MASH - manipulating a large number of polygons which are in a fixed x,y,z space

Anonymous — Tue, 04 Oct 2016 05:23:50 GMT

Hi,

I am fairly new to Maya.

I am quite excited about using the new MASH nodes to enhance an existing piece of work.

Here is some context. I have about 15,000 scientific observations (temperature observations) over 150 years.

I used a python script to represent these observations in 3D space -- each observation is a cube. X = month; Y = year, Z = the actual temperature.

I would like to manipulate these 15,000 cubes using MASH.

The eventual location of these cubes is important as they need to visually represent the original dataset. However, I would like to use MASH to animate these cubes in some interesting way ... along the way to the cubes final target locations.

The tutorials I have done so far using MASH seem to start with an original cube and then using procedural nodes to replicate / locate them according to some type of underlying mathematical function. I want the cubes location so be predetermined using either code --- or even better perhaps some type of input file (i.e. JSON, CSV ...etc)

The following is an image of the collection of cubes:

There is also a link to the original youtube animation.

Re: MASH - manipulating a large number of polygons which are in a fixed x,y,z s

joostkonemann — Tue, 04 Oct 2016 07:42:55 GMT

Hi,

The MASH distribute node accepts particle positions as input. So if you can import the position data into a particle object, you can plug the world position output of the nParticleShape into the inPositionPP input from the distribute node.

Importing position data to a particle object can be done in various ways, you can use partIO, SOuP or just a simple MEL or python script. The script option can be really slow...

topic MASH - manipulating a large number of polygons which are in a fixed x,y,z space in Maya Forum

MASH - manipulating a large number of polygons which are in a fixed x,y,z space

Re: MASH - manipulating a large number of polygons which are in a fixed x,y,z s