Some questions / remarks about Graphs ( RF 2014)

[Blax]

hi,

First, thanks a lot to all the Realflow team for this amazing 2014 version !

I have few questions and remarks about graphs :

• When I use the fieldDistanceUnion, the output is not a "field-distance" but a "field", so I can't stack fieldDistanceUnion nodes. What is the workflow if I want to combine more than 2 Distance fields ?
  
  Is there a vector magnitude operator ?
  
  When I convert distance field to field mask, I can't do anything with the output, exept display it, what king of field is it ?
  
  field blur / field noise (like naiad ) nodes would be perfect.

Thanks

Paul.

[Alex]

Hi Blax,

I'm glad you are liking RealFlow 2014 so far.

Let's go straight to the questions:

When I use the fieldDistanceUnion, the output is not a "field-distance" but a "field", so I can't stack fieldDistanceUnion nodes. What is the workflow if I want to combine more than 2 Distance fields ?

You are pretty right about this. Boolean operations between distance fields should result in a distance field.
At the moment the only workaround to "re-distance" the output scalar field is inserting a FieldRealMesher node followed by a FieldDistanceCreateFromMesh. It may kill performance a little bit, but should do the trick.

We will put the highest priority for the RealFieldToDistanceField missing node.

Is there a vector magnitude operator

Vector3Length is its name.

When I convert distance field to field mask, I can't do anything with the output, exept display it, what king of field is it ?

Mask fields can be used as inputs for the node called FieldMix. Actually, there is a node that didn't make it to the final release which is called FieldDiffuse and takes this MaskField as input. It is also related to your following question.

field blur / field noise (like naiad ) nodes would be perfect

Regarding the noise field, do you need your field noise to be a distance field at the same time? or is it enough with some random values over space? If it is the later, there might be a way to create one. Let us know what do you need it for if you need more help on this.

Best regards

[Blax]

Hi, thanks a lot for your precise answers, it more clear now ! (sorry for my poor frenchy english)

I think the noise field can be useful for randomizing things in general ; using a space-structured noise can be lot more interesting than using random values.

by the way, the FieldLoad nodes are really smart ! and let me generate alligator/Prelin noise Density fields in houdini, export them in .vdb, and import them into Realflow.

I've not used noise distance fields yet, only real fields, sampling them at my particles positions, eventually remapping them to the min max values I need, and mult the result by a custom channel to randomize it.

Can't wait to see that field Diffuse node

I'm doing some melting / sand tests, viscosity driven by fluid-distance (fluid-phi) * by an alligator noise.

Thanks.

Paul.