My first Particles Nodes test

Hi everybody !

I want to share with everyone my first playing with the Lukas Tonne (phonybone) experimental build : Particles Nodes. Look the videos (720p):

Simple collision and bounce:

At base I want to create real geometry collision and self particles collision but many nodes missing to do what I really want to do. But it’s very promising.It’s a bit unstable too but it’s normal for now at a alpha stage.

Simple attractor:

Big grey sphere emit particles and small one attract them. A bit of drag is added too.

Change instance from a value:

Here I change from the green monkey to the red sphere when the velocity is greater then 1. Any others value can be used.

Emit from a object distance:

Here a emit particles only if they at a distance of 1 from the orange wireframe sphere. I see vertexgroup will be added but not working for now. It's will be interesting with dynamic paint !

Hope to see all the power of XSI ICE or Houdini in this build and see it in the official build soon. Keep your good work Lukas, dataflow system is the future in 3D !

new video added for a simple attractor!

I add a video about changing instance from any value ( velocity used here )

and the last one for the weekend, emit particles from a object distance. I see vertex group option in the Sample Object node but it’s not working. Will be interesting with dynamic paint !!!

Great tests
so many possibilities with particles nodes!! :slight_smile:

Yes but for now a lot of nodes missing. But with all nodes , this will but powerfull. When you think then Lagoa was develloped in the beginning only with this kind of system ( with ICE system in Autodesk Softimage XSI ).

Hope Lukas can continue is great works!

Another good example of the power of this kind of system: http://vimeo.com/20652466
A raytracer make with ICE. This guy make other amazing stuff with ICE, just see it’s videos on vimeo.

Considering the power of PFlow in 3DS Max, It’s gonna be interesting to follow the development of the particle nodes in Blender. There’s some amazing work done so far and even more potential lurking just around the corner. Very cool indeed. :slight_smile:

I don’t well know Pflow, just by it’s name and some collegue working with ThinkingParticles talk about it. Probably because I don’t work a lot in 3Dsmax too :slight_smile: I’m know more about ICE and it’s very powerfull too (you can create and control geometry and many others things then particles too). I think the master of that kind of system is Houdini I heard from others collegues. Hope that see Blender with this kind of system soon.

ICE is like Houdini, you can do it all, particles, dynamics, fluids or modelling, it’s kinda the base of the whole system. PFlow is ‘just’ a particle system - but as far as particle systems go (and as I understand it) PFlow and TP is top notch. So if Blender matches that, it’s very cool. :slight_smile:

Edit: And I don’t work in 3DS Max either, hehe, I just checked it out due to PFlow & FumeFX. :wink:

I talk to a collegue working on vfx of Legends of Guardians couples of week ago and tell him what he is thinking about different system and he find TP more restrictive and less userfriendly then ICE and he know Houdini is presently where all fx artist goes ( he tell me a fx artist well know Houdini find a well pay job in a big studio really fast ). He talk to me about a friend start it’s own system too … a standalone can working with any software but I forgot the name for now … I know then some people talk about it on the forum.

I don’t know for other system but for ICE , one thing we see is compagny developp entire complex tool to sell with ICE. Not simple preset. I know autodesk probably want to integrate a kind of ICE in Maya too.

Btw , hope Lukas take all advantage of all softwares design… and give me enough node to do my molecular addon entirely with that :wink: I don’t have skill and time to code my own C++ node :frowning: . Hope to see this system take advantage of Cuda/OpenCL too! It’s can be very fast.

For me I don’t really get the comparison. Saying TP is restrictive when it’s a particle system where ICE is complete node based systems, not really a fair comparison. And I haven’t worked with ICE but I can say as much as Houdini being way more complex (and unintuitive) than either Pflow or TP - but of course you can do so much more, but it’s not an artists system at all, it’s all ‘engineering’. Imo. :slight_smile:

And if you want to get a job at a studio, learn python first, hehe… But I agree, if you’re good at Houdini you’ll probably find a job pretty easy too though the same can be said about 3DS Max/FumeFX or Maya Fluids, at least in Europe. :slight_smile:

Yes , you right. Houdini and ICE is probably more complex for a artist and is more oriented for TD or technical artist. The learning curve is tough at the beginning. I supposed to have a training in the next month on ICE.

But it’s impressive how many tool more technically advanced artist can do for others artist at the Studio where I’m working or many tool we find on internet ( free or not ).More the system is complex , less regular artist can understand it easily but more powerfull tool can be created for those artist by others. This can become s beautiful framework for creating tool with all the power of C++ without to have to learn it and manage many kind of complex stuff like memory or multithreading.

A good example is Thiago Costa , a simple artist (but a good one) , tested is idea with ICE for creating Lagoa Multiphysics. Okay at the end he is go too motivated and he learn C++ for developping it’s own node but at the beginning all done with native nodes. I know a bit of is story because I currently working at the studio where Thiago worked before.

All depends what Blender developpers want to do :slight_smile:

Well, it will be interesting to see if you can implement your script into the new particle system, it would be very cool. :slight_smile:

but your signature suggest you have a lot of experience , with vectors and others stuff. You are not interested to learn Houdini , ICE or any system like that? The guy it’s suppose to give me the training tell me it’s not too difficult when you know how vectors and others things like that works. Your PFlow experienced probably help a lot too.

Yes !!! I cross my finger about the work of Lukas not be left. I hope he create enough nodes too :D. I’m not ready to learn C++ to create my own nodes for now ! :wink:

The others think I’m thinking about is create my own NodesBasesSystem with python and cython … but probably not fast like real compiled C++ code.

Anybody ( developper or coders ) thinking about to make a plugins for Coral App ?

http://code.google.com/p/coral-repo/

A really powerfull nodal tool to make many things.
If not about to create a plugins , it’s a good inspiration for the one developped by Lukas.

If I primarily was a 3D artist I might had gone that way, but I got my roots in Photoshop continuing to video and compositing. So I’m a comper rather than a 3D artist (even though, the last few years, I’ve worked a lot in 3D). It’s kinda my second period doing 3D, the first being 1996-2000.

But I have played some with Houdini and it’s a cool way to work, but as in Nuke you need to have everything in order, planned, it’s not like in AE where you can just sit & ‘play’ until you get the results you want… And I think Blender also is a bit like that, it stimulates the playfulness rather than demand I stop & think about what the h*ll I’m doing… ;D

Edit: And vectors like in vector graphics, hehe, though I also used (motion-) vectors for creating motionblur & all that, but that was not what I was referring to in my signature. :wink:

Where can we find news about those particles? I know about http://phonybone.planetblender.org/ , but is it still developed?

I don’t know.
On the miikah website , the link for the build are removed. And on github the branch are removed too the last time I try 1-2months ago. Somebody have news ?