Rain on a window animation

[dhin]

I need to know what the best way to do an animation of rain hitting a window and rolling down it. I have a few ideas I've tried but paticals look bad and don't streak right. Any helpfull suggestions?

[FutureMan]

I had a similar idea one day driving in a rain storm but couldn't figure out how to do it. Good luck!

I was just thinking and maybe if you had a texture map\mask you could fake it by animating the map for the rain, I don't even know if this is possible let alone if it'll look even close to right. Just throwing it out there. Maybe this will jump start someone else and give them an idea.

Also I remember seeing something I think it was for Clothreyes where you could use it to simulate a jelly\softbody, maybe if you did that for each drop.

[dhin]

I had that idea with the texture map too. And that is what I'm trying to actually make, but I'm having a hard time getting it to look natural

[FutureMan]

Well if you have a digital camera you could always spray some water onto a window and see how that looks.

The Clothreyes thing might work but won't do the streaking, seems better than what I got from particles though.

Sorry if I'm jacking your post but this is what I got after some experimenting with Clothreyes and Vray just now. (I wanted the Vray caustics for my scene :D )

[kuman]

that's a cool idea and nice test there future man

i was thinking of something simpler than that even. it depends on the distance of your shot really. if you're not going to go super close up, why not just fake the streaking and droplets with animated textures, you can make an animated texture of a drop and then it streaking down and then map that to a rectangular plane and spread that all over the window

as long as its not a super close up it should hold up reasonably well

-k

[dhin]

That is my main intention. . . but the how close to the window it is viewed I can't control since it's for a interactive 3d envirnment

[simps]

www.rustboy.com

He has a scene where rain drops down a window, and says how he did it. It looks good. I think he went the animated texture route.

[kuman]

yeah if its real time you should definitely use texturing. as a matter of fact if its real time i'd look into not even using animated textures as they eat up a ton of texture space, try pulling it off with animated uv's instead, that might be what the dr. ordered.

good luck
-k

[dhin]

Simps - RUSTBOY! I knew I'd seen the rain thing some place I just couldn't remeber where. Thanks for jogging the faulty memory.

Kuman - actually your right I'll start looking at that instead. Thanks

[Vajra]

Toy Stoy used animated textures to create the rain on the window.

[dhin]

Kuman - Thanks for the idea, it seems to work the best out of all the possablities. And it was easiest to get working right.