Battering ram vs metallic door
#1
Hey, I'm trying to figure out the best way to simulate a metallic door covered by wooden planks getting hit by a battering ram:
https://i.imgur.com/gVhToY6.png
https://i.imgur.com/CGsjWQ6.png

I have been following this tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZA-g0cC5FcE
The setup is different from mine. Here's the results I'm getting with 200 and 8000 voronoi points respectively: https://i.imgur.com/yz5kIFU.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/Je1zDQP.mp4

UPD on sim: I use spheres as binding points. Movement is not perfect, and I don't want the door to crack. https://i.imgur.com/SIXrT00.pnghttps://i.imgur.com/qIuB83s.mp4

Perhaps I could just animate a soft selection like this - for this scene it'd probably work as it's just a cylinder ramming the door. Open to answers though. https://i.imgur.com/Jfe1uWB.png

I'd like the metals to bend and the wood to shatter when the ram penetrates the door by roughly 60cm. The wood and metals are two separate models. The door is surrounded by stone walls which should be static.

I'm also unsure how to tackle an issue where where a Kinematic/Dynamic switch using Surface Tests results in the door becoming alive and slightly moving before the battering ram hits the door. It does so as soon as the battering ram comes in contact with the distance set by the Surface Test. Is there a way to only activate the door once the battering ram hits the door? Maybe I'm just not understanding Tyflow physics correctly, in which case I'd be happy to know!
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#2
A little update... My max scene is crashing every time I try opening it with both Max 2022 and Max 2023 (the latter not having Tyflow installed).
It happened after I got this text in the bottom left flashing continously whenever I was at the particle's active frames. It stopped after scrubbing away from its active period. https://i.imgur.com/6bfcRWQ.png

The last backup was saved a month ago... a bit sloppy of me admittedly, but I was wondering if there's anything I can do to recover my progress since then.. I'm thinking it's the Tyflow object that causes the crash. I skin wrapped the wooden layer on top of the vertex animated metallic door. Tyflow wasn't okay with this so it generated the messages in the image above. After that, I saved the project scene and stopped Max to search for a fix.

Is there any way to restore back to a previous file save... or any of those sorts... the last backup in May 11 was right before I started working with Tyflow. Hope someone knows how to resolve this!

Edit: And sure enough... there it was! The wooden layer that I tried simulating with Tyflow was the culprit. I've been able to create a new project scene and merge the last save into the new scene, with the wooden layer excluded from the merge dialog.
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#3
Hmm, well there are a few options for data recovery, assuming the file isn't totally corrupted (which is usually unlikely).

1) Merge the contents of the bad file into a new scene (perhaps everything except for the tyFlow objects if they're the problem).

2) Hold Shift+ESC as the file loads, to cancel any/all tyFlow evaluation while it loads (if the crash is happening during evaluation)

3) Max by default saves its own autobackup files every so often. Check the autobackup folder for the latest one.

4) Submit the minidump here so I can check if tyFlow is causing the crash (instructions in sticky post).
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#4
Cheers. I was able to merge the project file two times to load back all models etc.

I have deformed the metallic door using vertex simulation but not sure how to deform the wooden cover on the door. I was using Skin Wrap earlier, but it seemed to cause 3ds Max to crash when using it as Tyflow object. Maybe I can attach the wood and metal meshes togeether, deform them at once, and only have Tyflow work with the wood's material ID?
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#5
Have you looked at the official example files showing how to deform geometry with the tyParticleSkin modifier?
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#6
Thank you, haven't found the example file but tyParticleSkin mod seems great (edit: I did not test it using particles at the time of posting, just meshes). Strangely initializing each frame takes roughly 1 minute https://i.imgur.com/dr9Xv21.png and it doesn't load into memory.
The project is 3200 frames but this shot only requires 127 frames. Wood cover and door is 10k triangles each, but Skin Wrap was heaps faster!
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#7
Perhaps you haven't adjusted the default scale to match your scene scale.
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#8
Aw it seems the door's got some problems. I'll have to look into this later. Before then... I've tried the tyParticleSkin modifier a little more, is it only supposed to bind mesh to particles? In my scenario I need to bind a particle to a softselection vertex animated mesh - have tried position transfer etc but it's not got the accuracy I'm looking for
to be clear - the first example is what I'm trying to achieve with Tyflow https://streamable.com/ufqd21

Working on the last scene (aside from the door scene above) that requires Tyflow now! I want to say it has been a very challenging but exciting two weeks since I started with the beta version. Thank you for the great plugin and your great patience. I'll try to use it a lot more in future projects and hopefully get more acquainted with it before buying the full version!
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#9
Any advice on getting the wooden covers of the door to follow along with the vertex animated door, and simulating just the wood using Tyflow would be greatly appreciated   Big Grin

p.s. I may try using tyActor and enable Non-skin deformations option. Suggestions welcome though!
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#10
I'm not sure I really understand what you're trying to do, but you can use an Object Bind operator in Surface mode to attach particles to deforming geometry in the scene.
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#11
Thank you, apologies for my vagueness - here's an example of what I'm trying to achieve with the wood shattering once hit: https://streamable.com/f3aq33

I will give you advice a try in the meantime and will report back if it works!
Hmm, it only seems to align to the door when it moves, but it does not deform
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#12
The metal bending can be achieved with a typical tyParticleSkin/PhysX setup. You can find those in the official example files. The wood splintering/cracking would just be a regular Voronoi fracture sim with the chunks initially bound together but separable by breaking forces. To get thin wood splinters, you'll want to scale the voronoi slice planes along the Z axis. Settings for doing that are in the Voronoi Fracture operator.
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#13
Thanks. Just checking - if I only want to include the wood in the tyflow sim, would I have to work with tyParticleSkin/PhysX as you mentioned? Or is that if I were to simulate the metal door?
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#14
I have tried adding tyParticleSkin to the wood and selecting the door as its target... but each frame takes about 45 seconds to load at approx 5 GHz i9 9900k. There's also some distorted vertices that pull away from the mesh. Have looked at example files but cannot figure out what I'm doing wrong

Oh... probably a mesh error. I'll try detaching some faces from the door to minimize errors. It's a pretty heavy mesh.

I have now tried adding tyParticleSkin to a test plane and selected a test animated box. It binds well. When I make the test plane into a Tyflow object, it stops animating though.
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#15
At last - I've found a solution to my problem! I've noted the steps below if anyone needs. Thank you again @tyflow for your support throughout the thread!  Smile
https://streamable.com/p5ysw6
1. Animate the door using soft selection
2. Create a plane with roughly same topology as the door, in front of the door to act as its cover
3. Skin wrap the plane to the animated mesh
4. Point cache the plane and hide it
5. Create a tyIcon, align to the hidden plane
6. Create a tyFlow object with the following nodes: Birth (0;0;1), Shape, Position icon, Display (geometry)
7. Shape: set to reference the point cached plane, scroll down and enable 'animated geometry' and choose your frame range
8. Position icon: set location to pivot (in my case that matches)
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