I’ll add that in.
hi pual,
i did something like this a while ago for a project and i noticed that there is huge framerate drops when using relativly small amounts of extended scripted helpers – in the end i stoped using scirpted helpers, and swithced back to the plain old vanilla helpers which dont have this problem
cheers,
mark
Yay, useful tools are always such a pleasure to use
A few things I noticed:
[ul]
[li]The list loses its selection when refocused, so it’s not immediately apparent when you reselect the object what the last selection was[/li][li]The list starts with a horizontal scroll bar taking up real estate[/li][li]Preset names are not reloaded when the scene is, so would be very easy to lose a custom mesh by accidentally clicking another option[/li][li]The “position” mesh feels very big compared to the other controls![/li][li]Having the size option start on 10 feels more intuitive than the tiny 1[/li][/ul]Some things that might be nice:
[ul]
[li]“Export to mesh” option for editing the meshes (Perhaps “Manage” could be “Mesh”, with Import, Export, Save and Delete)[/li][li]A “reset” and “lock axis” option for the Scale parameters[/li][li]Maybe save the scale per-mesh option[/li][/ul]I must say, I still don’t think the list adds anything, apart from feeling a bit showey-offy (LOOK at all my options! Aren’t I a clever little tool ).
I agree it’s nice to see the options all at once, but once you’ve set it, you’re really only concerned about that one option.
Nice tool though, one I’ve wanted for a long time.
Dave
I wondered about this but in simple tests I didn’t see a drop. Also I have added the feature to have it not draw anything at all. This is even better then the current helpers as they can still be selected on screen when all the diplay options have been turned off. This one can’t. I put a thousand of them on sceen and didn’t see a problem and that was with the most complex mesh. Took a bit to load how ever so simple meshes are better. I notice that the build mesh command is run a lot an I have also noticed that point helpers in them selves are slow, I always turn off the display properties on them when I’m done. CAn you do a test on this for me?
I’m working on the list selction when the UI is opened.
I don’t think there is anything that I can do with the horizontal bar as it could be needed if the names get long.
What do you mean the preset names are not reloaded? This should happen automaticaly when the rollout opens.
I think that I have already rebuilt the position object. That was added before I had the normalize option in there.
Default size is 10 as I felt the same way.
There is now an extract mesh option so you can get the mesh back out. A bit of a mess since in some cases you don’t want certain edges to be visible so it can look odd. I was able to clean up the mesh to the bare nessesities and then delete the old and readd it.
I have also added an offset position and rotation for the mesh that makes it easy to get the mesh in the location you want or to do things like mirror a foot control as I allow the scale to go into negative numbers.
So for the list you are thinking just a drop down list. Your right it is a bit showey but that kinda makes it fun. I’m going to add a lock UI function, might not have a UI item to go with it but instead just an option that you can get access to via script. This would hide the whole rollout so changes can’t be made to it. Also I wanted an option to stop the display from being turned off via script so it is easy to hide all helpers that are just part of a rig and not a direct control object.
What do you think?
hey paul,
ill have a look at it tonight to see if i can get it slow… maybe i had a mistake in my code
cheers,
mark
Just did another speed test. Helpers in general are slow. with 1000 point helpers I get a frame rate of about 9fps, 1000 PEN Helpers 9fps and 1000 spline sphere control objects I get about 14fps.
So this helper object is the same as others but half the speed of using splines.
Edit: As an update to this 1000 boxes was about 50fps
Hey Paul,
This is a great utility… thank you for sharing it. The default point helper has a “Draw on Top” attribute. Any chance that can be incorporated into your script?
Cheers,
Dave
Hey Paul,
> What do you mean the preset names are not reloaded? This should happen automaticaly when the rollout opens.
I made myself a custom mesh, names it “Cylinder” then saved the scene and reloaded. When I checked the the list, “Cylinder” was gone. So if I accidentally clicked the list and changed my helper to “hand” or something, there’d be no way to get “cylinder” back (save for adding it as a new mesh again).
Not a big thing, but significant I think. Your other changes sound good too.
Good luck with the rest of the development!
Dave
Dave, do you use Vista? Maybe Vista UAC doesn’t allow the the script to alter the xml file, it writes to the xml just fine here… (XP)
-Johan