cheers mat again the basic rules are fairly simple, the hard part was learning about goalU and goalV targets on curves/surfaces and manipulating them so the particles sat in the right positions
The generation of different cars/trucks/bikes etc will be a simple little instancer script or similar. If I can figure it out then there will be controls to add weightings - e.g, have 50% trucks, 40% cars and 10% others etc and move these about to get the desired effects.

thanks arran, glad you both like it
yeah the lane changing will be interesting - I know what it needs to do but getting it to work will be a bit of a challenge!

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Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net

Nice going Si!

Looking really good. I'm just fiddeling with MEL a bit more now, having fun trying to make a very simple plug in using visual studio and the maya developmant kit.

I'm still in the MEL phase of it, I then think i'll then try to code it in Visual Studio as a plug in then add my external inputs to it.

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"No pressure, no diamonds" Thomas Carlyle

cheers steve
cool - let me know if you get addicted or throw it out of the window (one or the other with programming)
I've not had a look at the development kit, what kind of things does it give you access to? It'd be really good to see how you go about it or if there are tutorials out there

Si

---

Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net

tick mate, i gotta say its far out but.., in my humble opinion.., it looks like cubes/cars moving along motion curves.., one on either side and one we can not see.., along the middle. there is nothing random about it.., and traffic has been used extensively in the chaos theory if memory serves.., that they/yours move at different speeds gives an illusion that there is some randomness in it.., there isnt! BUT..,thats not really the problem, as traffic often does move in this way.., as mentioned crossing lanes would pull this together.., even without any randomness though of couse that the grail. it would give the correct illusion even if they remained at the constant speed they are at. Even some wobble would help at the moment.

if its not motion curves then man, WOW.., if it is motion curves then.., err.., great but..!!?? if it is motion curves one could easily have the objects swerve in and out by giving the trails some randomness.., have then pass over each other.., but hen again.., that inherits its own problems doesnt it.., like collision

cool dude


M

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take it easy and life will be easy

Hi Si

Ive only just installed the plugins for the libraries in Visual studio at the moment.

Ive got 2 books on maya programming using MEL and C++ , both in the sme book(s) so pretty sweet, and its form the perspective that you dont know anything, even better! There both by David Gould and you can get them form Amazon, Ive had a bit of a search on the net but not really found much, theres some tutorials in the help files on installing and getting going, but i'm working via the book at the moment, just to get a feel at the moment.

The book says that using C++ gives you more control over how you can extend maya's functionality and gives more access, more so than in MEL alone. But it does say that learning both is better as it gives you more options to do the job.

As I said i'm only making a simple plug in (well hopefully it will be simple) to control some simple movements via an external source so i'm going to build it up first to get the controls via MEL, then do the same but in C++ as a plug in, then add hand the control over to the exernal inputs so hopefully having a logical step by step process will help out in gettingover any problems. I thought of just diving in with C++ but after a bit of consideration I thought I might as well do it in MEL to start with then go to C++ even though I might be doing some duplication.

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"No pressure, no diamonds" Thomas Carlyle

hehe, it does doesnt it mirek? I had a look at motion curves but they lacked customisation.
Actually you draw a curve anywhere you want and then run the script. It takes the curve, creates an inner one and then lofts between them with the specified number of section spans (lanes). The curves are then discarded (or hidden) leaving the road surface.
After that an emitter is created and a goal of the particles set to the road. A dynamic expression to set the goalU and goalV per particle attributes and a custom multiplier attribute is set so that they run down the road on the specified lanes.
As I'm not hot on doing things in the dynamic expression part yet I do a call to a python class/script that creates arrays of the particles on each lane sorting them by their goalU (distance on the surface) - to makes the system run faster. Each particle then checks if there is anyone within a certain range and if so slows down. If not then it attempts to reach maximum velocity.
Randomness will definitely be added once the mechanics are all working. It should be a simple case of giving slightly random maximum velocities to each particle based on the lane they are on. Also I'll probably play about with random acceleration rates depending on the designated particle type (truck, car etc)
If you're interested, it's based on the cellular automata system (wolframs rule 184) with modifications as I'm not using a grid structure for the calculations.

Sounds like you're getting in depth there steve
C++ is similar to MEL (C type structure) but it has pointers which can be a little confusing to start with, whereas it doesnt look like MEL has those (I might be wrong).
It'd be good to see how you progress and if you need any testing just shout

Si

---

Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net

Hey Si,

The differces that you just said I just read, haha!

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"No pressure, no diamonds" Thomas Carlyle

hehe, good timing then

if you find any good free online resources for that stuff then let me know steve as it does sound interesting

Si

---

Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net

man that SOUNDS amazing, I got lost after.., 'doesn't it Mirek' LOL., not quiet but man, Ive never even heard of 'Wolfram' or 'rule 138..??'..LOL

Theres no way I could have thought of all those things.., i didnt really think it was motion curves.., and I knew it was clever.., but to a grunt like me its looks that count and its no use me saying.., wow.., unless I really feel it.., no good for you, no good for me.., but after that explanation.., WOW..,

hey mate, good friend and confidont, buddy Pal.., err.., when you finish it can i be a beta tester.., ???

very cool mate, the amazing thing about maya is there is so much under the hood..,

do you use maya professionally.., or do you just work with computers??

cheers dude and thanks for that amazing explanation

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take it easy and life will be easy

hehe, its not really that complicated Mirek. If you go to the wikipedia and look at the rule 184 information then it is using a simple system to give simple results - its almost like quantifying with science something that should be straightforward
I know what you mean with it looking just like motion curves - that will hopefully change when the lane changing element is in as it will show that the particles arent constrained to a curve or similar element.
I agree with you about maya having so much under the hood - you learn one area to an acceptable level and then find something else with even more power that will take another year or two to learn!
It'd be great to do Maya professionally but I'm at uni on an MSc. A decent amount has to be 'sciency' (hence the research) and having years of programming experience helps to quickly pick up stuff like MEL or Python. I feel bad for some of the other guys on the course that dont have programming skills who are almost forced to 'science' up their projects somehow when they really want to do more artistic things.

Si

---

Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net

Hey Si

Will do, theres a few tutorials on highend 3d but they mainly go over making an exporter for somethink like a game. Having done some C++ a few years ago i'm trying to ease myself into it by making this, hopefully, simple plug in...

If I see some more i'll give you a shout

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"No pressure, no diamonds" Thomas Carlyle

cheers steve
I hope you get on alright with the exporter, I'm tempted to start playing around with stuff like that too, especially after going down to the london game career show and being told that for anything game related they only want c++ skills.

Anyways I've managed to get a basic version of lane changing going. In the video below, if you watch the first particle in a lane then it starts slow, speeds up, slows down and speeds up again. Any particles that are behind them and going faster will try and move into the outer lane (if nothing is there). If not then they slow down and stay behind the first particle. This happens down the chain.

I need to get the lane transitions running smoothly next and then consider adding variance to the top speeds and starting speeds so I dont need a control particle at the front to test - meaning they should all vary what they are doing

lane changing test

Si

---

Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net

can definitely see this looking cool when you add the models. are you also planning to have them move to the left as well?

it's looking great mate!

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arran3D

arran3D blog

cheers arran
hopefully it will save me from a lot of manual animating of traffic!

Yep, thats the plan, at the minute you would just draw another road going in the opposite direction to get a motorway type effect.
Future work could involve looking at using the same piece of road with traffic flowing towards each other - but not for a while

Here's a quick demo of setting a road up (no user interface for options yet though) with the traffic flow flipped to left hand drive:
bTraffic lane setup and generation

This demo is what it runs like real time - a little jerky but not too bad considering. It does cache real fast tho so if you get annoyed with the jerks just run a disk cache and then play it back real smooth (like the version I posted before this one)

Si

---

Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net

very nice! it's really cool how they bunch up at the bend and then the distance between them increases as they go on to the next stretch.

though it will look mad with traffic going the other way, i was actually asking whether they would change lanes to the left as well as to the right, if you know what I mean. Of course, it might not be necessary for the final animation.

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arran3D

arran3D blog