Hi,

Does anyone know how I can visualize mesh thickness? For example I need to find areas in a model that are less than 2mm thick. Or at the very least find the thinnest areas of a model (without specifying a minimum threshold in mm)

I found this SOP called Calculate Thickness but after going through the documentation and trying to fiddle with the settings I can't get it to work quite how I wanted. For example it is only giving me a grayscale image instead of a full gradient and it doesn't seem to be identifying the thin areas of a mesh in the expected fashion. 

The image below shows what I hope to achieve.

Many thanks,

BabaJ

Isaac Katz

BabaJ
You could use the fit function to reverse the values.

Can you elaborate more on this? You mean using the fit function inside the attribrandomize in the 'middle value' where the scale is set?

I'm not a super expert or anything on this so an example would be super helpful, thanks in any case!

Just post your hip and I'll add to it with an example.

Here you go. Thanks!

tamte

Isaac Katz
Any idea how I reverse the direction the exponential falloff is happening?

exponential falloff is a random distribution
it is not supposed to be a nicely organized gradient as in your picture, how did you even make Attribute Randomize to produce an obvious gradual ramp ?

Id suggest using Attribute Adjust Float, set Pattern Type to Bounding Box, pick Axis Direction and play with the ramp

lol I'm honestly not sure it just sort of happened. The gradient is happening on attribrandomize P, Im then creating another attribrandomize for pscale which is the one that's reversed from what I want. So the scale has nothing to do with the distribution.

In any case your tip worked great, exactly what I was looking for and perfectly art directable. thanks!!

BabaJ
You could use the fit function to reverse the values.

Can you elaborate more on this? You mean using the fit function inside the attribrandomize in the 'middle value' where the scale is set?

I'm not a super expert or anything on this so an example would be super helpful, thanks in any case!

Thanks! @Graham

Hi everyone,

Kind of a simple question but can't quite figure it out.

I scattered some points and copied cubes on them, randomized attributes including pscale

I am getting a nice exponential falloff on pscale which is what I want, but its in reverse. I want it to start big at the bottom and gradually taper off to nothing at the top. Basically the exact opposite of what Im getting now (see screenshot).

Any idea how I reverse the direction the exponential falloff is happening?

Thanks!

Mohanpugaz

Isaac Katz
Can you explain how this would be done? I only see Generate by Density option on the Scatter node. Thanks

simple example for scattering based on color this doesnt have solution to the original post, this is just for Isaac's question

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Thanks!! so simple

Mohanpugaz
you could scatter points separately on the geo using color

Can you explain how this would be done? I only see Generate by Density option on the Scatter node. Thanks!

Never mind I figured it out in the alembic loader you have to load the points as ‘Houdini Point Cloud’ then it recognizes the points as endemic to Houdini and you can do whatever you want with them. Also, better way to mesh is not a VDB but a particle fluid surface.

Hi,

I am importing an Alembic particle sequence from realflow. Shows up great in Houdini, no problems there. I want to ‘mesh’ it, I was thinking I would convert it to VDB and then to polys to have maximum control however the ‘VDB from Particles’ node is not taking the alembic particles (ie. nothing happens). Do I need to convert them to something else before? Am I approaching this completely wrong?

Much obliged,

Is there a way to do the same thing in a point wrangle (and avoid the workflow mentioned at the beginning)?

Thanks,

I just wanted to make clear, I appreciate the help Marty, the frustration / anger was not directed at you, but at SES, and I apologize if it came across another way.

Btw, do you have any idea about this?: https://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_forum&Itemid=172&page=viewtopic&p=185648#185648 [sidefx.com]

I'm sure you could help me a bunch.. thanks!

Thanks, I just saw it.

There is nothing really new there. Use a low res to preview, then bake it and attach the high rez mesh. The problem with that is that it's a hack, and you will *never* get the detail out of the high rez mesh following the low rez as if you had simulated the high rez in the first place. To imply otherwise would violate some physical principle or another (why would you over compute more when you can get the same result computing less. Answer - because you dont get the same result).

It's akin to upsampling photos. You can take a low rez photo with your phone and upsample it in photoshop all you want, but it's not going to be the same as if you had taken the photo with a high end DSLR.

In fact in the tests I have done, the actual behavior of the cloth colliding is so different at different resolutions as to render that method pretty much unusable.

Instead of trying to come up with hacks to get around functionality that should be there in the first place, SES should just focus on getting this to work right. Like many other people in all the other posts about this topic I've read, I'm shocked that this is the actual reality (like most other people, the solve was so unnaturally slow that I thought I was doing something wrong. Turns out I wasnt).

Hi,

I am trying to build a cloth sim following CMI's cloth tutorial.

The tutorial is a few versions old (im guessing around H11 or H12) and using the old cloth solver. Several of the shelf tools used, while they provide the same functionality, create drastically different nodes. This makes it very hard to tweak settings that are no longer there or insert a node in a network structure that doesnt exist, thus making it really hard to follow along and learn.

A simple example, in the previous version when creating a cloth object out of a mesh Houdini automatically created quite a few nodes in the Geo area such as ‘REST’, ‘Convert_To_Cloth’, etc. These are no longer present. Therefore, for example, I dont know how to make the cloth object want to follow a rest position (for example to be more fitted to the body).

Anybody have any idea if there is someplace documenting these changes and where to find the equivalent nodes in the new versions of Houdini, or how to get the same functionality?

Thanks in advance,

Very strange that Michiel didin't address any of the points mentioned before (ie. new cloth solver is slower, less functionality, etc.)

As a new Houdini user looking to run some cloth sims I am in the same position as Sam, wandering whether I should go back to Maya for this, and somewhat confused at the whole idea that Houdini doesnt have a decent cloth solver.

Would love to hear from SES people; what are the advantages of changing to FEM for cloth, what are the plans for this and when can we expect some decent speed out of it (and stability, currently trying to sim a 100k mesh, besides taking 15 min or more per frame it is crashing all the time).