Bifrost develops lightning tool demo 1

[Bruce.Lee.]

HI,
Lightning tool developed using Bifrost 2.1 version point cloud. And, I used this tool to make the first demo. You need Bifrost 2.1 version and Rebel Pack 0.3.0 to run this tool.

This is only the first version, and I hope to update it in the future. My goal is to make it easy for everyone to create any type of lightning effect.
Of course, I also hope that the official BIfrost team can release better lightning tools in the future.

I upload the file here. And, I will upload it in the compound sharing area.
Please enjoy!

Thanks!

Demo:

Tutorial：

[286380064]

thanks

I haven't tested it yet  in  redshift,

in maya software  mesh can be render,

and hardware  also can render,

convert mesh to arnold meshlight ,only "body"is  bright.

[a_baranov]

Sorry, I have one more question. Is there a way to connect or convert bif paticles to regular maya particle or nParticle shape? Unfortunately, redshift do not recognize bif particles too.

Thanks!

[Bruce.Lee.]

Hi a.baranov,
You can convert particles to volume first, and then convert volume to Mesh. Finally, use bifrostGeoToMaya to switch back to Maya's mesh.

[a_baranov]

Thaks for advice, but unfortunately volume conversion is a bit slow and lack of info for motion blur 😞  I'd rather try to use arnold only for particles pass, hoping I can achieve same DOF and MB results for different renderers.

Anyway, this is a good idea for some cases.

[Bruce.Lee.]

Hi,
Thank you for your feedback. I made a new compound: particles_to_mesh.
This compound can convert particles into mesh. And keep the velocity and particle age information.

The best way is to cache the mesh as a separate abc file through the write_Alembic node. Then use Maya's cache menu to import it. However, there is a bug in write_Alembic, which will cause Maya to fail to import. The team is fixing this bug.

Now, you can use particles_to_mesh to convert particles to mesh, which is much faster than volume conversion to mesh. Then open the node editor and use bifrostGeoToMaya to convert the bifrost data into ordinary mesh.

Thanks!

[a_baranov]

Thank you! 🙂 Now this is a game changer. It is really fast and usable for my particular task. The only question I have - should velocity data be visible only after baking alembic cahe (I mean from the file). Or there is something I missed? At least neither redshift nor arnold renderer show MB on mesh, converted from particles?

BTW I do tests in Maya 2020.2  Also I've noticed that particle Age limit parameter not working through simulate_lightning parameters tab in Maya 2020.2  To make it work correctly I have to make the compound editable, uncheck Random value in vary_source_property1 tab, then manually changing min and max in this tab.

[a_baranov]

There should be some kind of colorSet in mesh for MB data maybe, but it is absent for some reason?

[Bruce.Lee.]

You need to pass the user data node, and then pass the color information to the material. I remember that both Arnold and redshift renderers have their own nodes that can read point color information. And can also read age information.

However, now bifrostGeoToMaya cannot pass the point color information to the maya mesh. So, I think only Arnold can directly render the point color of bif. Until the team fixes the problem of abc export. At that time, you can export any data to an abc file, and you can use any renderer to render user-defined data.

[thanapoom]

@Anonymous

I m new to bifrost and  would like to try your "simulate_lightning"

I m using Maya 2020.4 with the latest Bifrost version 2.2.0.1  when I try to load your compound there are error in many area. ex resample_strand, scatter_points.  I just wonder ,Is anyway to fix those error?

thx

[sepu6]

You need to download the rebel pack.

https://forums.autodesk.com/t5/bifrost-forum/rebel-pack-0-4-0-for-bifrost-2-2-released/td-p/9931158

[thanapoom]

@Anonymous

Thank you for response really quick.

I download and install rebel pack 0.40 and copy to C:\Users\XXXXX\Autodesk\Bifrost\Compounds

show u as In attach pics

 

then load your compound , still got some error

 

 

 

// Error: Error: while compiling top level compound 'bifrostGraphShape1', around the port 'Bruce::simulate_lightning::scatter_points.amount':
no promotion exists from a value of type 'double' to a value of type 'float' //
// Error: Error: while compiling top level compound 'bifrostGraphShape1', around the port 'Bruce::simulate_lightning::scatter_points1.amount':
no promotion exists from a value of type 'double' to a value of type 'float' //

Did i install something wrong? missing extra compound?

thanks

[g2m.agent]

Same problem here. 
I found this is because the new version of Bifrost has its own "scatter_points" node, which covers the "scatter_points" node in "Rebel Pack 0.3".

[sklauss]

same here. i also get the error on the scatter nodes.

edit: ok, when I add a to_float node before each of the scatter nodes it works.

[Bruce.Lee.]

Hi,
I hope that some changes and redesigns of the Lightning tool can be made with the latest version. Please wait.

[Bruce.Lee.]

.

[gabriel.yogi]

May i ask when the file will be updated? I really want to use this lightning effect for my project but rebel pack 0.3 cannot be downloaded so my only hope is to wait for this.

[Christoph_Schaedl]

RebelPack 3 does download fine here. 

[gabriel.yogi]

Really? I can't seem to download 0.3 cause it will immediately forward me to 0.4 instead. This is the link that we are using right? https://area.autodesk.com/downloads/rebel-pack-030/?_ga=2.241964674.1459103439.1609589313-321596694....

[Christoph_Schaedl]

Here it is.

[gabriel.yogi]

Thank you for the files. I really appreciate it