Placing light objects from GH.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Marc Hoppermann on August 4, 2009 at 10:39am

hey Chris,
nice idea...

Attached a ghx file to create a bunch of directional lights from a list of lines with a vb component...
Just insert a list of lines into "LineLIst" and whenever you want to add (bake) them to the scene toggle the boolean "addLights" to true.

Is that what you meant?

Marc

Permalink Reply by Marc Hoppermann on August 4, 2009 at 11:11am

sorry... forgot to attach the ghx file...
here you go

Attachments:

• addLights.ghx, 116 KB

Permalink Reply by Atsuo Nakajima on August 4, 2009 at 8:47pm

Hi Chris, Marc, this ghz is quite useful. Placing lights is kind of headache.
I just added to define number of lights Y direction and Z direction separately.
Also rotate whole lights.
Marc, is it possible to add function to find duplicated lights and delete them?
Thanks!

Attachments:

• addLightsR1.ghx, 167 KB

Permalink Reply by Marc Hoppermann on August 5, 2009 at 5:55am

Hey Atsuo,
If you replace the code by the following you will give the lights a Name that you can then find back in the scene and delete the next time the vb component get's active. This way you make sure that you don't keep pushing new lights into your scene... (you might also just keep the booleanSwitch away and let it update automatically then...

another way is of course the good old manual "SelDup" command which deletes all duplicate objects ;o)

'/// the code starts here///
If AddLights Then

Dim nLights As Int32 = 0
Dim strLightName As String = "GH_Light"

'first delete Lights created before

'construct a new object iterator
Dim it As New MRhinoObjectIterator( _
IRhinoObjectIterator.object_state.normal_objects, _
IRhinoObjectIterator.object_category.active_objects)
it.IncludeLights(True)

'loop through each object found and delete if objectName= strLightName
For Each obj As MRhinoObject In it
Dim attr As MRhinoObjectAttributes = obj.Attributes
If attr.m_name = strLightName Then
doc.DeleteObject(New MRhinoobjref(obj))
End If
Next




For Each Line As onLine In LinesList

Dim newlight As New OnLight
newlight.SetLocation(New On3dPoint(Line.PointAt(0)))
newlight.SetDirection(Line.Direction)
newlight.SetStyle(IOn.light_style.world_directional_light)
newLight.m_light_name = strLightName
doc.m_light_table.AddLight(newlight)

nLights = nlights + 1

Next
doc.Redraw()
print(nLights & " lights created")
End If


End Sub
'--------------------------

Permalink Reply by Chris Wilkins on August 5, 2009 at 6:34am

Thanks very much guys! This will be a major timesaver for lighting my Grasshopper creations.

Permalink Reply by Marc Hoppermann on August 5, 2009 at 6:54am

now that you are placing them with code you might aswell add some lines for the light_settings itself like:

newLight.m_diffuse = New OnColor(clr) ' add a color input to the script
newLight.m_shadow_intensity = shadowInt ' to control the shadow

just an idea for a usage:

Permalink Reply by Atsuo Nakajima on August 6, 2009 at 12:46am

Thank you.
I have not tried VBScript yet, but I will play with it.

Permalink Reply by Peter Varo on August 7, 2009 at 12:00pm

Wow, that's a cool solution! But what if I'm just making a grasshopper animation, and I also want to change my cam, and here's my code:

Dim viewport As MRhinoViewport = app.ActiveView.activeviewport
viewport.SetTargetAndCameraLocation(targetPoint, cameraLocation)

and it's working and my final object is attached to a Preview component (it is very important for me, cause my viewport settings has to be true to my object) but when the camera is changing all my lights are gone and the "problem" with your solultion is that it can only bake the light and can not add it to the active area.
Am I explain myself clearly? Sorry for my bad english, it is very difficult to tell these things, hope you understand it.

ps: maybe there's something else went wrong, I don't know..

Permalink Reply by Chris Wilkins on August 7, 2009 at 2:49pm

Originally, I posted this under the general topics forum, and David Rutten replied that there are no light objects available in GH. He said that baking them was the only option currently. Here's the thread:

http://grasshopper3d.ning.com/forum/topics/placing-light-objects-with

-Chris

Permalink Reply by Peter Varo on August 7, 2009 at 5:24pm

But when you attach the GH generated object to a Preview component all the viewport settings will be shown on the object, for example the stereo mode what i switched on in the "rendered" view - which in my case is the point! So basicly I think the light is not a GH object but an active viewport thing, which can be controlled by rhino's .net framework. Am I right?

Well, I have to be right :):) because I dont want to adjust 4000 frames in photoshop for the 3D anaglyph mode.. PLEASE! VB and C# masters, help me from the timeless s*cks of editing photos one by one :)