Rope Sway in Wind

[Skotty]

New user here.  Product looks really good so far.  A quick noob question I hope someone doesn't mind answering.  I know there is an Ambient Wind setting on the Obi Solver that ropes react to, but I've been playing around and the rope always seems to stabilize and stop moving (my test rope is hanging suspended between two particle attachments).  If I want some sort of simulated wind turbulence where the rope keeps moving, do I:

1)  Adjust the settings somehow for that?  If so, what's the trick?

2)  Use a script, get the Obi Solver component at runtime, and dynamically manipulate the Ambient Wind value (assuming it's accessible)?

3)  Use a script, dynamically manipulate some control points at runtime to simulate the effect.

4)  Something else.

Thanks!

- Skotty

[josemendez]

If I want some sort of simulated wind turbulence where the rope keeps moving, do I:

1)  Adjust the settings somehow for that?  If so, what's the trick?
2)  Use a script, get the Obi Solver component at runtime, and dynamically manipulate the Ambient Wind value (assuming it's accessible)?

Hi!

Yes, that's the way you do it: modify the ambient wind direction/intensity in a script, feeding it somewhat random values. You can access it as simply solver.ambientWind (see the API docs for reference)

3)  Use a script, dynamically manipulate some control points at runtime to simulate the effect.

Control points have nothing to do with wind. They control the initial amount of particles/constraints in the rope as well as their placement - in other words, the length and shape of the rope. You should not modify control points at runtime as doing so triggers a re-generation of the entire rope from scratch, which is rather costly.

4)  Something else.

Force zones are a simple way of modifying the shape/intensity of wind. I addition to confining wind to a spatial area (as opposed to constant wind everywhere, like ambient wind does) they also have pulse intensity/frequency controls that allow you to simulate varying wind intensity.

kind regards,