Thanks Manuel,

I didn't realise I had to mark the thread as solved. Done.

WP.

Thanks Manuel,

making a copy of the camera and inserting into the new scene should do.

Just out of interest, why would it not just keep and use the selected camera in the first place? Seems a bit odd.

WP.

Hi folks,

whenever I use doc->Polygonize(), the selected camera gets ignored in the newly cloned scene. The cloned scene is viewed from the editor camera and not the original selected camera copy.

How can I keep the current/selected camera when Polygnize()'ing a document?

Edit: apologies, looks like I've selected the incorrect forum category, it should be in Cinema 4D Development, not the Cineware forum. I can't seem to edit this.

WP.

Thanks zipit,

makes sense being local. Zeroing out and multiplying by the frame matrix does it:

Thanks for your time contributors, been a big help.

WP.

Oooh..... I feel like such a dope. I had almost everything right to begin with, except I was accessing the returned CreatePhongNormals() SVector incorrectly. I was using operator()[] when I should have been using ToRV(). Here's a smoothed result:

Thanks guys, we got there

One last thing, how do I 'globalise' the normals? They look local to me (see floating cube, it's slightly rotated but has the same shading as walls in the background)?

WP.

Thanks Zipit / Manuel,

@zipit said in Getting poly normal and CreatePhongNormals():

If you want to interpolate between the already interpolated point normals (a.k.a. Phong normals), a simple bi-linear interpolation between these four normals should be enough

Yep - that's what I'm trying to do!! But I have a way with code that makes simple things really difficult . Whatever I try isn't working. I got to this:

but can't figure out the bi-linear interpolation. This is where I'm going around in circles. Maybe we take a step back for a moment and do this in two steps.

Step 1: I have a function that tests each polygon triangle using the Moller-Trumbore algorithm. Assuming the hit is true, how do I calculate the UV? I'm asking this step to check if I'm setting UV right (which, is where some of the code above comes from).

Step 2: how do I use UV to interpolate between Phong normals a,b and c (triangle)?

The end goal is to draw a normals map.

WP.

Thanks Manuel and PStudent,

I'm going around in circles. When I try blending between the 3 Phong normals, it comes out in variants like this:

The following is the code I use to calc the Phong normal:

//... hit test function here...
// f = 1 / area
Vector uvw;
uvw.x = f * s.Dot(h);
uvw.y = f * dir.Dot(q);
uvw.z = 1 - uvw.x - uvw.y;
//... end of hit test, return true if hit, uvw passed over...

// if hit function returns true, use uvw to calc normal at hit spot
// norms = CreatePhongNormals()
// let's test first polygon in poly 4(5)
Vector normal = uvw.x * norms->operator[](4*4) + uvw.y * norms->operator[](4*4+1) + uvw.z * norms->operator[](4*4+2);
// repeat for second tri in quad, if exists
// etc

I can get the plain polygon face normal fine. But blended ones I can't get my head around. Where am I going wrong here?

WP.

Hi folks,

I'm trying to calculate a polygon's normal. I've read CreatePhongNormals() can return an array of (vertices point?) normals if there's a Phong tag. How do I use that to calculate a normal at poly UV?

// psuedo code
po = (PolygonObject*)obj;
SVector *norms = po->CreatePhongNormals();

if(norms)
{
    int ply = 4;  // let's get normal for polygon 4(5), points abc
    Vector uv;  // the uv spot of the normal to get, on ply
   
    Vector normal = (norms->operator[](ply*4) + norms->operator[](ply*4+1) + norms->operator[](ply*4+2)) / 3;

    // do something with normal, etc.

    GeFree(norms);
}

Would like to include blending across the polygon if possible (i.e. the normal at spot uv). Not worried about speed, just learning.

WP.

@PluginStudent Thanks , progress bar sorted. For anyone reading, cast the vpBuffer into a Bitmap and use SetData().

Re GetDDescription(), I hard code my descriptions, but the function is never called. Any ideas?

WP.

OK, I've managed to get the 'render' plugin going, I can see it drawing in the PV. A couple of followup queries:

• can I update the PV progress bar manually?

• how can I break the rendering in my custom threads when the 'stop rendering' button is pressed?

• am I suppose to use GetDDescription() to draw the options in the render settings dialog (mine isn't showing anything)?

WP.