Bullet parts emiting particles

[marchermitte]

Hello
What I want to achieve is to emit particles (and make smoke / dust or even smaller chunks with surface HV) from the parts of my mesh that are used / simulated with Bullet.
I remember there was a video showing a script that allowed to emit particles from fractured parts of a bullet mesh. But of course, I can't find It anymore.

[mummyman]

Sounds like you might have to track some points, then attach nulls to the baked motion paths. Maybe there is an easier way to do this now. I used to have to use soft FX and bake certain nulls out. With OD Tools (if you have it) in 2019, you can select an object and run Copy Null to Obj vertex and get a null on each point. Good luck!

[marchermitte]

Yes, I have ODtool, never used that one. The video I'm refering was using a script , that was collecting the world coordinate of the vertex if I remember well. Oh, darn. I give It a try with ODtool, thank you!

[mummyman]

I also remember a "linker" or a parent to point script. I don't remember if it was Lscript or not. I think "Anchor" still exists, but that to stick to a UV map on an object under motion modifiers

[Oldcode]

Here's a good tutorial on how to Parent to Point. This will create a null that will follow a point throughout the length of the animation. You could easily parent a particle emitter to it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TKCdftEM-c

Good Luck,

[Ryan Roye]

You can also use a native plugin called anchor to attach objects to geometry using a UV map, this can easily be applied to bullet simulated things... maybe I should append this to my tutorial content.

[marchermitte]

Thank you for the ideas. Due to the number of chunks, adding null one by one isn't an option I'm afraid. I'm going to keep looking for that script, iof I find It, I will post the link here.

[Oldcode]

You can also use a native plugin called anchor to attach objects to geometry using a UV map, this can easily be applied to bullet simulated things... maybe I should append this to my tutorial content.

That sounds cool Ryan. I'd be very interested in seeing how that works. I've never heard of it before.

[mummyman]

Thank you for the ideas. Due to the number of chunks, adding null one by one isn't an option I'm afraid. I'm going to keep looking for that script, iof I find It, I will post the link here.

I do use a Lscript called "bakemotion2null" from time to time. It's not exactly used for your situation, but figured I'd throw it in the mix.

[prometheus]

For bullet You do not need anything special other than actually go to particle fx tabs calculate and calculating the particles as well for them to spawn from the fractured mesh, preferably you would set particle emitter to key and set a keyframe when the mesh hits the ground our similar.
Another way is to use collision events, but then you need to engage the old dynamics for particles and collision event.
Now all that is spawning particles from the mesh surface or mesh vertices depending on how you set the spawning method.


For applying a full emitter, which mostly is more useful for full trail smoke.
There is indeed some scripts to track points and spawn particles, but you may also solve it with old softFX, you add it over the mesh..turn off operators so it i set to none, the hit calculate, then do in to the softFX editFX tab and pick any fracture piece with the mouse and go to commands make path, you will then have a null applied to that piece and it follows that track, that way you can quite simple add several nulls and particle emitters to smaller pieces, then select the nulls and apply particle fx on that, but it will only spawn particles from that emitter attached to the null, nut the mesh itself, but the result may look like that since the null is following the selected fractured piece.

I would however recommend saving out ..baking the bullet fracture to mdd first(mdd baker, de activate it, then add mdd reader) so you only have to deal with calculation of the particles.
Oh...noticed, you have to many chunks to add nulls to.

I would probably look in to fluids instead, or gas solver...if not using turbulenceFD, bake it to mdd and I would use blender for the fluid smoke on the pieces, then depending on, render in blender, or importing back as vdb to lightwave and render there.

Will see if I can find the scripts.
Sample vid, no plugins..just calculating particles on bullet items...

[prometheus]

Bryphy77 had a decent youtube detailing of debri particle birth and trails, from bullet fractal pieces to have it emitt better from each fractured piece... with the help of the plugin LF obj to pfx, but I think he removed it from his channel, and the actual plugin is also of the grid..that would probably do exactly what you would want..had it been alive.
I think I have the plugin somewhere, but don´t have the time to look for it now unfortunately.
I found one LF pfx but that is just creating geometry from pfx, not pfx file, can´t recall if I had the other one downloaded, they are all made by steven cleveland.
https://www.lightwave3d.com/assets/p...entry/obj_pfx/

Edit...yup, I had the LF_obj_pfx as well, need to try it out though..and especially with 2019.

I would think you could also do something with sensei´s /truearts extended item info, for cloning ..I don´t have it though, and I don´t think there is a free alternative covering that either, not even in dpont´s nodes..not fully sure though.