Structure Synth (WIP)

[Dade]

I write a tiny model Luxrender exporter for Structure Synth (http://structuresynth.sourceforge.net/index.php). SS is a small wonderful tool capable to produce some really beautiful 3D structure (you can find some example here: http://flickr.com/groups/structuresynth/pool/). It works a bit like old L-systems: you write a script with rewriting rules in order to generate 3D structures.

Follow some (simple) example of objects rendered with Luxrender:






(by clicking on the images, you should be able to access high-res version)

The exporter template is available here (http://davibu.interfree.it/structuresyn ... ertemplate) however it is not very user-friendly at the moment (it requires some hand-editing of the .lxs scene in order to fix the camera and light placement and the latest SS version available from CVS).

I'm working on an exporter for Blender in order to be able to easy handling exported objects (it is really a pit but the Blender's VRML importer is totally broken and I have to find another way to import StructureSynth objects).

[Radiance]

hey,

nice images

I'm a bit worried about the fireflies in the render with suzanne's in it,
i assume you did'nt use MLT ?

i'll have to check this tool out, seems interesting

I've been playing with topmod recently, have you ?
i also understand you're running lux on a mac,
what we're your experiences compiling on it ?

greetz,
radiance

[Ratow]

Nice indeed! I didn't know about this too tool either.

I like how in the template you can specify a sphere object instead of a trianglemesh. This can make a huge difference when dealing with many instances, like in these fractals.
I'm afraid that this nice feature would be lost if you import the scene into blender. Is there another option for a better export interface?

Feel free to ask anything about the scene file format or any details about lux itself. I'd love to see a good exporter for this.

-Ratow

[Dade]

hey,
nice images

Thanks

I'm a bit worried about the fireflies in the render with suzanne's in it,
i assume you did'nt use MLT ?

I used the default settings defined by LuxBlend (the SS object was added with an "Include" directive and couple of translate/scale/rotate). Anyway I will check when back at home.

It looks like the huge amount of fireflies is related to the use if the "glass suzannes", I will do some test to check. The rendering was about 24hours long on a 4x core so it should be some sort of numeric instability and not simply something related to a short rendering time.

i'll have to check this tool out, seems interesting

I've been playing with topmod recently, have you ?

Very nice tools, I will try it, If my memory is not wrong I have seen a couple of images rendered with Sunflow in the past.

i also understand you're running lux on a mac,
what we're your experiences compiling on it ?

Nope, I have a Linux (Ubuntu 7.10) box.

[Dade]

Nice indeed! I didn't know about this too tool either.

I like how in the template you can specify a sphere object instead of a trianglemesh. This can make a huge difference when dealing with many instances, like in these fractals.

Yup, I'm even evaluating the idea to write a AxisAlignedBox shape for LuxRender. It should be quite easy to write and It could make an huge difference in memory usage (just a min. and a max. instead of several triangles per cube) and rendering time.

I'm afraid that this nice feature would be lost if you import the scene into blender. Is there another option for a better export interface?

You are right, I could export to Blender just the bounding box of the SS object and than replace the bounding box with an "Include" directive in the .lxs file. I'm still investigating the problem, it is a bit annoying the lack of support for simple primitives in blender

Feel free to ask anything about the scene file format or any details about lux itself. I'd love to see a good exporter for this.

Thanks, I will do

[GustavTheMushroom]

IS there a blender exporter? I've been looking like crazy....

Correct me if im wrong but this one exports straight into lux right?

[Dade]

IS there a blender exporter? I've been looking like crazy....

Not yet, but it is not hard to write one, I hope to have one in a short time.

Correct me if im wrong but this one exports straight into lux right?

Yup, right.

[Dade]

IS there a blender exporter? I've been looking like crazy....

Not yet, but it is not hard to write one, I hope to have one in a short time.

Done, I write a little generic exporter template for SS (available here: http://davibu.interfree.it/structuresyn ... ertemplate) than I wrote an importer for Blender of the generic format (available here: http://davibu.interfree.it/structuresyn ... porter2.py).

The importer supports both sphere and box primitive (but avoids to export color information at the moment).

Some example of SS imported objects:





And another rendering with Lux:

[PhilBo]

I love that last render of the "rubber band" ball.

[GustavTheMushroom]

Awesome work dade!

Thanks a ton!

Will do some experementing and see what I come up with. ...If you dont mind me asking... what liscense is that script published under?