Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

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bradworst
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Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by bradworst » 10 Apr 2012, 19:55

how can i do this in ice?

... polygon with no subdivisions, subdivide, extrude each face, subdivide, extrude each face... etc.

thanks for helping!!
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Extrude1.JPG

Chris_TC
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Chris_TC » 10 Apr 2012, 22:35

Unfortunately, the Extrude Polygon Island factory node does not support individual extrusions, so I had to use a Repeat node. Compound is attached.

Image
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Extrude and Subdivide.xsicompound
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Rork
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Rork » 11 Apr 2012, 09:46

nice one!

If you could add rotation as well, it will make a interesting fractal alike modeling tool for branches, vains etc.

It's great to see ICE used for stuff like this. :-bd

rob
SI UI tutorials: Toolbar http://goo.gl/iYOL0l | Custom Layout http://goo.gl/6iP5xQ | RenderManager View http://goo.gl/b4ZkjQ
So long, and thanks for all the Fish!!

bradworst
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by bradworst » 11 Apr 2012, 15:09

super!!!!

can you also do this with this compound? maybe based on weightmaps?
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grid3.jpg
grid2.jpg
grid1.jpg

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xsisupport
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by xsisupport » 11 Apr 2012, 18:29

Here's something [relatively crude in comparison to Chris_TC's effort]
http://wp.me/powV4-1Ls

Weight maps are per vertex, not per polygon, so that makes it more complicated to use weightmaps to control polygon extrusions.
// Steve Blair
// "You're not a runner, you're just a guy who runs" -- my wife
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Chris_TC
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Chris_TC » 11 Apr 2012, 21:06

This should get a per-polygon weight map value:

Code: Select all

Get self.blablabla.WeightMap.Weights -> Build Array From Set
                                                           |
                                                           v
Get self.PolygonToVertices         ->           Select in Array  ->   Array Average
I played with it a bit, however I had the weight map on a separate grid, because my starting grid for the subdivisions and extrusions was so low-res. I ran into weird issues. Both a raycast and closest location returned a 0 weight map value on a strip about one-third its total size, even though the weight map had values there. I tried a texture map on the main grid itself and got the same result. Seemed like a strange bug, will need to investigate if I have time.

Edit: Hahaha, Stephen, this is awesome! You just have to disconnect all edges, and the extrusions become separate without requiring a loop. Why did I never think of that? :)

bradworst
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by bradworst » 11 Apr 2012, 21:18

:-)

I don´t want to have them seperated... it´s a different look...

well, i can´t make it!!!!

xdxucn
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by xdxucn » 12 Apr 2012, 00:15

I like Greeble plugin in 3dsmax. This thread makes me to wonder if it is possible to do such effects with ICE modeling tool, and how about the efficiency (since Greeble is a compiled plugin, and will still fast even the model is very complex)?

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mattmos
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by mattmos » 12 Apr 2012, 00:54

bradworst wrote::-)

I don´t want to have them seperated... it´s a different look...

well, i can´t make it!!!!
You give up too easily! After the modelling compound you just add an edge weld op with a very low threshold - or clone the mesh and add the weld op there if you want to keep things separate.

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Maximus
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Maximus » 12 Apr 2012, 01:06

xdxucn wrote:I like Greeble plugin in 3dsmax. This thread makes me to wonder if it is possible to do such effects with ICE modeling tool, and how about the efficiency (since Greeble is a compiled plugin, and will still fast even the model is very complex)?

http://area.autodesk.com/forum/autodesk ... ce-greeble

there is also another compound for greeble, i'll post when i'll find in my folders.

here they are, one is from chris marshall, the other i dont remember.
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Greeble.1.3.xsicompound
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Greeble2.xsicompound
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woodengun
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by woodengun » 13 Apr 2012, 20:13

Thanks Maximus. These seem nice too.

It would be great to have a compound that could do what the Max greeble plugin does. Instead of being point cloud / emitter based it was more like extrusions on geo like the previous posts along with a little controller for complexity, taper, max and min sizes, etc...

Should we be using ICE modeling for this instead of emitters?

Just a thought.

Chris_TC
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Chris_TC » 14 Apr 2012, 13:55

It sounds easy enough to do using topology. I roughly know what the Greeble plugin does, but is there some kind of documentation or video where all the parameters can be seen and how it works? What do you supply as an input? A random mesh? And how does the output look? Are the extrusions all merged into the original topology, or are they just separate blocks?

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Mathaeus
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Mathaeus » 14 Apr 2012, 14:59

Something like - original page is probably this one. First step is extrude of all polygons with small inset. Second step actually is emission of cubes and L like shapes. I think second step is created by subdividing the polygon, then, maybe, joining the areas, randomly, using these areas as a base for new layer of objects.

woodengun
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by woodengun » 14 Apr 2012, 18:36

I fired up max and did some greeble examples. I'm attaching a screengrab (I hope you can see it, I always mess up attachments). Anyway, it shows the little control panel on the right. You can see the little "widget" shapes to choose from tetris style, the min and max size, height, density, etc... It looks like its extruding from the normals and as you can see when using with a pyramid some of the greebles are triangular, but on a sphere they maintain the rectangular shape. It always works with any piece of geo you use.

I have tried a few times to create something like this with ICE modeling, but it never seems to work all that great due to the changing polygon index, and variance shape/size of the extrusion. I hope that helps!
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screengrab
screengrab

Chris_TC
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Chris_TC » 14 Apr 2012, 19:32

Okay, so judging by your descriptions and screenshots there are two parts to this:
Panels: They randomly extrude and inset all existing polygons within a specified margin (min height, max height, fixed taper strength)
Widgets: These are spawned on top of the panels, they are selected from a fixed library of tetris-like shapes and placed to match the panels' normals. Users can specify a density as well as minimum and maximum size and height. There does not seem to be any prevention of overlaps, as I see lots of overlap between widgets in the screenshot. This makes sense, because together with random heights the overlaps will generate shapes that look much more complex than the basic widget library itself.

This can all be done in ICE Topo. Might even be a topic for a workshop..?

Some thoughts:
The panel part of this could be a bit cumbersome because of the limited functionality of the Extrude Polygon Island node. We can start off by disconnecting all edges (we can always weld them back together at the end of the ICE tree). This will have the Extrude Polygon Island work on all polygons separately. However, we cannot specify per-polygon transform values. The Extrude Polygon Island node only accepts one input. So extruding every polygon along its normal cannot be done with factory nodes as far as I'm aware. This is actually an area where I was 99% sure we'd see improvements and additional nodes in SI 2013, but I digress.

So we will either have to use a loop, which will make the panel part rather slow. Or we can try to build our own extrusion compound. However, for starters a loop should do. Performance improvements could always be made later.

The widget part would roughly go like this:
1) Plug an array of size (DENSITY*Number of Polygons) into the ID of a Random Value node. Use its result to pick topologies from a library. The library can be hard-coded into Create Topo nodes, so that no external geometry has to be used.
2) Build another array of size (DENSITY*Number of Polygons) with random transform values, but ensuring that the rotation always matches each polygon's normal. If DENSITY is 14, we'd use 14 times the normal of polygon 0, then 14 times the normal of polygon 1 etc.
3) Transform the topo array using the transform array.

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Kerro Perro
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Re: Extrude and extrude and extrude and...

Post by Kerro Perro » 15 Apr 2012, 13:47

Wow i would love to see some work on this - i've been hoping for an ICE greebler for a least a year!

But: do they have to be extruded? If you check out the max greebler results you'll see that only the base panels are extruded and some subdivided once - the widgets just lay on top and are not extruded:
greebles.PNG
(the SI viewport reveals what max hides ;) )

I think it would be a waste of effort to make them be extruded as this works perfectly fine plus i've always considered it a drawback that you couldn't connect external geo to it - would be nice if you could add a cool cylinder or antenna and get more of that "close up Death Star" effect! (Wich is my personal Holy Grail as far as ICE is concerned)

EDIT: whoops i'm an idiot - just read Chris TC's post more closely and see he already got this (of course), just consider this a vote for the widgets being more diverse... :ymblushing:

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