Tag Archives: cg

Pulldownit for Maya 2024

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Pulldownit , the destruction plugin, is already available for Maya 2024, you can review latest features of PDI for Maya in this post:

Pulldownit 5.5 for Maya released

Maya 2024 itself brings a number of updates in animation, modeling and performance, and native support for Apple Silicon chips in Macos systems. This new version introduces a novel Graph Editor Sculpting feature, allowing to drag or smooth animation curves in brush-like style to make adjustments on the fly. In addition, animators con now display all skin weights values directly in the viewport and multiple Skin Clusters are supported. Besides the Time Slider has been redesigned for better handling of keys selection ranges and audio waves visulaization. Finally Autodesk claims of significant performance improvements, especially when playing back animation on complex rigs.

Regarding modeling, Retopology tool has got a number of updates,a new symmetry option allows to get the same exact topology at both sides of the model, and there is new options for preserving edges by angle or component tag, also user can now display both input mesh and retopologized one simultaneously, allowing to compare result and adjust areas visually and there is a new option to pre-check mesh during Retopologize to quickly identify and fix mesh issues.

An there is a new unsmooth option which lets you simplify a smoothed mesh, useful for creating low resolution versions of 3D models, although currently only works with meshes subdivided by the Catmull-Clark method.

The old good Make Live tool has got an useful improvement aswell, now It supports multiple objects, speeding up the drawing of splines or quads over existing geometry.

USD support introduces LookdevX, a new material editor for creating USD shaders inside Maya. It is independent of the classic Maya Hypershade tool therefore counts with its own editor, according to Autodesk it is intended to work seamlessly across multiple DCC tools in the pipeline.

In the simulation field Bifrost updates to version 2.7 introducing a new MPM solver able to simulate snow and high viscous matter like toothpaste, ketchup or ice-cream along with improved volume rendering in the viewport.

AntCgi review and test many of Maya 2024 new features in this nice video:

Sci-Fi Industrial Zone 3D Competition

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Hum3D “Sci-Fi Industrial Zone” Challenge has started!

“Your goal is to design and create a highly detailed and atmospheric environment, rich with elements of science fiction and industrial design”

Pulldownit Pro license is one of the valuable prizes and there are plenty of them!
those interested can check rules and prizes here:

Visit Challenge Home Page

Remember you can submit your work until June 3rd, 2023.

Pulldownit 5.5 for Maya released

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Pulldownit 5.5 is here and comes with useful updates, Shatter it tool has been multithreaded and highly optimized, getting up to 8x faster shattering with regards to previous release. Chipping areas of the model is also faster and you can discard shatter centers directly in the viewport just by clicking the mouse over it.

Bounded Cracks introduced in version 5.0 has been enhanced with the ability to turn them dynamic at the desired frame, allowing to create easily stress cracks that ends up tearing the surface completely at some moment.

Working in complex destruction scenes is easier and more intuitive, in cases of many objects colliding, dynamic solver has been adjusted to get nice fracture results with default parameters and when two objects impact each other you can decide which one will break in first place simply by reducing its hardness value.

Maya Cache Playback is now supported after baking simulation keys for the whole scene, this allows user to play the simulation at a fast, sustained rate and recover dynamic data afterwards to make changes if needed.

There are also useful improvements to the UI, you can modify parameters for several fractures at once and create several crackers at once or toggle display of all crackers paths with one click.

Last but not least we have fixed quite a few annoying issues from previous version, making the tool more predictable and reliable than ever.

You can review below all performance and usability improvements and you can check the whole list of fixes in the Pulldownit version logs page:

Read the full list of fixes in the Pulldownit web site version logs

Licensed users can access already Pulldownit 5.5 from his account and there is a demo version for Maya 2023 in the Thinkinetic web site.

Shatter New Features        

Shatter it multithreaded along with other performance improvements that makes shatter an object in hundreds and thousands of pieces around 8x faster than in previous release.

New ability to remove shatter centers directly in the viewport, when in Shatter it draft mode simply by clicking mouse + ctrl key, the selected shatter center is deleted.

Dynamics New Features 

New ability to generate Bounded Cracks until frame , stress crack propagation can be set to last until desired frame, after that it continues as an usual dynamic crack.

Initial velocity can be set for “activation at frame” fracture bodies, linear and angular velocity can be added to static fractures bodies, setting in this way the initial motion direction when the object becomes dynamic.

More intuitive behaviour in collision between fracture bodies, user can decide which of them will break in first place simply by reducing its hardness value. Besides small fragments collisions don’t trigger fracture anymore, therefore fracture activation starts always at the exact impact moment between the two objects.

UI Enhancements           

Maya Cache Playback supported after baking PDI keys for the whole scene, deleting PDI data before using Maya Cache Playback is no longer needed, allowing to recover simulation afterwards to make changes if needed.

New option to auto clean all PDI data after baking simulation, this new option allows to use Maya Cache Playback at the fastest speed right after baking PDI keys.

New ability to set parameters for several fracture bodies at once.
New ability to edit name of selected Cracker.
New ability to show/hide all Crackers paths at once.
New ability to set parameters for several Crackers at once.
New ability to create Crackers for all selected curves at once.

                                                                                                                

                                                                       

                                                                                                     

Black Friday 2022: VFX Software Deals

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Black Friday/Cyber Monday is here!,  at Thinkinetic we are offering 20% Off in all our licenses for Autodesk 3ds Max or Maya, including one year of support and updates.

If you think our destruction tools can be useful for your Cg projects next year, that’s a good deal!, just visit thinkinetic shop when you are ready, discount is already applied in the final cost,  no special code needed.

Actually many companies in the CG  market are offering important discounts up to 50% Off in useful VFX and 3D tools, you can find them listed nicely in these great sites,

Review VFX software deals at the Toolfarm site

Review 3D/Render software deals at the Toolfarm site

Review best CG tools software deals at the CG Press site

Review best CG tools software deals at the CG channel site

happy shopping!

Tutorial: Oneiric temple destruction in 3ds Max

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In this great tutorial Esteban Cuesta show us how to crack and destroy an oneiric temple using Pulldownit 5 in 3ds Max , he explains step by step how to create long cracks over the surface before destroying the whole model to get a nice crumbling effect, worth to review it.

Bounded cracks is a new feature introduced in Pulldownit 5.0
allowing to create cracks over the surface of 3d models and controlling the strenght and extent of the crack easilly.

Final shot here:

Thank you Esteban for this great tutorial !

Cracking an Ancient Statue in Maya

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In this polished tutorial, Esteban Cuesta shows us how to create long cracks over
an ancient statue and shatter it using Pulldownit plugin in Maya,

Bounded cracks is a new feature introduced in Pulldownit 5.0
allowing to create cracks over the surface of 3d models and controlling the strenght and extent of the crack easilly.

Thank you Esteban for this great tutorial!

Tutorial: Abbey destruction in 3ds Max

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Some of Pulldownit users has asked us how we did the stunning cathedral destruction in latest PDI reel, so we have decided to make a video tutorial explaining it step by step, and as you can see in the video below , it isnt dificult indeed,

Thank you to Esteban Cuesta for this great tutorial and final shot, please remember to “like” the video if you liked it:)

Pulldownit 5 for 3ds Max released

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Pulldownit 5 for 3ds Max brings new destruction features and important updates in performance and usability.

Fractures solver computes around 2 times faster and gets more debris in impact areas without the need of further adjustment.

A new ability to shatter along part of a curve lets user refine cracks as many as needed in a visual way, surface cracks can be bounded to create easily nice stress effects and reversing a crack involves just one click, all of this making the creation and adjustment of surface cracks easier than ever.

Jagginess, the ability to add roughness to cut faces, receives also an important update, by default jagginess now only applies to broken areas in simulation, getting lighter meshes for rendering or when exporting it to game engines.

There are several other performance and usability improvements you can review below and you can check the whole list of fixes in the Pulldownit version logs page:

Read the full list of fixes in the Pulldownit web site version logs

Licensed users can access already Pulldownit 5 from his account and there is a demo version for 3ds Max 2022 in the Thinkinetic web site.

Shatter New Features                                                                                                 

New Extent parameter for Shatter it tool, this new parameter allows to shrink the shatter region in a visual way, making very easy to increase the density of fragments in any area of the model.

New ability to exclude part of the curve in Shatter it, simply by dragging the mouse you can select the extent of the curve to be used for shattering, as many times as needed, therefore one single curve is enough for all reshattering operations.

Jagginess applies to broken fragments only, by default Jaggines now only applies to the areas which has been broken in simulation, getting lighter meshes for rendering or exporting it to game engines.

Dynamics New Features                                                                                         

PDI Fracture Solver 2x faster, scenes involving hundreds or thousands of fragments in dynamics now computes around 2 times faster with the same stability than previous version

Improved quality of Fracture solver, cracks are now more realistic, pulling out small fragments in borders of fracturing areas without the need of further adjustment.

New bounded behaviour for crackers, user can now control the distance detached fragments can move, from making them stick on the surface to let them free and falling.

UI Enhancements                                                                                             

New ability to reverse Cracker direction, reverse a dynamic crack is now as easy as click on the panel button.

Create fracture body 2x faster, fracture bodies made of thousands fragments now needs only a few seconds to be created by PDI solver.

Create and modify fracture clusters is an almost instant operation.

Improved visualization in Stresses View, when in Stresses View all fragments are now displayed in solid colour, regardless of its material.

Stresses view “break at frame” clusters are now displayed in green color, in this way user can quickly identify clusters set to break at frame( green) from the rest.

Shatter Text Effects in Maya with Pulldownit

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In this new tutorial Esteban Cuesta show us how to create appealing 3d text shatter effects in Maya using new features for destruction included in Pulldownit 5, in a few and easy to follow steps he shows how to crack letters in diferent ways or turn a 3d text dynamic to get a nice crumbling effect, worth to review it.

More news are coming in September, until then have a great holidays!