Howdy,

With the addition of the new Data Channel modifier in max it’s quite easy to read the and output the velocities of a mesh into a map (say vertex color…)

I’d like to put in a feature request to use a mesh as a Velocity Field Source in the Stoke Object. Then it can just read the vertex position and the correlated vertex color channel to generate the velocities? Of course this is can be done with Stoke Magma object but thats a few extra steps…

Cheers,
N

We already calculate vertex velocity in other places, like the Krakatoa PRT Volume object where the particles get the velocity of the closest point on the mesh surface. We could use the same mechanism without the need for any other modifiers - just pick any mesh, and get velocities as long as the topology is consistent and it has mesh or object animation. Same code exists in XMesh when saving…
I am not promising anything, but if we were to add support for meshes as velocity field sources, I would prefer the direct approach.

Right now a relatively simple workaround is to make a PRT Volume from the mesh in question, and use the PRT Volume as the velocity source. Just uncheck the Jitter option and you get a point grid that is easily controllable with regards to spacing etc.

I think everyone would appreciate a direct approach to this. I just wasn’t sure how feasible it would be.

Nice tip using the volume prt from mesh. I’ll give it a whirl. Thanks Bobo!