[Released] dForce Strings and String Lights [Commercial]
RiverSoft Art
Posts: 6,380
Quickly and easily create dForce strings, ropes, threads, and string lights (i.e. holiday lights) using the powerful dForce Strings and String Lights scripts product! Four scripts allow you to create the perfect dForce String or String Lights for your scene: 2 will create your dForce string or string light between any 2 nodes in your scene, and 2 others create a dForce string or string light of an exact length. The advanced scripts create a dForce string or string light using the best techniques for dForce, including automatically creating support ribs to keep dForce from collapsing the string, adding rigid follow nodes so the lights stay in their position in the string, and even adjusting string surface simulation properties based on the geometry of the string to reduce the number of dForce explosions. dForce Strings and String Lights includes:
- dForce Strings and dForce Strings Lights scripts - Quickly and easily create dForce-ready string lights (or holiday lights) between two nodes. Create a perfectly sized dForce string between the nodes, with many options to set up the string and lights to your liking!
- dForce Strings Unattached and dForce Strings Lights Unattached scripts - Quickly and easily create dForce-ready string lights (or holiday lights) of a specific length, with many options to set up the string and lights to your liking.
- dForce Strings Configure Lights script - Quickly change the colors and luminance of entire dForce-ready string lights, all at once!
- Lots of Options and Control-Specify string length, diameter, number of segments, string color, number of lights, light colors, luminance, light “bulb” size, and light arrangement.
What's Included and Features
- dForce Strings & String Lights (.DSE/.DSA)
- dForce Strings Configure Lights
- dForce Strings Hide Lights
- dForce Strings Install Custom Actions
- dForce Strings Lights Unattached
- dForce Strings Lights
- dForce Strings Show Lights
- dForce Strings Unattached
- dForce Strings
- Detailed User Manual
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Comments
Hope this arrives soon enough for some holiday renders
Yessssssss!
It should. It is through testing.
I am glad you like it. It had been 2 days since I posted the announcement and nobody said anything... I was getting worried it was going to land with a thud.
My first impression was that the product was a little too specific. The string of lights is impressive from a technical standpoint, but not all that useful for anything other than XMas themed renders. But the d-force rope/string option makes it super versatile, and that's what excites me!
I'm excited for this, but wondering if you might consider an add-on or a second product based on the technology: Power cables. Same idea, a node for an electronic item like a tv or desk lamp, and then a second node that is an electric plug or electric plug and sockets. and then crate and drape an electric cable between the node on the electronic device and the plug.
Magical "wirelessly" powered electronics is a massive killer for reality in scenes
The additional attached images are what sell the product best, I think. Unfortunately, a forum bug sometimes hides attachments in the first post of a thread. I couldn't see those images, so I also thought it was just Christmas lights. To workaround the forum bug, a user can click on the date (December 1) under the RiverSoftArt avatar in the first message and make the images show up. This is the image that sells it for me:
This looks really useful. Like the other posters, I had taken a quick look and thought "Christmas stuff, don't need it" and moved on from the thread. But the other promo pics have definitely caught my interest.
Sorry, I was too busy making myself a tinfoil hat to comment, as it appears you have been printing products directly from my brain again.
Ah! I see. Maybe I should have chosen a better main, though it was hard to think how to combine the two. The dForce Strings were "easy" compared to the lights; I just had to figure out how to create support ribs for the rope so it would not collapse when simulated. The lights were a major pain as it required figuring out how to create Rigid Follow Nodes (RFNs) from code, which is a completely undocumented area of the script API.
If you have a plug object, this product can make the draped cord between the plug and the device. However, there are no bones so you would need to use something like dForce Magnet to move it.
Thanks for the advice. I put this image embedded in the first post.
I am happy to hear that!
LOL. It's not working!
Maybe your main promo image needs to be "split screen", like Dreamlight often does.
Maybe. I tend to avoid those types of main images as I find them too matter of fact.
Hm, clock ticking towards Christmas, and no dForce Strings and Lights in sight.
They are released:
https://www.daz3d.com/dforce-strings-and-string-lights
And in the cart
.
Thanks for the release announcement!
Enjoy!
Please post pictures.
Grabbed straight away
(but I have such a backlog to download and install, it may be a few days before I can play 
).
OK, I made my first attempt. I created two nulls and selected those two nodes in the Scene pane. I created a string with the default settings in the string script. When I simulated, the string fell down away from the nulls. So are nulls not valid nodes to connect strings to? What is valid?
Edit: So I created two tiny 0.1 CM cubes. That didn't work either. The string fell away again. I used World Space, but I don't really know what that means.
Edit: So I created two 1 CM cubes. One end of the string stayed connected and the other end fell completely away again. I used World Space again. I tried again without world space, and again one end fell away.
Edit: My previous cubes had only 1 division. I made 1 CM cubes with 4 divisions and then both ends of the string stayed connected.
Question: What if I want more draping between the two nodes? What can I do to control that?
I tried to make a little necklace from string lights. It took me many tries and a little manual adjustment, but I finally got it done. In this case, I should have just placed some emissive spheres on an existing necklace, in retrospect.
Great examples, @barbult
Please keep'em going.
Nulls are valid nodes obviously, but as you discovered, dForce won't hold onto the string. For that I just use a cube or a sphere.
Using World Space will use the origin world space of the node, which is usually the bottom.
From the tips part of the manual, "Modify the Density to control the sag in the string during simulation" Density is in the surface settings
Thanks for the responses. I made a jump rope, but I made my rope too thick.
Oh wow, cool! How did you do that? Did you have the handles far apart, create the jump rope, and move them in? Or a super density?
The handles were far apart at ground level. I moved them into place during a timeline simulation. I didn't change simulation surface settings.