COMPUTER AIDED ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN
Workshop 13 Notes, Week of November 11 , 2019

V-Ray Grasshopper Animation of Moving Object, Camera and Light (FIRST DRAFT)

1, Create three control point cuves for the object path, camera path and light path.

Start by adding the three path curves each one created with control points placed from left to right, or make 3 copies of the same curve.

Add a cone with a point on its cental axis on the ground plane.

Add additional solid objects in the background along the path for visual reference.

2. Open Grasshopper. Create a curve parameter for each of the 3 path curves, a brep component and point component for the cone and point, and a brep for the remaining solid objects and make the corresponding connections for the entities in Rhino.

3. Within Grasshopper, in the "curves" sub-menu, select the evaluate curve component.




4. Place one in the canvas window for each of the three curves/

5. Go to the V-Ray Module within Grasshopper and select the timeline component.

6. Place it on the lower left side of the Canvas window and connect it's output "fraction" the input "L" for each of the three eval components. The fraction is a percentage of the animatino complete from 0 to 1. Notice that a point is generated along each of the three curves accordingly.

Add a numerical slider that runs from 2 to 360 frames, set the current value to 180, and plug it into the "Frames" input port of the timeline.

7. Add a vector component from the cone origin point component the cone path eval curve output "P" (point along the curve) output port.

8. Under the Grasshopper tansform "trns" tab, add a move component to the canvas window and connet its "G" input port tothe ouput port of the cone brep

9. Note that the cone begins to travel along the cone path control path by moving the timeline frame slider.

10. Add a light sphere component and connect its input port "Position" to the output port "P" of the eval curve component for the light path control curve.

11. Add a camera component and connect its input port "Position" to the output port "P" of the eval curve component for the camera path control curve.

12. Add a V-Ray material preset (simple material definition) to the Grasshopper Canvass Window.

13. Right mosuse button click on the material present component and select the "Show Controls" option.

14. The last step reveals the inputs type material "Generic" and defaut swatch color of dark gray.

15, Select the color swatch and adjust the color value to off-white as in the dialog below

16. Now add a V-Ray infinite plane to the canvas window.

17. Right click on the infinite plane component, and open its "Controls" in which case twi Boolean "True" or "False" Toggles are revealed, and switch both to false.

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18. Connect the Material Preset output port named "Mtl" to the corresponding "Mtl" input port of the Infinate Plane.

19. Copy the Material Preset and it's controls to the area of the canvas window adjacent due the "Brep" component for the background objects.

20. Add a V-Ray Geoemtry component to the right of the "Move" component for the Cone object.

21. Connect the "Brep" for the backgrond objects and the "G" output port of the "Move" components the the "G" input port of the "V-Ray" Geometry Component, and add the output "Mtl" port of the "Mtl Preset" component to the "Mtl" input port of the "V-Ray Geometry" component.

22. Add a V-Ray Sunlight Rig System to the upper right of the V-Ray lighting component.

23. Connect the V-Ray Light Sphere output to the "Add Lights" input port of the V-Ray Sunlight Rig.

24. Add a number slider ranging in values from 0.0 to 100.0 with a current value set to 80.0 and connect its output port to the "Intensity" inpurt porf of the "Light Sphere".

25. Copy the number slider, set the copy slider's value to 0.0, and connect its output port to the "Sun Intensity" input port of the the Sun Rig.

26. Add a V-Ray Render component to the right of the Sun Rig.

27. Connect the output port of the Sun Rig to the "Light Rig" input port of the "Render" component. Right Click on the render component and show it's controls.

28. Change the render component "Mode" to "Production" and connect the V Geo and Infiinite Plane output ports to the "V Geo" input port of the "V-Ray Rendering" component.

29. Connect the cone path output port "P" the the "Camera' compnent "Target" input port.

30. In turn connect the "Camera" component "Camera" output port to the "Camera" input port of the render component.

31. Set the frame number to 60. Right mouse click on the Render component and choose the "Render" option to render a single image from the camera's point of view.

32. Adjust values for "Levels" and review the result.

33. Use the "Gumball" too to adjust the camera path as needed to improve the rendered view.

34. Re-render the view to see if the adjustment is closer to the view angle and view framing as what you are seeking.

35. Connect the V-Ray Timeline output port to the V-Ray Render component "Timeline" input port.

36. Double click on render component "Save File" input "control"to select a file type, name (e.g, "mycam.jpg"), and folder location (e.g., "myFrames"). The "jpg" format is recommened for the simplest default format.

37. Note that the control label has the name of the file "myCam.jpg".

38. Change the "Mode" control from "Interactive" to "Productive", and then right - click on the "Render" componet and select the "Render Animation option to render he animation.

39. Render and view the resulting animation.

40. Right mouse button click to "Light Sphere" component, use the "Show Controls" tools, and then toggle Boolean control for the "Invisible" property to "True".

39. Render and view the resulting animation and note that the sphere is no longer visible.