| | 00:55 | When all is said and done, we'll end up
with a project that when rendered will
| | 00:59 | turn out looking like this. What do you say?
| | 01:11 | I am ready to go. What about you?
| | 01:12 | We'll get everything started in our next video.
| | 01:15 | Let's go and check it out.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Setting up the Reactor cloth elements| 00:00 | Let's get our project started
by setting up our cloth simulation.
| | 00:04 | We're going to be using a
file named Cloth Curtains.
| | 00:07 | All the geometry needed for our scene
has been modeled and ready to go, which
| | 00:10 | will give us an opportunity to concentrate
on setting up the actual dynamic simulation.
| | 00:14 | Now, although a deforming cloth type
object would seem a logical candidate for
| | 00:18 | a soft body simulation, Reactor offers
a special collection and modifier type
| | 00:24 | for cloth-type sims.
| | 00:25 | Let's start by taking our front view
full screen, then zooming in specifically
| | 00:29 | on our right-hand side curtain.
| | 00:30 | We'll make the viewport changeover
using the Alt+W keyboard shortcut.
| | 00:36 | Okay, let's talk about geometry real quick.
| | 00:39 | In simulating cloth,
Reactor can use any 2D surface:
| | 00:43 | polygons, patches, NURBS--
| | 00:45 | it makes no difference.
| | 00:46 | What does make a difference is that
that geometry needs to be two-dimensional.
| | 00:51 | So whatever you use, it's got to be flat.
| | 00:53 | Another thing that's important is
the amount and the layout of the lines,
| | 00:57 | as both influence how well the cloth
will fold and stretch. Because of the way
| | 01:02 | that our curtains are going to
fold and be pulled to the side,
| | 01:05 | in our situation here we'll be able to
get away with using a wireframe design
| | 01:09 | that's very evenly laid out.
| | 01:11 | By that, I mean that all of our
mesh edges run straight acrossed,
| | 01:14 | both up and down, and left or right.
| | 01:16 | Most of the time though, when
simulating a cloth surface, you'll find that
| | 01:20 | your mesh will fold and stretch more
realistically if your wire design isn't too contiguous,
| | 01:26 | meaning that having your edges
traveling in a bunch of various directions will
| | 01:29 | actually make for a
better-deforming cloth object.
| | 01:32 | The reason for that is that cloth has a
tendency to fold along the pattern of its edges.
| | 01:37 | So for something like a shirt or bed
sheet, evenly spaced and squared-off edges
| | 01:42 | just don't typically make for as
realistic-looking cloth deformation.
| | 01:46 | Our curtains though, will fold just
fine with a more standard wire layout.
| | 01:52 | Now behind the curtain and in front
of the orange curtain rod, you'll see a
| | 01:56 | series of what look like yellow circles.
| | 01:59 | They're actually cylinders that are
going to serve as the clips that'll end up
| | 02:02 | pulling each of our curtains to the side.
| | 02:04 | The clips, which will be identified as
rigid body objects in our sim, will need
| | 02:09 | to somehow be secured to
their respective curtain.
| | 02:11 | We're going to do that using a
constraining mechanism on the cloth modifier that
| | 02:15 | we'll be assigning to each curtain.
| | 02:17 | Once the individual curtains are
assigned to the appropriate clips, we'll then
| | 02:21 | be able to animate the position of
the clips, which will in turn pull the
| | 02:25 | curtains back to the side,
| | 02:26 | having them bunch up or
gather together as they do.
| | 02:29 | After the clip attachments have been
made, we can then get our curtains into a
| | 02:33 | collection--that collection being
the ticket to being able to run our sim.
| | 02:37 | So let's set things up.
| | 02:38 | We'll select the curtain on the
right, assigning a Cloth Modifier from
| | 02:41 | the Reactor toolbar.
| | 02:43 | The Cloth Modifier, located a little
further down in the toolbar, will look like a
| | 02:46 | t-shirt with a small M to its side.
| | 02:48 | Now, I'd like to run this through a preview.
| | 02:51 | That's going to require us though, to
put this guy into a collection. What type?
| | 02:55 | That's right. Cloth surfaces go into Cloth Collections.
| | 02:58 | With the curtain still selected, back in
the toolbar on the left, we'll go to the top.
| | 03:02 | Once we are there, we'll
find the Cloth Collection.
| | 03:04 | It will be the second one down, the
icon looking like a shirt with a C on it.
| | 03:09 | Once you find that, you can go ahead and click.
| | 03:12 | Okay, let's run a quick
preview here and see what happens.
| | 03:15 | To get to the Preview
window, we'll simply use the
| | 03:17 | Shift+Alt+Right-click shortcut.
| | 03:21 | Now, because the curtain is resting a
little bit low in the Preview window, I'll
| | 03:25 | use the left and middle mouse
buttons to better position my object.
| | 03:29 | Now, I'll demo that.
| | 03:35 | Once I have it in better position,
I'll go ahead and press P for playback.
| | 03:41 | Well, that's not going to cut it.
| | 03:43 | The curtain, not having anything to
hold on to, simply drops like a rock.
| | 03:48 | This is where the curtain
rod clips will come in to play.
| | 03:53 | Each clip will be assigned to a series of
individual vertices on the curtain's surface,
| | 03:58 | the verts chosen being the ones that
are encloses proximity to each clip, and
| | 04:03 | that'll be what it'll
hold each curtain in place:
| | 04:06 | certain vertices on the curtain being
constrained to certain clips hanging
| | 04:10 | in front of the rod.
| | 04:11 | Now in order to be able to make our
vertex identifications on the curtain, we're
| | 04:15 | going to need to be in
Vertex mode on our Cloth modifier.
| | 04:18 | Let's go ahead and get there.
| | 04:20 | We'll select the curtain. Then head over to
the right-hand side of the screen.
| | 04:23 | In the Modifier stack, the top entry,
reading Reactor Cloth, has a Plus sign
| | 04:27 | to its left-hand side.
| | 04:29 | Go ahead and click on that.
| | 04:31 | When you do so, you'll see
the Vertex subobject level.
| | 04:34 | You'll then want to select that.
| | 04:36 | Okay, now we can drop little further down
to the Constraints area on the modifier.
| | 04:44 | The Cloth modifier gives you four
different ways to constrain a cloth surface to
| | 04:48 | something else in your scene.
| | 04:49 | Being that our curtain clips are going
to be seen as rigid body objects in our
| | 04:53 | simulation, we'll click on the
button that says Attach To Rigid Body.
| | 04:58 | That will open up a box directly below with
that new RigidBody entry showing in the list.
| | 05:03 | Because we're going to be having
several of these attachments on each curtain,
| | 05:06 | let's go ahead and rename our entry.
| | 05:08 | To do that, you'll simply single-click
on it a couple of times until you get
| | 05:11 | into the naming mode.
| | 05:14 | Once we're there, let's go ahead and name
this RT, then a space, then the number One.
| | 05:22 | You can then press Enter
to lock in the new name.
| | 05:24 | We'll then want to go back and click
on that new name as a way of telling
| | 05:27 | Reactor that it's the newly created
attachment that we are wanting to work on.
| | 05:31 | When you select it, it'll
highlight with the blue background.
| | 05:34 | Now back in the viewport, we'll
want to select at least a couple of
| | 05:37 | vertices around the specific curtain clip
that will bind back to that area on the curtain.
| | 05:42 | Now, we're working on the
curtain clip on the far right side.
| | 05:45 | In Vertex mode, let's now window-select
the six vertices that surround that clip.
| | 05:51 | After doing so, the vertices should turn red.
| | 05:54 | Okay, a little higher up in the
modifier in a section called Attach To Rigid
| | 05:58 | Body, click on the None button, then
in the scene click on the clip that's
| | 06:02 | right underneath that vertex selection.
| | 06:04 | If you've made a good connection, you
should now see the name Clip RT 1 under
| | 06:08 | where it says Rigid Body.
| | 06:10 | So that's how the attachment is made.
| | 06:12 | We can now do the same thing for the
other two clips on the right-hand curtain.
| | 06:15 | I'll drop back down to the Constraints
category, clicking again on Attach To
| | 06:19 | Rigid Body. That'll create a second attachment.
| | 06:22 | Now let's rename this.
| | 06:24 | We'll call it Right Two.
| | 06:29 | We'll then go back and select the
attachment, then drop back into our scene.
| | 06:34 | Now for the second middle yellow clip, we'll
again select the six vertices that surround it.
| | 06:40 | For that last row, you can either go to
the left like I've done or to the right;
| | 06:44 | it shouldn't make much difference.
| | 06:47 | To now identify that second clip,
we'll go back up to where it says Attach To
| | 06:51 | Rigid Body, click on the None button,
| | 06:53 | then back in the scene, clicking
on that second middle yellow clip.
| | 06:56 | Now once you've done so, go back to the
right and verify, under Rigid Body, it
| | 07:00 | reads Clip Right Two.
| | 07:02 | Let's now go ahead at our third attachment.
| | 07:08 | For this one, I'll name it Right Three.
| | 07:14 | We'll reselect it, then go in for our vertices.
| | 07:16 | Now for the clip on the left, why
don't we grab let's say the eight
| | 07:19 | vertices that surround it.
| | 07:21 | We'll start on the upper left-hand corner,
pulling down to the second row, then over four.
| | 07:25 | Very good! Now we'll go back up in the Modifier column,
making that identification back to our clip.
| | 07:33 | We'll click on None, then
we'll click on the clip itself.
| | 07:36 | Now after doing so, again, for
verification purposes, we'll go back to the
| | 07:41 | right-hand side and verify under
Rigid Clip it reads, Clip RT 3.
| | 07:46 | Okay, let's now run another
preview and see what happens.
| | 07:49 | I'll right-click using the Shift+
Alt combo to get to my preview.
| | 07:54 | As the warning message is telling us,
we need to get our curtain clips into our
| | 07:57 | rigid body collection of their own
being that they are going to be a needed
| | 08:00 | part to our simulation.
| | 08:02 | So we'll close the message box,
hitting H to go to select by name.
| | 08:07 | From the list, we can then drop halfway
down, selecting Clip RT 1, RT 2, and RT 3.
| | 08:13 | Once we've done that, we'll click
OK, down in the bottom-right corner.
| | 08:17 | Now that will give us our selection.
Now, we're going to have to create that
| | 08:20 | rigid body collection.
| | 08:21 | In the Reactor toolbar over in the
left, there it is, way at the top.
| | 08:25 | We'll verify the name of the icon, then click.
| | 08:28 | Okay, let's see what happens
this time going through a preview.
| | 08:33 | Even in the preview goes a little bit
slow due to the calculations taking place,
| | 08:37 | now I am playing things back,
| | 08:39 | you see the curtain definitely has a
little more stretch to it than we probably want.
| | 08:43 | We'll be able to adjust that, but the
good part about the Preview is the cloth
| | 08:47 | is staying attached to the clips.
| | 08:50 | Let's now do the same thing
for our left-hand curtain.
| | 08:52 | Adding a modifier, making the attachment
assignments and adding it to the Cloth Collection.
| | 08:57 | We'll close the window,
then go back into our scene.
| | 09:00 | Once I have better situated the left-
hand curtain, I'll go ahead and make the
| | 09:02 | selection and add the Cloth Modifier.
| | 09:05 | This time around, I'll use my Quad menu with the
| | 09:07 | Shift+Alt+Right-click selection.
| | 09:10 | Okay, back to the Modifier column.
| | 09:12 | Let's get into Vertex mode.
| | 09:13 | Working in the Constraints category down
below, we can now click on Attach To Rigid Body.
| | 09:21 | Okay, same thing here.
| | 09:23 | We'll rename the attachment Left One.
| | 09:29 | We'll then, working again in Vertex mode,
| | 09:31 | select the six vertices that
surround that right-hand clip.
| | 09:34 | Let's go to a little closer in,
so we can better make our selection.
| | 09:39 | Once we've got those vertices and our
crosshairs, we can then go back and make
| | 09:43 | the attachment back to
that right-hand-side clip.
| | 09:45 | Let's do the same thing for the middle clip.
| | 09:50 | Down to Attach To Rigid Body.
| | 09:52 | This one we'll name Left Two.
| | 09:59 | We'll then reselect the attachment
entry, going back to make a Vertex selection.
| | 10:04 | Again, why don't we select the six
verts that surround the middle clip?
| | 10:08 | We can then go back up on the right
and identify the middle clip as what we
| | 10:11 | want these vertices to attach to.
| | 10:16 | Again, before going on, make sure to
return to a right-hand side, verifying that
| | 10:20 | the Rigid Body reads, in this case, Clip Left 2.
| | 10:24 | Very important, you don't want to be dropping
that vertex selection somewhere along the road.
| | 10:27 | Let's now slide over and
work on the clip on the left.
| | 10:30 | Once in position, we'll return to
Attach To Rigid Body, naming our
| | 10:35 | third attachment Left 3.
| | 10:42 | We'll then go identify in this case
the eight vertices that'll be attached to
| | 10:45 | the selection. And as a final step,
we'll then identify the clip on the left.
| | 10:50 | Okay, once we've finished up with our
attachments, we'll get out of Vertex mode,
| | 10:54 | then head back to our scene
to select the Cloth Collection.
| | 11:01 | With the Collection selected, back on
the right using the Pick button, we'll now
| | 11:04 | click on that left-handed side curtain.
| | 11:09 | Before running another preview, we're
going to want take these three clips,
| | 11:12 | getting those also into
our Rigid Body Collection.
| | 11:15 | Using H, I'll select the RBCollection, then
over on the right click on the Add button.
| | 11:22 | From the list, we'll simple go about
halfway down, identifying the three clips.
| | 11:26 | Okay, let's run another
preview and see how things turn out.
| | 11:37 | On play, you'll see the things
are turning out looking pretty good.
| | 11:40 | Now, with that second curtain coming
into action, we're getting a little bit now
| | 11:44 | even slower version of our
playback. So let's do this.
| | 11:49 | As a setup, because we really don't
even want to work on one curtain at time,
| | 11:52 | let's go back to our Rigid Body
Collection, this time deleting--at least
| | 11:55 | temporarily--the right-hand curtain.
| | 11:57 | I'll need to go back and then select
the Cloth Collection, then on the right
| | 12:05 | click on the name Curtain Right.
| | 12:08 | Once I've got that highlighted,
I'll go down below on the right-hand
| | 12:11 | side clicking on Delete.
| | 12:13 | Okay, that'll, at least for the time
being, take that right-handed side curtain
| | 12:16 | out of the simulation.
| | 12:17 | So I am liking the way things are
turning out. Both curtains now seem to be
| | 12:21 | holding together fairly well.
| | 12:23 | Now, the next thing to do is going to be to
animate the clips pulling back the curtains.
| | 12:27 | We'll do that keyframing in our next video.
| | 12:29 | Let's save our scene up as Cloth
Curtains01, so we can take the file with us.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Animating the rigid body curtain clips| 00:00 | Now that we have our two curtains
safely tucked away in a Cloth Collection,
| | 00:04 | let's animate the six rigid body clips that
are controlling the position of those curtains.
| | 00:08 | Using a file named Cloth Curtains01
that we brought with us from the previous
| | 00:12 | video, let's see what we can do.
| | 00:14 | Why don't we start with the
clips for the curtain on the left?
| | 00:17 | Let's temporarily hide the
curtain itself, so we don't have to worry
| | 00:19 | about working around it.
| | 00:21 | We'll select the curtain, then
right-click, choosing Hide Selection.
| | 00:25 | Now, we can zoom in closer to
the curtain clips up at the top.
| | 00:30 | The idea here will be to have the clip
on the right and the clip on the middle
| | 00:33 | move closer to the clip on the
far left over a period of time--
| | 00:36 | that time frame being let's say 3 seconds.
| | 00:39 | With the clips controlling the
position and look of the curtain, animating
| | 00:43 | those attachments will serve to
push the curtain more into a closed, or
| | 00:46 | gathered-up, position.
| | 00:48 | Let's go ahead and activate our Auto Key and
it we'll start with the clip in the middle.
| | 00:51 | I'll use the keyframe shortcut
N for that keyframe activation.
| | 00:56 | Using a 1-second delay before the
curtain begins to close and having each
| | 01:00 | curtain take three seconds to get to its
bunched up position, we'll set our start
| | 01:04 | stop here keys at frame 150.
| | 01:06 | Down on the timeline, let's go
ahead and move to that 150 frame.
| | 01:10 | Activating the Move command will now
move that middle clip to about one inch away
| | 01:14 | from the clip in the left.
| | 01:19 | Down on the timeline because of using
Auto Key, you'll see our first key has
| | 01:23 | been set at frame 0. We're going to want to
select that key, moving it back to frame 30.
| | 01:28 | That'll give us that one-second
delay before the action starts.
| | 01:31 | Once we've done that, we'll go ahead and
start working on the clip on the far right.
| | 01:35 | After making our selection, we'll move that
clip to about one inch away from the middle clip.
| | 01:39 | Again, make sure that you're
working at frame 150 when you make
| | 01:42 | that transformation.
| | 01:43 | Now, the spacing of your three
clips doesn't have to be perfect.
| | 01:47 | Once you've done that, back down on the
timeline we'll take that keyframe at 0
| | 01:51 | moving it to frame 30.
| | 01:53 | To see how things look, we can now
scrub the timeline. Looking good!
| | 01:59 | Now, because we want our clips to move
and animate during the sim, we're also
| | 02:03 | going to want to go back in the each
clip's Property Editor and make sure to turn
| | 02:07 | on the Unyielding option.
| | 02:08 | We could actually do that for
all three clips at the same time.
| | 02:12 | So we'll type H to get to our
Select by Name list and from there, select
| | 02:15 | the three left clips.
| | 02:20 | Once doing that, we can then open up
the Property Editor, making sure that
| | 02:23 | Unyielding has been checked.
| | 02:28 | We can then close that dialog.
| | 02:31 | Let's now unhide the curtain
and see how our preview looks.
| | 02:34 | The direction I'll go to do
that will simply be to right-click.
| | 02:37 | In the Quad menu at the top,
I'll choose Unhide by Name.
| | 02:40 | Then I'll unhide that left-side curtain.
| | 02:45 | Back to the preview with the
Shift+Alt+Right-Click option.
| | 02:49 | When the window opens, I'll reposition my
curtain, then press P. Now, that looks great.
| | 03:00 | Just as planned, the
left-hand curtain bunches up.
| | 03:03 | Now we're going to want to do the
same thing with the right-hand curtain,
| | 03:06 | animating its clips, then
activating Unyielding on each clip.
| | 03:10 | I'll close the Preview window, then head
closer to the right-hand curtain in the view.
| | 03:16 | Just as we did with the left-hand
curtain, I'll then select the curtain, get out
| | 03:19 | of Vertex mode if necessary,
| | 03:20 | then hide it using the
right-click > Hide Selection.
| | 03:24 | Once that's taken care of, I'll zoom in
closer those to right-hand-side clips.
| | 03:28 | Because of the position of the Rigid
Body Collection icon, let's go ahead and
| | 03:31 | select that and move it a little out of the way.
| | 03:33 | Before you do that, make sure to turn
off your Auto Key button down below.
| | 03:39 | Once done, we can then go
back in activating Auto Key.
| | 03:42 | Down on our timeline, let's return to frame 150.
| | 03:47 | We can then select the clip in the
middle, moving it to the right about one inch
| | 03:50 | away from the far right clip.
| | 03:54 | Let's then take its keyframe
at 0, moving it to frame 30.
| | 03:58 | We can repeat the process for the far-left clip.
| | 04:06 | Just to verify the results,
let's again scrub the timeline.
| | 04:14 | Once done with that, we can focus our
attention to turning on the Unyielding
| | 04:17 | option for each of the three clips.
| | 04:19 | We'll type H for Select by Name.
| | 04:21 | We'll select the right clips: 1, 2, and 3.
| | 04:26 | We can then open up the Property Editor
and verify that Unyielding is indeed checked.
| | 04:32 | Once we've got that out of the way,
let's go ahead and unhide our curtain,
| | 04:35 | verify that it is indeed in our Cloth
Collection, then run another preview.
| | 04:45 | Now, for adding the curtain back the
Cloth Collection, you'll select the
| | 04:48 | Collection icon, then on the
right-click Pick, and then select the
| | 04:52 | right-hand side curtain.
| | 04:54 | Once doing so, verify on the right-hand
window it reads Curtain left and Curtain right.
| | 04:59 | For this one, let's ahead
and return to four views.
| | 05:01 | We'll use the Alt+W shortcut,
and then we'll reactivate our Preview window.
| | 05:05 | Why don't we zoom in by rolling our wheel just
a tad. Then we can press P. So, there you go.
| | 05:24 | The curtain is being driven by the
animated curtain clips traveling in their
| | 05:28 | opposite directions, bunching up on
each side of the glass sliding door.
| | 05:32 | Now in out next video we're going to
take a look at some of the settings in
| | 05:35 | the Cloth Modifier that can help us
in controlling the look and behavior of
| | 05:39 | our curtains.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Making adjustments to the curtain cloth modifiers| 00:00 | The Cloth modifier gives you a handful
of helpful settings that allow you to
| | 00:04 | control the behavior of a cloth
surface--whether that be a blanket draped
| | 00:08 | over the back of a couch or a living room
curtain like we are working with in our project here.
| | 00:13 | Using the Cloth CurtainsO2 file that we
saved at the end of our previous video,
| | 00:17 | let's see what we can do about the way
our curtains stretch and fold as they
| | 00:21 | gather up to the sides
of our glass sliding door.
| | 00:23 | To begin, let's temporarily turn off the
map that we have assigned to both curtains.
| | 00:28 | That will eliminate the scintillation that
we have been getting in our previews, in
| | 00:32 | addition to allowing us to better
review and evaluate our curtain geometry.
| | 00:37 | When opening up the Material Editor, you'll
find the curtain material on the top row, far left.
| | 00:42 | We can simply drop down do its map
section, turning off the check mark to the
| | 00:45 | left of the Diffuse Color slot.
| | 00:47 | Why don't we now focus our
attention on the right-hand-side curtain?
| | 00:51 | We will select that, then head over to
the Modify column in the Command panel.
| | 00:55 | Okay, on the Cloth Modifier,
let's right away turn on a setting
| | 00:59 | a little further down
called Avoid Self-Intersections.
| | 01:03 | This will make sure that when the
curtain geometry starts bunching together that
| | 01:06 | nothing crosses over unrealistically.
| | 01:08 | Once you have made that change, go
ahead back up to the top of settings.
| | 01:13 | To take some of the stretchiness out of
the curtain, in the Force model section,
| | 01:17 | we can experiment with the Stiffness value--
| | 01:19 | a higher number making the
cloth surface stiffen up.
| | 01:23 | Let's see what a number like 0.5 would do.
| | 01:28 | Now currently, we are running both of
our curtains through our simulation.
| | 01:31 | In the view, let's select the cloth
collection and remove the left-hand curtain
| | 01:35 | from the simulation.
| | 01:39 | Now, we can go ahead and run our preview.
| | 01:52 | So, that tightens things up a little.
| | 01:57 | Reselecting the curtain, then back to
the controls on the right, the Damping
| | 02:00 | setting can also help with the stretch.
| | 02:04 | Officially, Max's reference manual
will tell you that Damping controls how
| | 02:08 | fast or slow the so-called energy that makes a
soft surface change dissipates, or fades away.
| | 02:13 | More simply put, a higher Damping value
will force our curtain surface back to
| | 02:18 | its original shape quicker.
| | 02:20 | Let's see what changing
that number to 0.5 would do.
| | 02:23 | After typing things in, we will
run another preview. On review,
| | 02:39 | that seems to have helped a bit.
| | 02:40 | Now, we probably need to make our
curtain just a little bit stiffer, so let's
| | 02:43 | take that stiffness to let's say 0.8.
| | 02:48 | And we will run our
simulation through another preview.
| | 03:05 | So, that's a little better still.
| | 03:09 | Now, there are a couple of other
settings that you might want to experiment with.
| | 03:12 | Air Resistance is another setting
that deals with the way an object loses
| | 03:15 | energy as it moves.
| | 03:17 | A higher number would allow the
curtain movement to die down a little better
| | 03:20 | once it's been pulled open.
| | 03:22 | Let's plug in a value of 0.8 there.
| | 03:24 | Friction deals with how smoothly a
cloth would move once it came into contact
| | 03:29 | with something else, while relative density pertains
more to the buoyancy of a cloth when floating.
| | 03:34 | Neither of those really have much impact here.
| | 03:36 | So, I am going to be happy with
the way things currently look on the
| | 03:39 | right-hand-side curtain.
| | 03:40 | Now, we can plug those same
values into the curtain on the left.
| | 03:43 | We will set the Air Resistance to 0.8,
the Stiffness value will also go to 0.8,
| | 03:50 | and the Damping will be set at 0.5.
| | 03:52 | Now, make sure you also turn on the
Avoid Self-Intersections check mark a
| | 03:56 | little further down.
| | 03:58 | That should get us rolling.
| | 03:59 | Now, there is one last thing we ought to
do, and that's to see if we can get our
| | 04:03 | curtains to start our
animation in a more relaxed-type state.
| | 04:07 | Right now, when the action in our scene
starts, both curtains appears stiff as a board.
| | 04:12 | To loosen that look up a little,
Max offers an option in its preview
| | 04:15 | window called Update Max.
| | 04:18 | What the option does is it takes the
position and look of an object during
| | 04:22 | a simulation and transfers, or
updates, that condition or state back into
| | 04:27 | the actual Max scene prior to creating
any keys, and that's what we need to do here.
| | 04:32 | Now before we do that though, let's
make sure that both of our curtains are
| | 04:35 | being included inside our sim.
| | 04:37 | We'll go back and select the cloth
collection in the scene, then on the right,
| | 04:41 | add backend or left-hand curtain.
| | 04:45 | Okay, let's now go ahead and
open up that Preview window.
| | 04:50 | What we are going to do here is start
the preview, then stop it right at the
| | 04:54 | point where we have our curtains in a
little bit more of a relaxed position.
| | 04:58 | That should happen just moments into our sim.
| | 05:01 | Let's see what we can do.
| | 05:01 | We will type P, then stop the play once
our curtain has made its initial drop down.
| | 05:09 | Once we've done that, up at the top of our
preview window, we will go to the Max pulldown.
| | 05:14 | In there, we will then choose Update Max.
| | 05:17 | Now the actual update back to our scene
won't happen until we close the Preview window,
| | 05:22 | so let's go ahead and do that.
| | 05:23 | Taking your Camera view back to being
full screen, we can now see that both
| | 05:33 | pieces of our curtain geometry
have a not-quite-so-iron-flat look.
| | 05:37 | The curtain deformations stored in the
update Max command now reflect back on
| | 05:41 | our scene. Pretty cool how that works.
| | 05:43 | Why don't we now reactivate the map
that we have on our current material, and we
| | 05:47 | will render things up to see how things look.
| | 05:56 | The more relaxed look for our curtains,
even though subtle, definitely looks better.
| | 06:01 | That will pretty much do it in
preparation for creating our permanent keys.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating keyframes in preparation for rendering| 00:00 | Now that we have our curtains
adjusted and ready to go, we can make a few
| | 00:04 | final adjustments, then create the keyframes
that we need in order to wrap up the project.
| | 00:08 | Now, there are a couple of other rigid
objects that we probably ought to add to our sim:
| | 00:12 | I am thinking of the back wall and the
curtain rod, just in case our curtains
| | 00:16 | come into contact with either at
some point during our animation.
| | 00:19 | To do that, we will first have to
select our Rigid Body Collection.
| | 00:22 | Then, in the modify column on the
right, we will click on the Add button,
| | 00:26 | bringing in the wall.
| | 00:30 | Now the curtain rod was originally
frozen in the scene, so we didn't have to
| | 00:33 | worry about selecting it when we
were working on the curtain clips.
| | 00:36 | To get to that one, we will first have
to right-click, choosing Unfreeze All.
| | 00:39 | Then we can go back to the right-hand side,
clicking on Add, bringing in the curtain rod.
| | 00:45 | Okay, in the Utilities column in the
Command panel, we can now adjust the End
| | 00:50 | time frame to match that of our scene's timeline.
| | 00:53 | That would take the EndFrame to 250.
| | 00:56 | Let's go ahead and type that in.
| | 00:57 | With that, I think we are ready.
| | 01:01 | Let's go ahead and hold our
scene, and we can create our keys.
| | 01:04 | Now, have a little patience here;
| | 01:12 | we have got a ton of calculations
happening now behind the scenes.
| | 01:16 | Think about it: each and every vertex
on both curtains are having keyframes
| | 01:20 | generated at every frame during our animation.
| | 01:23 | That's making, even on today's highest-
end computers, for quite a calculation.
| | 01:27 | Okay, now that we have got that done,
| | 01:29 | we will close the open
window and play things back.
| | 01:37 | So that turned out looking pretty good.
| | 01:38 | Taking a few minutes to render things out,
our results would end up looking like this.
| | 01:43 | You can find this AVI file named Cloth Curtains
in the Exercise Files folder for this chapter.
| | 01:49 | So there you go with a little cloth simulation.
| | 01:51 | I will go ahead and save our completed
project out as Cloth Curtains Completed,
| | 01:56 | if you would like to go back in and take
a look at how things were done. Nice job!
| | 01:59 | Hopefully you were able
to learn a few new things.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
5. Project: Simulating Rippling WaterAdding the physical properties and collection| 00:00 | Our rippling water project will have
us using a file named Rippling Water.
| | 00:04 | With the majority of the elements
that we'll be needing for a scene having
| | 00:07 | already been built, we'll be able to
concentrate our efforts on creating
| | 00:11 | our Reactor simulation.
| | 00:12 | Let's start with the red-and-yellow
checkerboard ball situated above the ramp.
| | 00:16 | After selecting the ball, we can go
in to add its physical properties.
| | 00:20 | I'll make that selection, then go over
to the toolbar on the left, activating
| | 00:24 | the Property Editor.
| | 00:25 | For the values, let's give the ball a
Mass of 65, then we'll take the Friction
| | 00:29 | amount to let's say 0.2. Because of
its shape, we will also change its
| | 00:34 | Simulation Geometry type to Bounding Sphere.
| | 00:37 | Now for the rail, which was created
by lofting an outline U shape along the
| | 00:41 | helix, the only thing we really need
to worry about is its property editor
| | 00:45 | geometry type for simulation.
Because of its negative space, in other words,
| | 00:50 | the area inside the rail, we're going
to want to change its Simulation Geometry
| | 00:54 | type to Concave Mesh.
| | 00:56 | In fact, before we do that, let's leave
the Simulation type as it is, and we'll
| | 01:00 | go ahead and add both objects--the ball
and the rail--to a Rigid Body Collection.
| | 01:05 | That will give us a chance to see when
running a preview just exactly why the
| | 01:09 | Concave Mesh method of
calculation on the ramp is necessary.
| | 01:13 | We'll select the ball and ramp.
Then in the toolbar on the left,
| | 01:16 | we will add a Rigid Body Collection.
| | 01:18 | Okay, let's run a preview
and see how things work.
| | 01:21 | To activate the preview, I'll simply
use the Shift+Alt+Right-click shortcut.
| | 01:25 | Then once the window is
open, I can type P for play.
| | 01:31 | Well, as you can see, we've got the
ball falling right through the ramp that it
| | 01:34 | is supposed to ride down.
| | 01:36 | Let's close the Preview window and see
what changing the simulation type on the
| | 01:39 | ramp to Concave Mesh will do to correct that.
| | 01:42 | We'll select the rail, then activate
the Property Editor, again using the
| | 01:46 | Shift+Alt+Right-click shortcut.
| | 01:47 | Now on the Simulation Geometry, we'll change
it from Mesh Convex Hull down to Concave Mesh.
| | 01:54 | Okay, let's run another preview.
| | 01:59 | Well, the ball now at least sees the
ramp, but with the way it's riding above
| | 02:03 | the ramp groove, it leads me to believe
that our simulation's collision tolerance
| | 02:07 | is probably a little too high.
| | 02:09 | Let's again close the Preview window, and
we'll head into the Utilities panel and
| | 02:13 | take that down a bit.
| | 02:13 | Why don't we set the
Collision Tolerance value to one?
| | 02:20 | Okay, let's now run another
preview and see how that looks.
| | 02:32 | Now, because of where our ball is
ending up, let's also add the pool frame
| | 02:36 | into our collection.
| | 02:37 | Over on the right-hand side of the view,
you'll see the Rigid Body icon. Let's select that,
| | 02:42 | move to the Modify column. Then down
below the Property window, we'll click the
| | 02:46 | Pick button on the left and then
select the pool frame in our scene.
| | 02:50 | Now once you do that, go back to the
right-hand side, verifying the name pool frame.
| | 02:55 | Okay, now that we've got that stuff taken
care of, let's get to creating our Reactor water.
| | 02:59 | We'll do that in the next video.
| | 03:01 | Let's go ahead and save our file up as
Rippled Water01, so we can take it
| | 03:05 | with us.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating the water helper| 00:00 | In this video, we're going to create the
Water Helper that's needed in order to
| | 00:04 | generate our project's rippling effect.
| | 00:06 | We'll do that using the Rippling
Water01 scene file that we saved up at the
| | 00:10 | end of our last video.
| | 00:11 | To create our water object, let's
first return our orientation to four views.
| | 00:15 | Then we'll activate the top
view, taking it full screen.
| | 00:19 | Because our water object will fit
directly inside our pool frame, let's select
| | 00:23 | that frame, then right-click,
activating the Isolate tool.
| | 00:27 | Now the pool frame is going to be those two
light blue squares you see just on the left.
| | 00:31 | To lock the extents of our Water
Helper to the exact measurements of the
| | 00:34 | inside frame of our pool, before we
make that Water Helper, let's first
| | 00:38 | activate our Snap command up in the
toolbar, making sure the Snapping option
| | 00:42 | has been set to Vertex.
| | 00:44 | Now you can activate the settings
once you get on top of the button by
| | 00:47 | simply right-clicking.
| | 00:49 | We'll change from Grid Points to Vertex.
| | 00:51 | Okay, we can find our Water Object
over in the Reactor toolbar on the left.
| | 00:55 | Its icon is going to look
like three wavy horizontal lines.
| | 00:59 | Once we find that button, we can click, then
draw the Water Helper inside the pool frame.
| | 01:04 | Once we have that in place, we
can go ahead and turn off our Snap.
| | 01:07 | For that, I'll simply use
the keyboard shortcut, S.
| | 01:10 | Now we should probably add a few
extra segments to our water object to
| | 01:13 | improve the way it deforms.
| | 01:15 | Over in the Modify column, let's
change its Segment Values to 60 and 60.
| | 01:19 | By segments, I mean subdivisions.
| | 01:22 | Once we've done that, we can turn
off our Isolate tool, taking our
| | 01:25 | viewports back to four.
| | 01:27 | If we now activate the front view, taking
it full screen, you'll notice the water
| | 01:30 | object is resting directly
on top of the pool frame.
| | 01:33 | We're going to want to
move that down just a tad.
| | 01:35 | Right-clicking to activate the Move
command, I'll pull the water object down
| | 01:40 | probably a 16th to an 8th of an inch.
| | 01:42 | Once doing that, I can return to four views.
| | 01:45 | Now the Water Helper doesn't have to be
added to a collection in order for it to
| | 01:48 | affect the simulation.
| | 01:50 | So let's go ahead and run our preview.
| | 01:51 | Why don't we close the Preview window
and get a little closer in, so we can see
| | 02:03 | exactly what's going on?
| | 02:05 | I'm going to activate my Camera
view, then change it to a perspective
| | 02:11 | orientation by typing P. Once I've done
that, I can use the navigation controls
| | 02:15 | in my lower right-hand corner to zoom in.
| | 02:19 | My scroll wheel can also
help me with that task. Okay.
| | 02:22 | Let's go ahead and run another preview.
| | 02:24 | Again, I'll simply use the
Shift+Alt+Right-click shortcut.
| | 02:27 | Now, let's watch that again.
| | 02:29 | I'll hit R for Reset, then play again.
| | 02:37 | Now, from closer up, we can see how the ball
is just passing right over the top of our pool.
| | 02:42 | It's the same thing we pretty much
saw with the ball on the ramp--the ball
| | 02:45 | riding on top of the ramp and not in it,
until the correct adjustment was made.
| | 02:50 | The solution here is going to be to
set the Pools Frame Simulation Geometry
| | 02:53 | Type to Concave Mesh.
| | 02:55 | Let's go ahead and do that.
| | 02:56 | I'll close my Preview
Window, selecting the pool frame.
| | 02:59 | With its Property Editor open, I'll
change the Simulation Geometry to Concave Mesh.
| | 03:05 | Okay, let's see what that's done
now to improve our preview. Okay.
| | 03:14 | That will do it for setting up our water.
| | 03:16 | In the next video, we'll
start making a few adjustments.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adjusting the water parameters and creating the keys| 00:00 | With our Water Helper now in our scene,
we can turn our attention to making a
| | 00:04 | few adjustments to add to
the realism of our effect.
| | 00:06 | We'll do that using the Rippling Water02 file
that we saved up at the end of our last video.
| | 00:11 | Let's select our Water Helper and head
over to the settings in the Modify column.
| | 00:15 | Okay, let's start with the water's
density setting. The name of the control
| | 00:19 | pretty much spells it out.
| | 00:21 | Density sets the relative density of the liquid.
| | 00:24 | In a nutshell, the number you plug in
determines whether an object will sink
| | 00:28 | into the water, or if it floats,
just how low in the water it will go.
| | 00:31 | Let's experiment with a few different
values and we'll see how things turn out.
| | 00:35 | Let's begin by taking our Density to
25, and once we've done that, we'll go
| | 00:39 | ahead and run a preview.
| | 00:43 | Now at 25 you can see just
how dense the water object is.
| | 00:47 | Being curious, let's see how things
would look if we crank that up to 50.
| | 00:50 | Then we can run another preview.
| | 00:52 | This time the ball bounces
as if it is hitting a trampoline.
| | 00:56 | Let's take things to the opposite end of the
spectrum and take in your density to 0.5.
| | 00:59 | So you can see settings things at the other end
of our values makes quite a bit of difference.
| | 01:04 | Let's finalize the setting using a value of 8.
| | 01:09 | Another important setting is Viscosity,
which measures how difficult or easy it
| | 01:13 | is for an object to move through the
water, higher values dampening an object's
| | 01:17 | ability to move forward.
| | 01:19 | So for an example, an object traveling
through motor oil would certainly feel
| | 01:23 | more resistance than if that same
object traveled through let's say milk.
| | 01:26 | The reason being is oil has a
higher viscosity level than milk.
| | 01:31 | So with Reactor, the less you are
wanting an object to easily move forward, the
| | 01:36 | higher you are going to want
to set its Viscosity value.
| | 01:39 | Let's see how this setting
affects the ball on our scene.
| | 01:41 | We'll activate the Viscosity value,
typing in 50. Then we want to preview. Wow!
| | 01:46 | That pretty much stops
the ball dead in its track.
| | 01:53 | Let's take the Viscosity down to let say 25.
| | 01:58 | Okay, this seems much better, but the
water still feels just a little bit too thick.
| | 02:03 | And I'm curious here, what does the viscosity
value of zero do to our preview? Let's try that.
| | 02:08 | Well, now we're getting basically no
grab at all, so why don't we settle in with
| | 02:14 | a Viscosity value of let's say 1.5?
| | 02:19 | Okay, now I think we're getting
somewhere as far as creating a
| | 02:21 | believable-looking effect.
| | 02:24 | Now a few other controls that you
might want to experiment with. Wave Speed
| | 02:27 | sets the speed at which a waves
crest, or peak, would spread across the
| | 02:31 | surface of your water,
| | 02:32 | while minimum and maximum Ripple limits
or restricts the size of the waves that
| | 02:36 | are being generated in the water.
| | 02:38 | Neither of these controls are going to
have a major impact on the way that our
| | 02:41 | water is going to move here.
| | 02:42 | So I will leave it up to you to play around
with those two settings in your own projects.
| | 02:47 | Now one thing to know about a Water
Helper: Max thinks of that object as a
| | 02:51 | space warp. And if you know much about
3ds Max, you're very well aware that
| | 02:55 | space warps don't render.
| | 02:57 | We can quickly see that by
simply rendering our scene.
| | 03:00 | Let's hit the teapot render icon on
the right-hand side of our main toolbar.
| | 03:06 | So there's proof positive: we got
our pool frame but no visible water.
| | 03:10 | So we are going to need to create an
actual piece of geometry in order to
| | 03:13 | simulate our water effect. That geometry
needs to be flat, so we will be using a plane.
| | 03:18 | Now if we activate our Snap command,
making sure Snapping option is still set
| | 03:22 | to Vertex, we can actually create our plane
object in our current view if we're careful.
| | 03:27 | Let's see what we can do.
| | 03:28 | We'll turn on the Snap control, then
right-click to make sure that Vertex is
| | 03:32 | what's been selected.
| | 03:33 | Back on the Command panel Create column,
we'll then activate the Plane command.
| | 03:37 | Now, here's where we got to be careful,
but let's now draw our plane directly on
| | 03:41 | top of the inside extents of our pool frame,
| | 03:43 | basically making at the same size as our
already-in-place, water space warp.
| | 03:47 | To improve the ability of our plane
to now deform, let's crank up its
| | 03:51 | segments to 75 and 75. And once we've done
that, we're going to want to turn off out Snap.
| | 03:56 | Okay, let's now move the level of our
plane down to just above our water helper.
| | 04:01 | Make sure, if necessary, to beforehand
changing your screen coordinates over to view.
| | 04:05 | Let's also rename our plane
object using the name Water.
| | 04:09 | Now in order for a newly created plane
to be affected or influenced by our water
| | 04:13 | helper, we're going to need to bind
the two together using the good old Bind
| | 04:17 | to Space Warp command.
| | 04:18 | We'll select the Water, then click on
the Bind to Space Warp option up on the
| | 04:21 | left-hand side of our toolbar.
| | 04:23 | To make the binding process a little
easier, let's just type H. And from the
| | 04:27 | list, we can now choose the name Water001.
| | 04:30 | That's going to be a Water Helper.
| | 04:32 | Once you're done that, you can go to the
lower right-hand corner and click on Bind.
| | 04:36 | Now in order for our ball to roll
down the ramp and drop into the water--
| | 04:39 | effectively making contact with our
water plane--we're going to need that ball
| | 04:42 | at this point to be animated--
| | 04:44 | that animation coming through creating
the keys for simulation. So, although we
| | 04:48 | still have a few adjustments to
make in tweaking some of our scene's
| | 04:50 | believability, now is the time
to create those simulation keys.
| | 04:54 | Let's go ahead and do that.
| | 04:55 | We'll begin by changing back to our Camera view.
| | 04:57 | You can do that by simply typing C.
| | 04:59 | For the next couple steps, we're going
to want to get into the Utilities column
| | 05:02 | in the Command panel. Let's do that.
| | 05:04 | In the Preview and Animation section,
you'll notice our End Frame is set to 100.
| | 05:08 | We're going to want to match that up to
length of our active time segment, our
| | 05:12 | time line in other words, that going to be 250.
| | 05:15 | Let's type that in.
| | 05:16 | Let's, we should always do before
creating our keys, also hold our frame
| | 05:21 | just for safety's sake. Okay.
| | 05:22 | I think we're ready to rip.
Back in the Utilities column,
let's now click on the
button that says Create Animation.
| | 05:27 | When the dialog box opens on
the screen, you can simply say OK.
| | 05:31 | With the ball making contact with our
water's surface, we can see there is a very
| | 05:35 | slight amount of reaction to that collision.
| | 05:38 | Let's see if we can't
amplify that effect just a bit.
| | 05:41 | I think we'll be able to see your
results little better if we change the
| | 05:44 | wireframe color on our
water to let's say light blue.
| | 05:46 | Now there is setting on the water space
warp that I think will help us out here.
| | 05:51 | Let select the water object and see if
we can't find our settings over the Modify column.
| | 05:55 | The setting called Scale
Strength is what I was talking about.
| | 05:59 | Scale Strength basically multiplies
the deformation effect in the geometry
| | 06:03 | that's being affected by the water
space warp. That in our situation here would
| | 06:07 | be the object that we created, the plane,
that's visually representing the water in our pool.
| | 06:12 | Watch how this works.
| | 06:13 | Let's increase the Scale Strength to 3
and scrub through the timeline. Check out the
| | 06:18 | difference that's made.
| | 06:19 | Let's get going up from here and
see what that does to the effect.
| | 06:22 | We'll take our Scale Strength to
5 and again scrub our timeline.
| | 06:26 | Now a little bit tough to see, but you'll
notice that the blue geometry is indeed
| | 06:30 | deforming when it comes in
the contact with the ball.
| | 06:33 | Let's try a value of 10 and see how that looks.
| | 06:35 | Okay, now that things are little
more visible, why don't we go ahead and
| | 06:40 | play back our timeline?
| | 06:41 | Using a higher Scale Strength value,
you can really see what impact it's having
| | 06:46 | on the look of our water surface.
| | 06:48 | Let's keep taken the number higher.
| | 06:49 | Let's try a Scale Strength of
30 then playing things back.
| | 06:57 | Those higher numbers are definitely
creating a more of a dramatic effect, as far
| | 07:01 | as that deformation.
| | 07:03 | Now even though we're going in kind of the
wrong direction here, I'm kind of curious,
| | 07:06 | let's try a Scale Strength
of 50, playing that back.
| | 07:17 | That is really cool the way that
works. Now, to make things look a little more
| | 07:21 | realistic for our scene though,
| | 07:22 | to finalize things, let's
take our value back to around 5.
| | 07:27 | Okay, now that we have our water
geometry doing what it needs to do, let's
| | 07:31 | redirect our attention to making a
realistic skin for that water surface.
| | 07:35 | We'll do that in our next video.
| | 07:37 | We're going to take this file with us,
so let's save it up as Rippling Water03.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Building a believable water material| 00:00 | With our ball now rolling down the
ramp and realistically deforming the water
| | 00:04 | when contact is made, we can shift our
attention to creating a believable skin
| | 00:08 | for that water surface.
| | 00:10 | We'll do that using the Ripping
Water03 file that we brought with us from
| | 00:14 | the previous video.
| | 00:16 | Now, there is quite a few different ways to
create a realistic water material in 3ds Max,
| | 00:21 | most of those techniques coming from
taking advantage of the skins Max offers
| | 00:25 | when using the mental ray rendering method.
| | 00:28 | With the mental ray rendering engine
currently in place, let's cruise over into
| | 00:32 | our Material Editor and see what we can find.
| | 00:35 | Selecting a clean sample sphere, let's
then click on the Get Material command,
| | 00:38 | which you can find on the far left
side of a horizontal row of icons.
| | 00:42 | In the Material/Map browser, under the
mental ray material selections, let's
| | 00:46 | choose Autodesk Water.
| | 00:48 | Once we've done that, we can drag our
material down to our water object of our scene.
| | 00:52 | Okay, let's now render.
| | 00:54 | Now from a distance things are
little bit tough to see, so let's do this.
| | 00:58 | We'll change our camera view
to a perspective orientation.
| | 01:01 | Once we've done that, using our
Navigation controls on the lower right-hand
| | 01:05 | corner, we will zoom in to our pool area.
| | 01:08 | Once we've done that, we'll
go ahead and render again.
| | 01:15 | With the Autodesk Water, there are a couple of
different variations that we can choose from.
| | 01:21 | Under Type, we'll change it from
Swimming Pool to Generic Reflecting Pool.
| | 01:27 | Then we can render again.
| | 01:30 | So we can see the actual results of
the way the water will look when the ball
| | 01:34 | comes in contact with it.
| | 01:35 | Let's move to a later
frame in time and render it again.
| | 01:39 | Okay, now we can see the rippling effect.
| | 01:42 | Let's try a different
variety of that Autodesk Water.
| | 01:46 | Back in the Material Editor, let's change from
the Reflecting Pool down to the Stream/River.
| | 01:50 | As you can see, we've got
quite a bit of difference there.
| | 01:56 | Now the Stream/River also gives us
an option to change the wave height.
| | 02:00 | Using the slider, let's take that to the far
right, and we can once again render things up.
| | 02:09 | Let's see what we can do about
finding maybe a few other material types.
| | 02:13 | I'll also position our ball a little
bit more toward the middle of our pool.
| | 02:19 | Okay, back on the Material
Editor, using a new sample slot.
| | 02:22 | This time we'll go down the right-hand side
of our interface, clicking on the word Standard.
| | 02:27 | This gives us a whole new set of options,
being able to choose different types of
| | 02:30 | materials. For this one, we'll move a
little further down in our browser, looking
| | 02:34 | for the Autodesk Material Library.
| | 02:37 | Now even of the skins we're going to
use aren't considered water, the glass
| | 02:40 | materials work very nicely.
| | 02:42 | Opening up the Glass category if
necessary, let's choose the one named
| | 02:46 | Glass Frosted-Blue.
| | 02:48 | Once we've got that loaded in, let's
go and apply this one, then render.
| | 02:52 | Take a look at the difference there.
| | 02:55 | The Autodesk Frosted Glass comes
with a setting called Reflectance.
| | 02:59 | Let's take that to a value of 10.
| | 03:01 | Rendering again, we can see how that turns out.
| | 03:04 | This gives us a little higher level
of reflectivity on our water surface.
| | 03:09 | There's also material in the Autodesk
Material Library called Clear Blue Glass.
| | 03:13 | Let's see how that would work.
| | 03:15 | Again, new sample slot. Then click on Standard.
| | 03:18 | You'll find it just a few slots up
from the Frosted-Blue. Then we can apply
| | 03:22 | that and render again.
| | 03:25 | Okay, with the Clear Blue Glass, we can
actually change the color of that glass surface.
| | 03:29 | To do that, we'll click on the long blue color
swatch directly to the right of the name Color.
| | 03:33 | Now, what I'm going to want to do
here is darken my color a little bit.
| | 03:36 | Let's go down to the Value ramp on
the right, taking that number to 0.4.
| | 03:40 | We can then close the Color
Selector and render again.
| | 03:44 | So that I think looks a little
bit nicer now being a darker hue.
| | 03:47 | It might be a little bit too much
blue though, so let's lighten that up.
| | 03:51 | Back in the Material Editor, we'll
again click on that now darker blue swatch,
| | 03:55 | and this time, using the saturation ramp,
we will take that value to somewhere
| | 03:58 | between 0.5 and 0.6.
| | 04:02 | So that gives us a nice little
handful of different material types that we
| | 04:05 | can now choose from.
| | 04:06 | Why don't we save our file up as
Rippling Water04, and we'll head into our last
| | 04:11 | video for this water project,
where we will wrap things up.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Wrapping things up| 00:01 | Having our project pretty much
wrapped up as far as the needed simulation
| | 00:04 | tweaks and adjustments,
| | 00:06 | we can now begin to tidy things up a
bit in preparing ourselves to render.
| | 00:10 | I'll be working with the Rippling Water04
file that was saved at the end of our last video.
| | 00:15 | Now, the only thing I'm really worried
about at this point are two things: making
| | 00:19 | sure that we choose the most
realistic water material from the ones that we
| | 00:23 | built in our most recent video,
and being sure to return our scene to using the
| | 00:27 | proper viewport orientation
before creating our final render.
| | 00:30 | Both are easy fixes.
| | 00:32 | Let's begin with making our material selection.
| | 00:34 | Now, we created three
different looks for our water.
| | 00:38 | Let's go back and render each, so we
can make some decisions as to which one
| | 00:41 | will work best for our pool.
| | 00:43 | I'll start with the water
material the top row far left, the
| | 00:47 | generic Stream/River.
| | 00:49 | I'll select the water object in our scene,
apply the material, then render things up.
| | 00:54 | Now when we last rendered this particular
material, we had set its wave height quite high.
| | 00:59 | Let's turn that off and try rendering again.
| | 01:01 | I'm also going to move to a frame where
my ball is in the water, so we can see
| | 01:04 | the effect of that contact.
| | 01:07 | So that's nice, but the water might
be a little bit too clear and clean.
| | 01:11 | Let's instead try the glass
frosted blue for comparison.
| | 01:15 | Back in the Material Editor, that's
the one on second row down, far left.
| | 01:19 | Okay, here we're getting a nice little
reflection, but the water looks maybe
| | 01:23 | a little bit to milky. It doesn't look bad,
but let's compare that now to the clear blue glass.
| | 01:29 | Okay, now this one I like.
| | 01:32 | Now, for the orientation of our scene for
rendering, there is already an animated
| | 01:36 | camera set up in the scene, so
it's really just a matter of typing C to
| | 01:39 | make the switch back to the
Camera view. So there you go,
| | 01:43 | a little rippling water
project, start to finish.
| | 01:46 | I'll save the final file up as
Rippling Water Completed, if you'd like to go
| | 01:49 | in and take a look. Congratulations!
| | 01:52 | Job well done!
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
ConclusionGoodbye| 00:01 | Well, that will do it for
our look at 3ds Max's Reactor.
| | 00:05 | We leave having had the opportunity to
learn quite a bit in a short period of time:
| | 00:09 | collections, modifiers, constraints,
setting up properties. And we've had a
| | 00:15 | chance to take that
knowledge into real-life projects where
| | 00:18 | we've learned a few things about rigid
body dynamics and soft body collisions
| | 00:23 | and cloth and water.
| | 00:24 | And as you continue exploring all the
cool things that you can do with 3ds
| | 00:28 | Max, be sure to check out all the Max
titles in the lynda.com Online Training Library.
| | 00:34 | I've had a blast. I hope you've enjoyed it.
| | 00:37 | Until next time, for lynda.com, I'm Steve Nelle.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
