noseman

My very loyal but invisible Developer made me a Plugin for Christmas. It's the "Phong to Spline" and uses the Phong Tag values or Isoparms to generate a Procedural Spline. Watch the tutorial and Download the plugin from the provided link:

you can try to open them in R21, select all and copy to new file, save, and try opening in S22.

Great script Andreas! Thanks

Regarding 2: Exactly as CBR says, BUT I would ask for what you want to use it for, as there may be some ways to achieve your end-goal without having to do it by adding random subdivisions...

YES! Your example shows one of the huge advantages of this method. I was thinking of doing a follow-up video, showing this alternative technique... I will be very happy to credit you if you wish... let me know if there's any specific information you'd like me to mention. Name, website, twitter and so on...

and the E2S is 3 times faster 🙂 (I see you're cloning splines after all)

For your setup, Yes, but what if you want to displace the spline and then make the tubes?

Hey everyone, check out my Youtube channel where I have the download link for a Free "Edge to Spline" plugin. It's Open source, procedural, do-whatever-you-want with it. The code is open, so use it for educational purposes as well. Modify it, and make more super plugins. Please don't sell it. [Disclaimer. I have no responsibility, expressed or implied as far as the plugin is concerned. Use it as-is. Whatever happens, it's your fault. By downloading it, you agree to this... and owe me a grilled steak... medium rare please] Share, Like, Subscribe. edgeToSpline.zip

missed the first reply... sorry 🙂

select the spline and in the Attributes set the intermediate points to Uniform:

why don't you constrain the Prism to the same spline with an Align to Spline and synchronize the motion using XPRESSO? https://www.dropbox.com/s/rujxxgvvj7tt7r0/aligned prism.c4d?dl=0

Yes https://www.dropbox.com/s/btxo7gduxe0k4q4/eating.c4d?dl=0

Why would you think they are inefficient? And you don't need to use metaballs. As for the rest, I don't really understand what the problem is. Can you post an example of what you want to achieve?

I think there are a couple of possible solutions. Instead of Metaballs you can use Volumes. As far as an advanced FFD, you can use the Mesh deformer instead. Overall, I think the Volume solution would offer you the best and more versatile results. Press play in the attached file. https://www.dropbox.com/s/7vk78w490374r5d/ffd1 Volumes.c4d?dl=0

Let me throw in my couple of cents to this. Planning and lot's of work are key elements. If you have 2 different objects and want to morph them into each other, you first need to define what the boundaries of the effect will be. For example, in the Transformers movies, the transformations are totally unrealistic in real life. Most of the stuff just scales down and disappears and other stuff scales up and appears. Very few objects morph into each other. In your case, you would need either to make both objects using the same point count, or use a similar method for both. For example, if you use Volume and noises to build both Spheres, then "morphing" from one volume to another is not difficult. Here's a tutorial: https://www.cineversity.com/vidplaylist/morphing_objects_with_volumes_fields/morphing_objects_with_volumes_fields_creating_complimentary_meshes Overall, you first need to define what you want to do, then identify the potential technical difficulties, then set the acceptable type of effect (maybe you can just use masks in compositing, and a flare to hide the transition) and THEN build it to accommodate the above.

or you could use an animated Arc spline under a Spline Mask with Create Cap activated... animated Arc.c4d

Was the point cloud saved as Points or Particles? Did you check to see the import settings are identical between R19 and R21?

Thanks Hrvoje! Always my pleasure.

yes, this produces the same result. I did the whole thing in R21, which defaults to Remapping OFF for Volume Fields. The main thing is to understand: 1. what the data is: SDFs have negative non-normalized distance values inside the volume. 2. How to use the data: I want to create a "3D mask" (Field) from 0-1, where 1 is the selection I'm going to apply the Smoothing on. So I want the negative values to become 1 and the positive 0 (no selection). Therefore, first of all I need to negate the Volume Value, so that negative becomes positive. Then I need to apply "contrast" by compressing the distance values to 1 (range mapper is a "data contraster" and compresses the value gradient). You can do the same thing using remapping, or many other ways...

and a little bit from Jonathan Banks

Recently I pinned a reply on the Youtube Chat. If you're on R20, the Volume builder, by default, has remapping ON. You need to turn OFF remapping for the Volume Builder Field. R21 does that by default. I missed that difference in the original recording. Let me know if it worked.

so, the only viable method I found, if for you to follow this tutorial, and transfer the Dynamics to a hierarchy of objects, after you bake the mograph Cloner to a mograph Cache tag. https://lesterbanks.com/2015/03/bake-mograph-animations-to-objects-using-xpresso/ After you have successfully transferred the Dynamics to the Objects, hide the Cloner, go to the last frame, apply your material to the Parent Null using a Flat Projection, and when you're happy, from the Tags menu, do a "Copy Tag to children" This will apply the material at THAT frame, at THAT position for all tiles. When you scrub back, you'll see that the texture is stuck on each tile. I have used another method to make the activation of the Dynamics similar to the original emitter. Project link attached: https://www.dropbox.com/s/pn6n8ow1cuqrwsl/Tiles 01A.c4d?dl=0