Public Beta: Trestle & Scrim

[AVTPro]

Very beautiful Work. Modeled in EIAS? Inspiring.

[halfworld]

I sent the Igors an email about this but the powers that be have asked me to post it here for feedback…

So, I don’t mean to be rude, but EI plug-in interfaces are invariably barren, terse and generally sterile. I’m a HUGE fan of Helios for the single reason that it looks friendly!

I say we should round Scrim off with a banner, it’ll make it look warmer and more complete.

Trestle is another matter, in my opinion it should not have a banner because it has an expandable interface and a banner would interfere with this functionality (I have expanded trestle to full screen size a couple of times).

Having said that, I am willing to be convinced otherwise (hey, it looks cool), take a look at the examples…
Ian

[Igors]

Hi, Ian

I say we should round Scrim off with a banner, it’ll make it look warmer and more complete.

Trestle is another matter…

Agree with both: in Scrim a banner is in place and in Trestle is not. Ok, let us prepare a banner

[Igors]

Hello, gentlemen

The promised utility plug-in is attached here. Sorry for no doc, we hope this little one is quite self-intuitive. WireMaker makes wires (particle lines) from polygons or edges of its child groups. You can add some variations to wires…

[Vizfizz]

Beta testers… you’ll also find a copy of Wiremaker in your emails.

[bronco]

Ian, you are right, plugins with banners look A LOT nicer and friendlier.

Igors, wiremaker seems to be a very nice addition. i’ll give it a little testdrive tonight.

[Igors]

Hi, Brian, Uwe

Beta testers… you’ll also find a copy of Wiremaker in your emails.

Ops! Sorry for disorder from our side, mail server reported our letter to you was delayed.

Igors, wiremaker seems to be a very nice addition. i’ll give it a little testdrive tonight.

That’s another interpretation of what you showed with UberShape lines: automatic creation of some “food” for Scrim

[bronco]

hi, automatic wire creation nice very nice.
i have tried it with some of my recent models, organic and mechanical, and some übers.
organic and geometric forms tend to give nicer results. (my chaotic blood again )
i got some crashes when changing the “wire source” setting, but nothing that i can reproduce, so no project file attached.

[Igors]

Hi, Uwe

hi, automatic wire creation nice very nice.
i have tried it with some of my recent models, organic and mechanical, and some übers.
organic and geometric forms tend to give nicer results. (my chaotic blood again )
i got some crashes when changing the “wire source” setting, but nothing that i can reproduce, so no project file attached.

Hmmm… would it be usable if Scrim “skips” a surface between sources “are enough far away each from another”? (just an idea for discussion)

[bronco]

Hi, UweHmmm… would it be usable if Scrim “skips” a surface between sources “are enough far away each from another”? (just an idea for discussion)

i don’t know if i understood you right.
if you mean: if distance is greater than 100 = skip, for example
then, ya, that would be very useful.
with no control over the order in which polygons are processed this is the best way to prevent scrim from working over arches (like the teapotexample or the arms of the girl) and holes.
i guess making this treshold value animatable would only produce jumping surfaces, so not useful.

[Igors]

Hi, Uwe

i don’t know if i understood you right.
if you mean: if distance is greater than 100 = skip, for example
then, ya, that would be very useful.

Yes, this, but with relative factor. For example: calculate an average distance and break a surface where the actual distance exceeds average * factor.

with no control over the order in which polygons are processed this is the best way to prevent scrim from working over arches (like the teapotexample or the arms of the girl) and holes.

Yes, it depends from polygons order and it’s bad cause a result is unpredictable. NL has a free utility plug-in to change polygons order (don’t remember a name, it came with Dervish). Hmm… maybe XYZ sort is not what we need here…

i guess making this treshold value animatable would only produce jumping surfaces, so not useful.

We never shared an opinion like “everything should have anim. channel”

And another one: if possible, please render the girl with GI etc. i.e. show “what is a maximal result now”, maybe it makes no sense to add more options to get a partial success only.

[bronco]

i know i said that i will make some form of tutorial about the car.
well, i haven’t had the time and this will not change so quickly.

so, here’s a little gift for all Trestle & Scrim users:

TS CAR PROJECT FILE

this way you can take it apart and see for yourself how this is build.
you can change it the way you like, or just use it as it is. i don’t care.
change the scrim settings to something low and use it as a backgroud prop or whatever.

most of the trestle groups are still named in german, but this is a WIP and i will post updated versions when i find the time. a little read me is included.

igors, if you want, you can add it as an example project to the release version.

this is FREE so have fun

[bronco]

And another one: if possible, please render the girl with GI etc. i.e. show “what is a maximal result now”, maybe it makes no sense to add more options to get a partial success only.

i don’t have the project file anymore, but these are the rendered layers.
as you can see, some of the strings go really wild.

[Igors]

Hi, Uwe

igors, if you want, you can add it as an example project to the release version.

Don’t worry and don’t rename something from German to English, that’s not a problem. You posted prj, all other is our affair. Thank you

[Igors]

i don’t have the project file anymore, but these are the rendered layers.
as you can see, some of the strings go really wild.

Finally we came to conclusion. We’ve 2 news: bad and good. Let’s say bad first:

It’s NOT for Scrim. The “straw style” requires careful and numerous PATH’s building, then that paths are transformed into simple straw units. That’s exactly vice versa to where lofting is powerful.

Ok, now the good one: that’s very suitable for one of next 2 modeling plug-ins

That’s all

[halfworld]

Well then Igors, I guess that is good news

So I had a play…

Scrim crashes EI when you select ‘by array’ and WM is a child (accidentally discovered).

Examples… The first is a plant, the second and third a torus. Very ‘arty’.
I noticed the animation channels and I’ll try animate something tonight!
Ian

[Igors]

Hi, Ian

Scrim crashes EI when you select ‘by array’ and WM is a child (accidentally discovered).

Oh, yes, Scrim is crashed when “by array” + single child only. That’s fixed, we’ll send new beta tomorrow (together with banner)

Examples… The first is a plant, the second and third a torus. Very ‘arty’.
I noticed the animation channels and I’ll try animate something tonight!

We don’t understand why “plant + torus” is a first what’s checked Why not “torus + scaled torus”?

Edit: for example: “push” one geodesic with WM. Push/scale another one geodesic in a bit different way. Pass these 2 WMs to Scrim’s array. Add more childs, deforms etc. You’ve fully controllable and predictable results. In other words: final shape’s complexity can be implemented with a sequence of simple operations with very simple source data.

[halfworld]

Oh, no reason, I just didn’t get round to it.
I will,
Ian

[Hiddenman.fr]

WireMaker is really a great addition to make lots of strange things. A question so. Wouldn’t it be possible to make the ID readable by Xpressionist to animate objects construction for example, or create parts of objects depending on a sound music. All types of great animations could be controled by this way. No?

[halfworld]

Yeah, very cool… So animate the ID from ‘1-2’ to 1-1000’ or whatever…

I thought about this yesterday but my thinking was more along the lines of an animated ‘u’ channel - like in revolver, for revealing a surface.

Ian