Planetside Software Forums

General => Terragen Discussion => Topic started by: dhavalmistry on February 13, 2007, 02:35:32 PM

Title: Null Population
Post by: dhavalmistry on February 13, 2007, 02:35:32 PM
I just realized something, there is something called "Null" under population menu.....I tried it but couldnt figure out what it is??...
Title: Re: Null Population
Post by: MeltingIce on February 13, 2007, 03:02:11 PM
Quote from: dhavalmistry on February 13, 2007, 02:35:32 PM
I just realized something, there is something called "Null" under population menu.....I tried it but couldnt figure out what it is??...
A lot of times null groups are used for workflow improvement and grouping objects together for easier reference.  Not sure what the use is in TG2 though.
Title: Re: Null Population
Post by: Will on February 13, 2007, 04:57:57 PM
Yes I have been wondering about this aswell but MeltingIce's anwser is kind of what I was think but maybe Oshyan will pop-in and say. By the way I haven't seen Jo or Matt around lately, must be working on the next update kep up the good work boys (and girls)!

Regards,

Will
Title: Re: Null Population
Post by: Oshyan on February 13, 2007, 10:49:35 PM
Yep, Jo and Matt are hard at work. :D

Null objects can have many uses but I've most often seen them used as stand-ins or references to external objects. Say for example you're composing a scene in TG2 and plan to render a high poly complex object in another app to composite in later. For reference when setting up your scene you could load the object itself, taking up memory and slowing things down, or you could just use a stand-in. In more complex scenarios these can actually be used by cross-communication scripts to automate data interchange and compositing.

- Oshyan
Title: Re: Null Population
Post by: Dark Fire on February 14, 2007, 04:18:57 PM
Aah...Very clever Oshyan. Null objects are quite useful then...
Title: Re: Null Population
Post by: efflux on October 21, 2007, 05:12:45 PM
Null object is useful of course but what about a null node? I know you could just use another node that is doing nothing but I think we need a null node which is a different colour so that we can hook graphs up between different internal networks and still easily see what's going on. This is what I presently need to do but don't see any way to make the connections visually obvious, at least in a quick and easy way.
Title: Re: Null Population
Post by: cyphyr on October 23, 2007, 01:09:18 PM
Any chance the nulls will be used for parenting so when a the null is moved/scaled/rotated all the child objects are moved/scaled/rotated at the same time?
Richard
Title: Re: Null Population
Post by: Oshyan on October 23, 2007, 02:07:43 PM
Quote from: cyphyr on October 23, 2007, 01:09:18 PM
Any chance the nulls will be used for parenting so when a the null is moved/scaled/rotated all the child objects are moved/scaled/rotated at the same time?
Richard

Not likely this year, but very possibly in a future update.

- Oshyan