Houdini 21.0 Nodes Geometry nodes

Crowd MotionPath Arcing Layer geometry node

Blends between a set of animation clips based on the motion path’s turn rate.

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Since 21.0

This SOP layers additional animation clips on top of the agent’s base animation clip, where the blend weights are determined based on the agent’s turn rate.

A common use case is to blend between variants of the agent’s base cycle when the character is turning to the left or right in an arc. This allows for more realistic motion when turning (such as leaning for quadrupeds) compared to only adjusting the agent’s orientation.

See SOP motion paths for more information on the SOP Crowds MotionPath toolset.

Parameters

Group

The motion paths that the layered animation clips are applied to.

Turn Rate

Controls how the agent’s turn rate is computed from the motion path.

Smoothing

Smooths the computed turn rate along the path to prevent sudden changes to the clip blend weights.

Strength

The amount to smooth the turn rate values along the path. Higher values move the turn rate values farther from their original values.

Filter Quality

Higher values preserve finer details from the original turn rates. Lower values are faster and produce smoother turn rates.

Reference Direction

The original facing direction of the agent. This is used to compute the agent’s turn rate along the path.

Reference Up

The original up vector of the agent. This is used to compute the agent’s turn rate along the path.

Turn Rate Attribute

When turned on, creates a point attribute with the computed turn rate along the path (in units of degrees per second). This can be used for visualization and debugging, or to drive other downstream operations.

Clips

Clip Sets

Specifies the number of base animation clips that have associated arcing clips.

Base Clip Name

The name of the base animation clip, which should typically consist of motion in a straight line. The Arcing Clips are layered onto any points on the motion path that use this clip.

Arcing Clips

Clip Name

The name of the arcing clip to apply as a layer.

Turn Direction

Specifies whether the character is turning to the left or right in the clip.

Radius

The turning radius in the clip. This is used along with the Turn Direction to determine appropriate blend weights based on the turn rate.

Inputs

Motion Paths

Polyline curves representing the paths of the agents over a time range.

Agents

A crowd of agents whose motion is represented by the Motion Paths input.

Outputs

Motion Paths

Polyline curves representing the paths of the agents over a time range.

Agents

A crowd of agents whose motion is represented by the Motion Paths input.

See also

Geometry nodes