PhysX Bones/Ragdoll effect
Author
I have a question about PhysX. It looks like it has bones to do ragdolls with. But what are the capability of those bones? Can I replace parts of the bones and load animations into the bones? I know it has a ragdoll effect, but can I tell it, like, where he got shot to make it so he reacts as if there was force there? Also, I'm still looking out for PhysX tutorials.
Author
Also, does PhysX do the transforming of the vertices for me, if I've weighted them already? And can I just link vertices to a bone? In fact, does anyone here even use PhysX? I figured if alot of people used PhysX there may be some tutorials.
I would really love information on this also, if anyone has any information on this, it would be greatly appreciated!
Usually a physics library will not handle vertex weighting for you, since its primary concern is physics and modelling is a graphics problem. what you want to do is to use an API that will handle the vertex weighting for you, and use the physics api to control bone positions. Normally the ragdoll is disabled until you set the character into "ragdoll mode" after which you stop playing animations and just let the ragdoll collapse to the ground, fall down the stairs, get eaten by a cross between a wolf and an owl, or w/e.
My recommendation is that you try cal3d which is a skeletal animation library.
My recommendation is that you try cal3d which is a skeletal animation library.
PhysX can do ragdolls in the sense that a ragdoll is another joint/actor structure. Each bone in the skeleton maps to a PhysX actor, and each bone joint maps to a PhysX joint. You'll have to take the position/orientation of the PhysX actors and map them to the skeleton position/orientation in the renderer.
Author
I looked at Cal3D. First, I couldn't find any tutorials. Second, I couldn't figure out how to install it. I went to download, and I got this folder browser. I don't know which one to get ! =( Also, what exactly can Cal3D do? Will it load in a model for me? And can I use Blender with it?
Quote:Original post by Jedimace
I looked at Cal3D. First, I couldn't find any tutorials. Second, I couldn't figure out how to install it. I went to download, and I got this folder browser. I don't know which one to get ! =( Also, what exactly can Cal3D do? Will it load in a model for me? And can I use Blender with it?
All questions that can be answered by a google search, forums, or by reading documentation. Getting a library installed is not difficult but it does take some basic knowledge. Try the For Beginners section or #gamedev for help on this.
Quote:Original post by Khawk
PhysX can do ragdolls in the sense that a ragdoll is another joint/actor structure. Each bone in the skeleton maps to a PhysX actor, and each bone joint maps to a PhysX joint. You'll have to take the position/orientation of the PhysX actors and map them to the skeleton position/orientation in the renderer.
That's the way we do it more or less. You author a set of PhysX collision bounds that map to the skeleton of your character. Ragdoll/hit reacts are then just a jiggering of your animation system to take input from the PhysX actors.
Ragdoll => your animation is fully driven by the PhysX volumes
Hit Reacts => essentially a blend between your normal keyframe/whatever animation and the PhysX simulation.
If you set up your joint constraints properly you can get pretty decent looking ragdoll. Getting nice looking hit reactions is still a work in progress for us are requires a lot of tuning.
-me
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