Best fracture plugin?

#21

thanks mate, I think it doenst support alembic, at least the lite maya version, I tried that script some time ago, sadly it is dificult to set up and you have to select pieces little by little to get it working but at the end some internal faces are missed anyway, hope you are right and they fix it soon,

#22

That’s too bad about the script and Alembic. I think some people in the Pixelux forums actually confirmed Alembic as working with DMM though. Not sure if that has anything to do with the license type.

  Like I said, I haven't tried it in Maya 2013. My personal impression was, that for some reason DMM simulations run faster in Maya 2009 than in Maya 2012, so I basically haven't  moved out of Maya 2009 for DMM stuff yet, other than for playblasting  the cache with Viewport 2.0 in Maya 2012 for those vids on Youtube, that is. Most of the other FX stuff I do, I do in Max with TP and/or Rayfire. I'm sure a lot of Maya fanboys will disagree, but I personally find Maya a lot better suited for character animation and related things, rather than "regular" VFX stuff. nDynamics for example, are great and extremely useful for character work.
  
  Anyways, so far I'm still personally leaning on Max with said plugins for VFX type work, but everything seems to point towards Houdini being the best solution for those making a living purely with VFX and requiring that extra control and convenience. Well, the good news is, it's not owned by AD. lol
  
  Cheers!
#23

If your work is increasingly dependent on complex dynamics Houdini FX is a real blessing.
It’s lightyears ahead in everything dynamics and with time, you’ll like to render in H too.

Download the free apprentice versions and slowly try to build small procedural projects. It’s fun. Also knowing Houdini even on a immediate level can be the difference on missing or landing a job.

#24

Good for a sales pitch my friend but very far for truth, Houdini currently counts with 3 diferent rigid body solvers ODE, RBD, and Bullet, all of them has limitations and issues, you can read official SideFx documentation about these limitations here:

http://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini12.0/dyno/rbd

so basically ODE is an old solver, it only works with boxes and spheres, Bullet is fast but only works with “convex meshes” however aside simple boxes it explodes a lot while computing and takes time to stabilize it, finally RBD can handle any shape but is terrible slow, tested like 60 times slower than Bullet, thats make it useless in most productions

You say “H is lightyears ahead in everything dynamics”, please try other tools before claiming something like this

Im glad to tell you Pulldownit solver in Maya is about 2.5 times faster than Bullet and handles any kind of shape, convex or concave, fast and stable, in addtion it is able to compute fracture of brittle materials like stone in a very easy way.

Adding Pdi to Maya particles and fluids you can get quality destructions effects much easier than with H, thats my opinion

Finally, missing or landing a Job depends on your skills and experience my friend, Maya is number 1 used 3D platform nowadays, but it doesnt mind really which tool you use as far as your reel is good enough,

“is the artist not the tool”

#25

Well said Carlos.

#26

I agree with you here but I just wanted to point out that Maya isn’t the number one used 3D software package. It’s 3ds Max, according to Autodesk’s sales figures last I heard of them. Maybe you’re referring to feature film but even that’s guess work unless you can back it up with something other than your own experience and perspective.

Also I do think tools are important, and I think if you want to be the best artist you can be you need to stay open minded about all tools out there. Some do things better than other software and therefore can speed up your workflow – and it’s all in constant evolution. At the moment, for an example, Houdini has an unprecedented level of velocity control (though I don’t know much about XSI’s ICE) and that coupled with its great fluids make it stand out with those things. Z-Brush and Mari do what they do extremely well as well compared to other software.

So IMO tools do matter, but I think it’s a very dangerous trap to ever fall into to being emotionally connected to a piece of software – at least to the point where you won’t consider other software because you think the one you use is the best.

#27

I don’t want to endorse any tool here or sound biased towards any but when it comes to simplicity I think It just took me a day or say few hours to understand/learn all the basics working of PDI Dynamics & DMM which are well integrated inside Maya but each has its own pros & cons. More I overcome the limitation or issues my knowledge gets more better with every trial & error. so its really depends on the skill set of an individual artist of how far things can be pushed whether its PDI or DMM or just Ncloth shatter with Particle instancers.

p.s : Carlos I fucking love the speed of your shattering tool …I hope to see more in future ahead.

#28

Hello friend, and thanks for the introduction of Maya to a 10 years+ maya user. :slight_smile:

Also thanks for info on the old H solvers, which are obsolete and are probably just kept for backwards compatibility purposes.

I haven’t used the tool you are selling, so I can’t judge on it’s speed quality or directability and/or integrity with other dynamic tools. I don’t know for example if you can make cg water that breaks a cg bridge with cg characters trying to survive that and such…

What I try to say is that H is much more than a shattering tool and if you are serious or curious about that kind of effects, don’t be afraid to get your hands dirty with it.

But for the sake of not derailing this thread and stick to “shattering plugins”… There is surely a place for every shattering tool, with speed being the advantage of one, simplicity that of the other and so on.

Peace a& Cheers!

#29

No problem mustique, cheers & peace 2u, Im not comparing Pulldownit with the whole H, that makes no sense, rather Im comparing Maya + destruction Plugins with H as a serious alternative.

Anyway, H is a great tool sure, but not perfect and pretty complex to use, rbd solvers isnt the best part of H, and even with Bullet it has still issues, but I do not why Houdini users always talk about it as working perfect :surprised , now everybody agrees older rbd solvers in H are pretty bad but a couple of years ago, before bullet was built-in users of H were telling marvels about them in this same board, thats funny, I would like Houdini users were more honest when discussing tecnical issues

#30

Then, how do you sim concave object in Houdini?
Bullet can not do it. own solver is slow.
Do you need plugin?

#31

http://forums.odforce.net/index.php?/topic/15196-bullet-concave-objects/page__hl__%2Bconcave+%2Bobject

#32

I don’t think Convex Hull is a true triangular mesh collision.

Bullet manual says “If a concave dynamic shape is required, then it may be specified by combining convex shapes (usually primitives and btConvexHull) in various configurations.”

You can use only use “static” concave shape sams as PhysX.

#33

Hey guys, after reading the above threads I am in a serious toss up between FractureFX and PullDownIt.

The problem with the plugins is that they have so many limitations for the demo I can’t really tell which is the better purchase. Honestly, I find their limitations especially FractureFX so limiting I can’t really tell if it’ll handle the project I need it for.

But it sure seems to give a lot of control in an easy way and I think I can pick it up and the word art direct-ability seems like a common thing going with FractureFX.

Can some shed light on this? I basically have a product being shot at and I need controlled fractures in those regions followed by a final shot which is like a tremor that shifts the pieces out of place and an explosion following shortly behind it.

Some scenes seem to need to feel like slow-mo. Can someone please provide advice. This project requires an immediate purchase and the companies never really show anything then basic box explosions.

I know it might be a little too much to ask but I need something simple but with control, I feel realflow is much like that.

#34

Kinematics:

I’m a fracture - user ( since beta testing four years ago ) so I wouldn’t know what limitations there’s in the demo but if you could elaborate a bit ( what do think you would need but is limited ) I could try and help you with your decision.

/risto

ps: fracture is designed to break stuff, so for your “tremors” I’m guessing an
alternative ( read: do it with maya’s dynamics ) method will come handy at that point.

#35

Hello Kinematics -

The problem with the plugins is that they have so many limitations for the demo I can’t really tell which is the better purchase. Honestly, I find their limitations especially FractureFX so limiting I can’t really tell if it’ll handle the project I need it for.
Send an email to contact@fracture-fx.com to get a trial version without the limitation of the public trial.

the companies never really show anything then basic box explosions.
At Fracture FX we deliberately avoid canned tutorials. Consequently, our tutorials are all based on production shots, from simple to advanced:
http://www.fracture-fx.com/tutorials
Our clients use Fracture FX for the most complex demolition shots on TV and film. Have a look at some of their work on our client reel: http://www.fracture-fx.com/reels

Some scenes seem to need to feel like slow-mo. Can someone please provide advice
The shot below was done with a beta version of Fracture FX a few years ago.
http://vimeo.com/15953409

Any more questions, let me know. :wink:

#36

All that you mention can be done with Pulldownit and not dificult, for the tremor a camera shake is more important than dynamics to get the feeling, beliave me. Slow mo can be done by changing de FPS when computing or mimic it just reducing gravity, thats a good trick.
One advantage of PDi is the scale of destruciton with thousands of fragments in scene, the solver can handle it stable and much faster than maya rbds or bullet.

Since when not surfing the web, man? all companies I know show final shots in addition to pretty good viewport demos, for example this one by Boris Bruchhaus with Pdi isnt “basic boxes explosión” and you can find more of this in our gallery,

http://www.pulldownit.com/gallery-3.php?iditem=39&idcate=4

cheers

#37

DrGonzo and dynamic boy, can you give examples of blockbusters scenes that use your plugins ?
I watched fracture reel but didn’t see any blockbuster scene (the majority was TV series scene and the reel generally was not very impressive).

That X or Y studios use your plugins is great, but what would be amazing is tell us what blockbuster scene have been made with your plugins because when i watch your reels or user stories i don’t see anything that could make me say "wow, this scene has been made with pulldownit/fracturefx ? Amazing. You know what i mean? Like rayfire for max, we know what blockbusters it was used in.

Thanks guys

#38

DrGonzo and dynamic boy, can you give examples of blockbusters scenes that use your plugins ?
Dredd 3D, Snowwhite and the huntsmen, Wrath of the titans - and a few more in development.

I watched fracture reel but didn’t see any blockbuster scene (the majority was TV series scene and the reel generally was not very impressive).
http://whitsblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Troll_Face.png

#39

How to NOT give the will to consumers to know more about a product:

Step 1. To the simple question “can you give examples of blockbusters scenes that use your plugins ?” …well answer like if you didn’t read “scene” and throw 1 blockbuster name (wrath of the titans) and 2 others that, even if they have VFX are far from i call blockbusters (from my point of view). And for the mystery factor, throw a “few more in development”, he will be impressed.

Step 2. Hope you’ll impress people giving snow white and dredd as the most representative power of your plugin (obvisouly if it would have been used for impressive work in real blockbusters - you know stuffs like iron man, avengers, hulk, man of steel, star trek etc. - you could have name them and name the scenes, and show other stuffs in a showreeel (that must show the top notch of what your plugin can do) than 50% of heroes scenes, 30% of the event, and 15% of commercial.

Step 3. When someone says he was not impressed with the showreel and that obviously you don’t agree because it’s your plugin, it’s the best fracture plugin and you need to sell them, make him pass for a troll with a link to troll face because it’s unaceptable that someone don’t share your opinion and is not impressed with the few examples he’ve seenl.
Love those people who don’t respect others opinion :applause:

Step 4. Be proud of your communication and marketing and hope that it will give the will to other potential consumers to buy your amazing product. :thumbsup:

Hope dynamic boy knows a little bit more marketing, communication and respect.

#40

I hope so,

http://whitsblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Troll_Face.png