Group Meeting and Notes:
We discussed our progression with being inducted and understanding how to use the VR oculus rift. We showed our progress with our Google Tilt Brush development and discussed how we intend to develop the storyboards created in the previous week into VR space. The VR team began implementing and testing the modelled assets and their potential functions in VR
VR Induction and Testing
Following on from last week’s research into storyboard creation in tilt brush for VR, myself and Mariana got inducted into using the virtual reality headsets provided at the university to practice and get used to using the equipment. During this process, we were able to better understand how 3D space works in immersive engagement which can later help us better understand how to create 3D assets and animations utilizing the very personal and up-close experience that is inherently coupled with putting on the headset.
Models
Progressing from last week’s models, this week I created the ice cream cart that the two seagulls will interact with, and the ‘Ice Cream’ Mini game will take place. This means that the model required surface area and interactable ice cream cones that are separated from the original mesh. In order to heighten the level of realism, I learned how to create an N Cloth material so that the roof of the cart would be able to realistically interact with elements such as wind in the unity engine.
N Cloth/ Cloth Simulation in Unity
Importing this model into unity proved to not effectively retain the baked simulation information, so I researched alternative solutions and there proved to be an efficient Cloth simulation very reminiscent of Mayas, within Unity programming. This can be controlled by both collision and elemental effects such as wind, which may prove useful at later stages of the project.
Following a youtube tutorial, I began to understand that by attaching a Cloth node to a specified object it functions very similarly to the Ncloth function in Maya, and began to translate my understanding of simulation friction, dampness and weight to the cloth in unity.
In this light, I imagined that the use of passive colliders, similarly to Maya, would be required for object collision. However, I came across several issues during this process that differed from Maya. Unity’s colliders seem to be created into specific shapes (Spherical, Cylindrical and Box), none of which accurately made the polygonal structure of the cart, which caused the shape of the cloth to fall in an unnatural and asymmetrical manner.
Following on from this, It created the cloth simulation to fall off the object as if it was attached to a cylinder, rather than the shape of the cart and fell off in a very fast and unnatural way that would not work for our game. After looking into several tutorials, I contacted a team member from the VR group to help me analyse exactly what the issue was and engage my learning and understanding of unity to a higher standard.
After consultation and working with our VR team member, Cal, he was able to assist me in further understanding the different functions of colliders. His initial exploration involved shaping the different spherical, cylindrical and box colliders into a shape that appeared reminiscent of the box cart mesh, in order to create the illusion of the cloth falling into the correct place. However, this proved ineffective and only created more issues in the unrealistic cloth formation.
With the both of us looking deeper into cloth simulation, the use of ‘cloth particles, is used to create greater accuracy as you can use a brush tool in order to indicate which aspects of the cloth you want to directly affect and bind to different elements of the mesh. Using this Method, Cal was able to demonstrate how to effectively get the cloth to be stabilised and attached to the mesh, and also have realistic object and simulation reactivity.
Critically reflecting on this process, I feel that when working in unity it will be extremely beneficial to understand in further depth the controls of cloth simulation as working and exporting in Maya cannot always be fully reliable. Taking this into consideration, however, I feel as a 3D artist predominately using Maya it will be very beneficial to further explore Ncloth’s relationship with different software and how to properly export a simulation for better industry standard practice.
Tutorials for Cloth Simulation Learning Reference
(38) Maya 2016 tutorial : How to export an nCloth object ( FBX ) – YouTube