?? plugin or utility viability of assigning existing obj groups or softbody attach for dynamic cloth

Diomede

Greetings,

Complete idiot here. I don't even know if the following is possible.

I don't know what the limitations of the Carrara SDK are. However, there has been significant progress in developing a method to efficiently use softbody upon softbody physics collision to simulate clothing drape. However, it has a number of aspects that could be quite tedious, especially for figures that have been morphed or otherwise customized. I am trying to learn whether some of these tedious steps could be facilitated in a utility or plugin. The method creates a mesh envelope (called the undersuit) surrounding the base figure (V4, M4, or whatever). Collisions are turned off for the base figure. A clothing article collides with the undersuit, so softbody collides with softbody, which calculates much faster. The undersuit's vertex groups are softbody attached to the base figure's bodypart bones, and thus the envelope moves with the figure. Because softbody to softbody seems to calculate so much faster than softbody to base figure, the process has potential to be very useful. However, creating the undersuit mesh, with panels corresponding to figure bones, and having those panels each be assigned to its own vertex group, and then softbody attaching each vertex group panel to each bodypart bone, can be quite tedious.

Can this be assisted by a plugin or utility?

Some of the keys are:

- automate creating a custom undersuit by exporting and importing the figure mesh as an obj with appropriate settings?
- automate translating undersuit polygon groups to vertex groups?
- automate softbody attaching the undersuit mesh vertex groups to corresponding base figure bodypart bones?

The thread - http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49954/

concept illustrated for default Aiko 3 with user-made panels
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49954/P195/#757931
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49954/P195/#758041

concept illustrated with custom morph-dial Genesis2 with panels from exporting and importing the figure obj
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49954/P210/#758514
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49954/P210/#758521

concept summary with sample settings
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/49954/P225/#758667

So, can the Carrara SDK access export and import the figure and adjust settings to create a grouped obj for the undersuit to fit a morphed figure?

Can the Carrara SDK access the mesh obj in some way to translate polygon groups to vertex groups?

Can the Carrara SDK access the softbody attach tabs in the object modifiers panel to match vertex groups to figure bodyparts?

Is any of this even possible as a plugin or utility?

Philemo_Carrara

Unfortunately, I'm working on another project, but, after a quick look, I think a plugin is possible.

Creating the undersuit is possible via the I3DExVertexPrimitive and IPolymesh interfaces.
naming the vertices is done via I3DExVertex interface
Getting the polygon name is done via IPolygon

Adding the modifier to the figure is straightforward
Setting the data to the modifier is a little more tricky and would ne exploration and experiment.

The whole plugin should be a scene command

Sorry not being able to help more, being short on time.

Diomede

Very helpful information, thank you.

Since I posted that question, some issues surrounding joints such as shoulders have become more clear to me. As a result, I don't think that creating the initial undersuit to match the base figure mesh is a good solution (think of the collar/shoulder area, when the shoulder bone rotates down but the collar remains unbent, the top of the collar mesh extends too far out over the shoulder).

But however the undersuit mesh is made, is it possible to streamline the creation of multiple soft-body attaches for a mesh that has named vertices groups matching the bones to which they will be attached? For something like a long dress, a softbody attach needs to be created for 2 forearms, 2 shoulders, 2 collars, 1 neck, 1 chest, 1 abdomen (maybe 2 depending on the figure), 1 hip,... The problem is that when a mesh with named vertices groups that has been softbody attached to a boned figure is saved as part of a larger group, the softbody attaches have to be reset when the group is reloaded. For whatever reason, Carrara's save and load process is distorting the softbody attaches.

Any insight is appreciated, even if no one has time for this particular project. I just don' know what is possible.