so that I can connect a GEO node and create particles. However, whenever I try to connect the edge to the CHOP top to, it doesn’t let me. What am I doing wrong?
Here’s my beginner project:
Have 糀 and 麹 “grow” organically, mimicking mycelium spreading.
Use particles to create a dynamic, living texture around the text.
Make the motion reactive to sound, such as bubbling or steaming sounds from koji-making.
To connect your edge to the TopTo, you need to specify the top you are pointing at in the TOP parameter of the TopTo operator. You can drag and drop your edge1 in that field and it will connect.
Now, that is not going to be to useful to create particles, because the data you get from a TOP is pixel value data, which in this case will be just a collection of 1s and 0s, since your input is a black and white texture. If you want to emit particles, you will need position data, not pixel value data. Does that make sense?
The most straightforward approach to get that kind of data is to simple use a text SOP with a SopTo operator. That will give you the positions of all points from your text in space for the particles. I attach a simple example to get you started with that. Also include there how to do some data conversions.
Finally, a proper mycelium simulation (like the classic physarum system), is not so straightforward. The best approach will be to write some shader code, and with different levels of complexity if you want it to be 2D or 3D. If you are just starting and have no experience writing code, I’ll recommend to try something simpler. You could start with reaction-diffusion, which is possible to do in 2D just with a few operators and feedback. There are many resources online that explain how that works.
Thanks! This was helpful. I wasn’t able to run your example, as I get an error and I’m such a newb I wasn’t sure how to get it going.
I do have experience writing code (javascript, a little python) as I’m a data visualization engineer, but I understand that writing code for shaders is very different!
That’s not an error, but a warning about wrong path for the window operator. You get that warning because probably you double clicked the .tox file I attached, which opens a new blank project with this result. That is because the module I sent you is a Base COMP, and does not have a TOP that the Window operator can read.
But that is not quite how to use .tox files. They are meant as modules that you can import to your project. So, instead of double clicking the file, you can open TD, and then simply drag and drop the file in your network. A module will be created. Then, look inside the module to see how the network is built.
