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VEX101 - A (Not So) Quick Recap & Fake Hanging Wires (Patreon)

Published:
2018-06-14 10:01:00
Imported:
2026-06
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Videos

Downloads

  • VEX_101_Pt15_Repetition_Fake_Hanging_Wires.zip

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Content

We decided to record (sort of) a repetition, going over some of the fundamentals in VEX.

Along the way we'll talk about how to generate catenaries: The curves that wires / chains form when hanging under their own weight. (Hint: it looks a lot like a parabolic curve.)

Files

Previews only

VEX 101 pt. 15: Quick (Long) Repetition - And Fake Hanging Wires

Comments

Konstantin Magnus

Thanks for creating these! A useful follow-up would be asymmetric catenaries of course. Maybe combined with a more in-depth episode of "How to implement algorithms from technical papers into Houdini" ? Would be great!

reaze

Will it be possible to talk about matrices in the Vex course in the future?

entagma
>>13219903

Hm... I have the feeling we might need to do a few separate tuts on CG Math 101, as this is a topic that might need a bit of background. Did you have something specific in mind? Cheers, Mo

julien morneau

Great explanation! Do you often test your node performance and compare with others to see wich is the best option? Also, it's hard to remember or know every specific node that have specific attribute, like the @curveu inside the Resample node. If you work in a team and you have to share your work with them, will it be more convenient to use a pointWrangle that create the @curveu (Exemple: f@curveu = float(@ptnum / float(@numpt - 1)) with comments inside the wrangle or the Resample node? Thank you!

entagma
>>13250044

Hi Julien, good question(s). Testing my setup's performance usually happens only if I know that it's gonna be used quite frequently in production / if I'm aware that there will be lots of iterations using that setup or if it already feels sluggish after I finished the first draft of it. Then I definitely try to figure out why it is slow & what's making it slow. Yet with quite a few setups I don't bother profiling. However it's definitely more adviseable to profile each setup before handing it off. The resample-SOP and curveu-attribute are a good example of why I found Houdini quite difficult to get into first. The divide-SOP (for calculating a mesh's dual graph) would be another good example - I always forget its name... Indeed some of the nodes are not really named clearly enough, however I find myself using the resample-SOP so often that by now it's easier for me to just use that to caclulate curveu (or tangent) than writing my own line of VEX. When collaborating I guess it depends on the techniques the other artists/TDs cultivate. However when you receive a setup from another TD, it always involves some getting used to and figuring out what the node tree does. So usually you either find out what a given node does or you ask the person who passed that setup on to you. Haven't experienced a major issue regarding that yet. But that is of course only personal experience... Cheers, Mo

entagma
>>13193398

Thought about it a lot. I was kinda hesitant at first because it's hard to break that down into a 15-30min tut, but I'll give it a try. If it works out, we'll publish it :) Cheers, Mo

EOB

This was my favorite part so far, a great recap and an extremely encouraging example reading through that formula (I had previously basically told myself I'd never be able to implement any mathematical equations, but you breaking it down like that made it seem so doable!). Can't wait for future episodes, this course is extremely well made.

Mr Racecar

Hear! Hear! I find myself googling different line shaping algorithms and implementing them thanks to this course. Impatiently waiting for the next one :)

entagma
>>13448577

Very cool! Which ones did you find? Are there any other relevant ones apart from symmetric & asymmetric catenary and parabola? Cheers, Mo

Sid Muralidhar

@20:13, wouldn't it work if you just wrote @numpt instead of @ptnum?

JORGE LEGA

Can you relink the Vimeo page? Video not loading... thanks!

Robert Wilinski

Thanks for the encouraging words at the end - I totally agree - when I go back in time, like 2 years back, I remember that almost everything in Houdini was like some sort of sorcery in Houdini (I was a MAYA user so the switch was quite shocking). First tutorials, first simple procedural modeling, first line of VEX (I have never done any programming or scripting in my life before I started to use Houdini), it was hard and frustrating sometimes but with time I see now that a lot of things I wouldn't even now how to do back in the days now I can do almost naturally. Partially it was your tutorials guys - they really made me want to use and learn Houdini so thanks :)