Contortionist v 2.02

#2

well could you post what you have so far?

If it is just for a still image, then you should be able to use modeler to
have a circle outline be lofted along a path in modeler.

#3

Swage could also work. Its animated extrusion along a path is designed for that.

#4

…thank you for responding.

I’m trying to animate a rope coiling around
a post…nothing to show at this point. I haven’t been
able to get the rope to follow the path in
Contortionist.

When you modify a NURBS Curve in Modeler does it
change some characteristic thus confusing Contortionist?

#5

…if I’m unable to accomplish this with Contortionist,
I will definitely invest in Swage.

Thanks for the insight.

#6

Can you describe how you’re wanting to “coil” the rope around the post a little better? Does the rope just need to follow along the extrusion path or does the whole rope need to be animated as if its being tossed around the post multiple times…

#7

…thanks, again.

The attached image shows the NURBS Curve path, and
currently how Contortionist isn’t following the path.

#8

Well… I can’t really speak much on Contortionist because I don’t own it. I do have Flexpath which is a similar process. As with most Northernlight’s plugins, make sure you’re obeying Blair’s 0,0,0 placement for objects rule before assigning them to the plugin. It looks like you’re getting somekind of offset from the path.

If you want, send me this project without the contortionist call but include the polyline and geometry and I can try something with Swage if you like.

I’m assuming your exporting out the nurbs curve as a dxf entity converted to Fact for animator to read correct?

#9

I purchased Swage, Trestle and Scrim over a year ago in order to solve an issue very similar to this one. Not only is Swage ideal for this type of thing, I now use it on every shot that I do. Having animatable geometry in Animator has completely changed the way I set my scenes up, I dunno what I’d do without these great plugs.

For the rope, I’d animated the creation of the rope around the post using Swage… to make the rope look as though it’s actually wrapping around, I’d animated the rope texture’s UV to make it look like it’s advancing with the rope build. It’s a very simple set up with Swage and Trestle.

If you have any questions about the process or wanna see a quick mockup of how it can look, let me know.

Peter

#10

…thank you for the great input and advice. I will follow-up
with the outcome.

#11

seems simple enough to create using the deforms?

Cj

#12

Hey Gabe…

I’ll try to get to that project file today…

#13

Hi Brian

Would you please explain about obeying Blair’s 0,0,0 placement for objects rule before assigning them to the plugin.

As i have Dante 3.1 and it’s very onstable all the time.

Thanks Paul

#14

Most of Blair’s plugins require the objects being utilized by the plugin to be placed at 0,0,0 initially otherwise you may see offsetting or have problems getting predictable results. It has to do with the way he originally programmed his plugins and the earlier EI architecture. This may not be an issue for newer plugs any more… I"m not sure… but here is Blair’s explanation in his own words on how his “Control Group” system works.

“When you have a plugin as the parent and that plugin is making use of the child group, the
situation becomes more complicated. The plugin may see the object at its absolute location
in the world or it may see it at a location relative to the plugin. The problem becomes even
more confusing if the plugin is being moved or rotated. And the problem becomes more
complicated than that if the plugin is duplicating or moving instances of the child groups.
In the case of a plugin instancing child groups such as a particle plugin, the best way to handle the problem is to first make sure that the group in question is at (0.0, 0.0, 0.0) in position and rotation before it is made a child of the plugin. Once the group is linked to the plugin, open its Linkage window and uncheck Inherit Position and Inherit Rotation. This will prevent any movement of the plugin from affecting the child group’s original position and thus eliminating any compounding movement.”

#15

Thanks Brian

Yours Paul

#16

Hey Gabe,

I just quickly dropped in a Swage call into your project and used default profiles to give a chord/cable/tube look. I didn’t change a thing and it snapped right onto your EIM wires. Your EIM wires could use a little more resolution to make the coiling look smoother.

But as you can see…Swage “grows” the geometry along the path rather than moving the object along it like Contortionist. So there a couple of things you could do to improve the appearance of this. Swage can use a separate profile to extrude along the path. That can be another imported child object (wire) or it can be generated by Trestle. That profile could be a triad of circles that could be rotated around the extrusion path to give a true twisted/braided rope look. Secondly, you could apply a texture to the resulting geometry and then animate the texture map’s UV position to make it appear like its moving. It would just depend on what kind of appearance you want. I’ll admit that animating the texture map is kind of a drag…and I’d like to see if I can get the Igors to include some new controls in future versions to help simplify the process…but for now, its what we’ve got.

http://www.paralumino.com/CG_Talk/Swagetest.mov

http://www.paralumino.com/CG_Talk/Swagetest2b.mov

#17

Actually, the way Contortionist works is intentional. It gives you the ability to deform objects that may or may not align precisely with the path e.g. roller-coaster track rails.

#18

Yah, Swage has a similiar offsetting capability along with its transformer modes. Either system should work well for this scenario. The primary difference between the two plugins is one generates & extrudes geometry on the fly while the other deforms and moves existing geometry along a path. Both functionalities are pretty critical to EI. But they are different.

Gabe…its up to you to determine which works better for your project. I could see why you’d like Contortionist, especially if you don’t want to mess with the texture map thing in Swage. Either way, you should be able to get Contortionist to deform the tube/cable around your path. If I had a copy I’d certainly try to help you out. I only have Flexpath.

#19

I want to express my thanks to everyone who helped.

I still have a long way to go, but I am making progress.

The link will take you to a sample

http://www.hilltop-studios.com/2/page23.html

#20

That’s looking pretty good. What you need to do now is get a smoother version of the path from your modeler. Try reading about UV tesselation.

#21

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