Believable water drops on glass?

[OberonX]

You might try one of the water droplet shaders at the Deep Shade site (http://www.maxon.net/~deepshade/). They may do for your project. (Note that these shaders are in .sit format, so you'll need an appropriate utility to open them if you're not on a Mac.)

[Hilt]

Thinking Particles is your best friend here.

Dont forget to pay royalties to mdme_sadie, since there's an example on his site at http://www.peranders.com/c4d8/index.html (and mdme_sadie will pay royalties for me for advertising his site, so in the end questions like these get pretty complicated..)

There you can find an image like
http://www.peranders.com/c4d8/samples/jpg/dew2.jpg
that is also an example file to make liquid on surface.
Basically it's just to use PSurfacePosition (did I remember it right?) that makes particles born on surface and then use MetaBalls to make it look liquid.

.mjt

[flyingP]

it's not a close up but yeah I'd go with TP, I used modeled geometry for the drops here myself just altered the size with noise, sorry the render really is a bit small
http://www.bjread.joice.net/fposts/render12.jpg

[fiveshorts]

Thank you one and all.

I find the Deepshade water drops a bit plasticky — as if the whole thing's been dipped in acrylic. But a quick solution nonetheless, thanks.

Thinking Particles certainly seem to be the way to go, but there's a REALLY steep learning curve for me (never having used it in anger) and I'm not sure I have the time on this job...

So maybe modeling is still the best way to go — some random arrangement of spheres... a bit laborious, but predictable.

Brian, how did you use noise to control the drop size?

[flyingP]

like this http://www.bjread.joice.net/fposts/Picture1.jpg

[kromekat]

That file on mdme saides site is all you really need - you only need to have a look in the Xpresso editor to see which bits to replace, and then the water drops will be on your model as they are on the orange cylinder in his! - trust me - I did that with zero knowledge of Xpresso or TP.

Failing that, you might also try another method using the 'Re-selector' and 'Place On Points' plugins - duplicate your model and give it a major subdivision - to get a LOT of points.

Use Re-selector to select a random number of the points on your ultra sub-divided version (maybe 30-40%), from this create a slection tag, create a water drop sphere, drop both inside a Place On Points 2 object, tell the POP2 object where the point selection tag is, randomise the scale of the droplets also.

http://www.kromekat.com/examples/waterdrops.jpg

Here is the file (http://www.kromekat.com/examples/kromekat_water_drops.c4d.zip) for example.

[fiveshorts]

Now THAT'S a solution!

I really appreciate the TP example and I shall be exploring that when time really allows, but the Place on Points plugin is a godsend and really intuitive — I can just paint a point selection on my packaging and floor et voila!

This is what I was hoping for — and thanks for the sample file; always makes a difference.

thanks to everyone for your time and suggestions. I shall post the finished image as soon as I'm done.

TG

[kromekat]

You're welcome! - it's not a perfect solution, but it does the job! :)

[fiveshorts]

...and of course I now see that if I make the PoP results editable and drop the subsequent folder of spheres into a Metaball object, they smush together just like the 'real thing' making the effect even more lifelike.

You've just gotta love this c4D world.

If I can just get the Maxwell renderer and ZBrush I can die happy.

[Incarnadine]

Thanks for the sample file Adam! I don't have TP so this is a great help - very much appreciated.

[rodney71]

Flying P, thanks for the xpresso setup diagram. Can you explain what the first node box on the left is (titled "polygon emitter...") and how you set it up briefly? I assume it is something you built with user inputs or something? I know very little of Xpresso unfortunately and am trying to stretch myself.

thanks

[Hilt]

1)Can you explain what the first node box on the left is (titled "polygon emitter...") and
2)how you set it up briefly?
3)I assume it is something you built with user inputs or something?..

1)It's a preset for emitting particles from mesh.
2)It's pretty straigthforwarded to set it up. All you need to do is dig it up from Objects-> Object library->(TP Polygon Emitter)
3)correct, TP presets use User Data fields for easier access. (later you will notice that it is actually faster and less complicated to work straigth in Xpresso when things go more complicated)

.mjt

[flyingP]

yeah that one's in the object library along with a number of other useful presets, all I did was add a noise node to randomise the size, the rest of the settings you can do over the user data sliders/inputs that are included in that preset

[Whipyo]

Does anyone know where I can find the Place on Points plugin2 (Mac)? I can't seem to locate it anywhere......

[JamesMK]

Does anyone know where I can find the Place on Points plugin2 (Mac)? I can't seem to locate it anywhere......
http://spot4d.co.uk/plugins_pop.asp

[jph]

Thinking Particles is your best friend here.

Dont forget to pay royalties to mdme_sadie, since there's an example on his site at http://www.peranders.com/c4d8/index.html (and mdme_sadie will pay royalties for me for advertising his site, so in the end questions like these get pretty complicated..)

There you can find an image like

that is also an example file to make liquid on surface.
Basically it's just to use PSurfacePosition (did I remember it right?) that makes particles born on surface and then use MetaBalls to make it look liquid.

.mjt

...hmm... dosen´t show any dew on mine..., any ideas?

later jan


.....got it... the time node in the expresso was a hint,... gota move the time slider

[kromekat]

play forwards a little then render. :)

[Whipyo]

Thanks JamesMK! :thumbsup:

[mrmoose]

You can see here: a good videotutorial that explain what you want!

http://83.217.81.28/portal/forum/showthread.php?t=18

By!

[duderender]

One thing to watch is not to over use the sphere like geometry as water condensation doesn't really look like that. Especially pay attention to sheer surfaces where you should see gravity affect the "bubble" so it should appear weighted.

Great info here though.

[rodney71]

Agreed Jason, but I'm curious how you would set it up to have weighted looking water drops?
can you post or describe how to change the Expresso setup to orient customized droplet geometry to the normal direction of the polygon emitter? Maybe someone else can if you're not sure?

[duderender]

Probably, try adding a gravity with dynamics maybe?

Or, if you are predominantly dealing with a sloped surface, model the metaball or poly object to mimic this. Don't forget to "sink" these objects slightly below the surface so that their sides slope up to the drop apex due to convection. (or is it conduction, can't recall).

Spray a glass and look, you'll see what I mean.

[rodney71]

for sure. I know how it looks with surface tension in real life but to get that shape of water drop (with surface tension and a trailing edge) on a vertical surface I'd have to model it manually. the question then is how do I modify FlyingP's example expresso setup to place the droplets as particles so that they are oriented the right direction (parallel to normals) and allow control over offset from the surface (so they overlap the underlying geometry slightly)?

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