Help Don't Understand Particle Workflow

[PatrickManalich]

Hi,

I'm having issues editing my ObiRope. So I've set it up correctly and its working fine. I've decided I want to change the CPs of the ObiCurve and some other particle-related parameters. When I edit them, my changes have no effect. Looking online it seems you have to hit "Initialize" when changing particles. When I do this, it breaks a lot of things. First, all the particles that were previously fixed are no longer fixed. A little annoying to go back and edit them all, but I can work around that. But also my ObiParticleHandles are no longer having an effect on the rope. It seems like the connection is broken somehow, and I can't figure out how to fix it.

It's making me thinking my workflow is wrong. I shouldn't have to delete my entire rope and make a new one and set it up every time I want to tweak the rope. What is the general workflow for editing particles? What am I missing?

[josemendez]

Hi,

I'm having issues editing my ObiRope. So I've set it up correctly and its working fine. I've decided I want to change the CPs of the ObiCurve and some other particle-related parameters. When I edit them, my changes have no effect. Looking online it seems you have to hit "Initialize" when changing particles. When I do this, it breaks a lot of things. First, all the particles that were previously fixed are no longer fixed. A little annoying to go back and edit them all, but I can work around that. But also my ObiParticleHandles are no longer having an effect on the rope. It seems like the connection is broken somehow, and I can't figure out how to fix it.

It's making me thinking my workflow is wrong. I shouldn't have to delete my entire rope and make a new one and set it up every time I want to tweak the rope. What is the general workflow for editing particles? What am I missing?

Hi Patrick,

Once you click Initialize, the path and properties are used to generate the particle/constraint representation of the rope. If you later change the curve shape, amount of control points, or any other property, a re-initialization is required. This will generate new particles and constraints, so all references to the old particles (such as handles) will be lost.

I'm fully aware this is less than ideal, and a chore to work with as it expects you to get settings right the first time, else you're forced to re-do the entire thing. This is why i've rethinked this workflow from scratch for the upcoming update, Obi 5.0 (currently undergoing beta testing, out very soon, free upgrade from any previous version). It no longer requires any initialization, changes in the rope are applied right away as you modify the curve, and outside references to particles aren't lost. You can see a somewhat old WIP video of the new workflow in this blog post:
http://blog.virtualmethodstudio.com/2019...5-preview/