Organic Unfurling with Simple Tree Part 01
Added 2024-10-07 15:36:11 +0000 UTCWe're going to learn how to create really complex looking unrolling/unfurling effects using a plug in called Simple Tree. I highly recommend getting it, I use it all the time for organic stuff. In this first part I'll show you how to create an organic unrolling effect that happens across the surface of an object.
Comments
Hi Ian! It's a great tutorial! I'm a beginner in houdini and I can follow along your tutorial very well. One thing that I can't follow is in the Redshift part. My current GPU isn't supported by Redshift. Do you have any suggestion that I can take to tackle this?
Muhammad Rahman Aldi
2025-01-11 20:34:46 +0000 UTCThanks for sharing, that’s super helpful!
ian frederick
2024-12-22 09:12:16 +0000 UTCHello again. I reached out to SimpleTree creator and he shared with me this "Shedding some light on "Initialize Curves" HDA. I've noticed many people having trouble using this node so in this post I will try my best to explain what this node can do for you and most importantly, what it can not do for you. First off, what it's for: Curves that are not made with STT needs a few attributes to work within the STT ecosystem. "Initialize Curves" does exactly this. It creates all these attributes that are needed and tries to build curves that are usable within STT. Second, what it can NOT do for you: It can not take any curve or geometry you feed it and magically create a usable STT curve structure/hierarchy out of it. There are some caveats. The STT ecosystem works on branchlevels and parent/child relationships. A trunk (parent) can have several branches (children), but a branch (a child) can NOT have several trunks (parents). That makes sense from a logical perspective of course and is obvious. But how do you calculate these relationships? The "Initialize Curves" node does this for you, but that means that if you feed it a curve structure that has multiple children/ multiple parents relationships its pretty much impossible to calculate, and that's why the node fails. So what can you do about it if it fails? Think logically about the parent/child relationship and if its applicable on the curves you're trying to initialize. If not, use "Fuse" sop (no overlapping points) followed by a "Polypath" sop (rebuilds the curves with no overlaps) and use the Pre-Process option in "Initialize Curves" sop and choose your start points. This will force a complete "rebuild" of the curves to make sure that the curves follow the parent/child relationship I just mentioned. I hope this post makes sense, and if there's any questions let me know and Ill try and explain further. Cheers." After using his instructions the sims runs on the fly. If you do not do this you will have a really heavy to computate sim. I really recommend the setup Fuse+Polypath and using the Pre-Process feature
Bruno Suraski
2024-12-21 19:02:58 +0000 UTCHi Ian. Would you share how many points you have after resampling your curves? I am experiencing something strange with my setup. I am using a different Geo, but after the "fuse" node, I get 1700 points, which I am happy with. When adding a "subdivide" node after the fuse, it goes to 250000 points, which I find pretty strange. Since level 1 of subdivide should not add 250 times points at level one. I am using the "resample" node to get the curveu attribute. I unchecked the "Maximum Segment Length" and "Maximum Segments", so I don't get any resampling in the viewport. It seems to work (no visual modification) but adds 250,000 more points. I am confused by these two things: Why does subdivide add an insane amount of points from 2k to 250k, and why does the resample node with unchecked resampling parameters multiply my amount of points, too, when I am just using it to get the curveu? Thank you
Bruno Suraski
2024-12-21 13:11:59 +0000 UTCThanks a lot for your answer, it worked ! I think I messed up the RSramp node so I reset it and tried your solutions too.
Jean-Marc Weiss
2024-12-07 11:21:43 +0000 UTCMake sure that those attributes are point attributes, then maybe refresh your render view? Sometimes that helps. Otherwise try renaming those attributes to something different and using that in redshift instead. Sometimes that helps too
ian frederick
2024-12-07 10:32:18 +0000 UTCHello, thanks again for sharing those tutorials, I'm really impressed by your works !!! I'm a beginner in Houdini, and i've followed every steps you did, but I've got a problem at the shading part, the Redshift node to capture the attribute can recognize the color of the flower (Cd attribute), but not the "grow" nor the "curveu" attribute. I've played with the RSRamp but the result isn't changing anything, it remains only one color. That's strange because the "grow" and "curveu" attribute does exist in my instance group... Do you have any ideas of the problem ?
Jean-Marc Weiss
2024-12-07 10:08:59 +0000 UTCThank you Ian for the unfurling series! This has been a lot of fun to follow. Though I couldn't afford the Simple Tree, thanks to you I was able to create the HDA with the tutorial you recommended, and all your demonstrations and tips were just perfect!! Looking forward to future videos
Taek Oh
2024-11-25 17:07:41 +0000 UTCI think for this one you can just use free MOPs
ian frederick
2024-10-17 12:38:31 +0000 UTCAs I'm not familiar with MOPS, just wondering if it's possible to use regular free MOPS or MOPS+ required?
Deko
2024-10-17 12:26:34 +0000 UTCsame , been waiting sore some simple tree and mops, Thanks! keep them coming :)
Ciprian Dinu
2024-10-10 15:14:08 +0000 UTCFor anyone who doesn't have Simple Tree, I'm going to see if I can incorporate the vex in this post to do the unrolling: https://tokeru.com/cgwiki/CurveUnrollTutorial.html
Lukasz Pason
2024-10-07 16:53:53 +0000 UTCyessss! I've been waiting for these!
Lukasz Pason
2024-10-07 16:50:28 +0000 UTC
