I'm trying to use Poser 6 dynamic cloth to get a curtain to drape nicely. Simple, I thought - just put the row of vertices at the top of the curtain into the constrained group and hey presto. But no matter what I try the whole curtain drops under the influence of gravity when I run a simulation.

I'm obviously missing something very basic. I even looked at the manual, but I remain unenlightened. The only clue I can find is in Chapter 29 (The Cloth Room) of the Poser 6 Reference Manual where it says (on page 263) that "Constrained vertices “stick” to corresponding polygon faces of the underlying figure"

I have my 'underlying figure', a simple curtain rod, and the constrained vertices in the curtain are reasonably close to faces of the curtain rod. My best guess is that Poser is either:

1. Not recognising the curtain rod as the 'underlying figure'. Q1: How do you tell Poser what the underlying figure is?

2. Not 'sticking' the vertices of the curtain to the faces of the curtain rod. Q2: How close do the vertices and faces have to be to 'stick'?

TIA for any words of advice!

parent the cloth to the rod

Yep, that seem the most logical thing to me too.

Tried that, but I still got the same problem!

you set the collide against to the rod?

also try in simulation settings additional collision settings 

I've just checked again to be 100% sure. Yes, the curtain's parented to the rod and set to collide against the rod.

Just noticed that there's a fair gap between the curtain and rod - reducing that changes the simulation, but it still drops straight of the rod!

Just a thought: what is your collision Offset and depth? Might try setting that to very low numbers, like .12 and .1, respectively. Also, you might set cloth density to like .0001 or something.

Just tried it with the top row of curtain vertices inside the rod (which I expected to cause the simulation to fail). The simulation runs, and all except two of the constrained vertices fall straight out of the rod, but two of them get caught. I'm just doing a screen-cap of a few frames to make it easier to see what I'm on about... here's frame 1 (the curtain is sort-of concertina'd, and the rod is a simple stretched cube - it's very basic!)

I need to rush off to pick up my better half, but I think there's a few clues here? Back soon I hope!

If you want the vertices to truly stick, try putting them in the choreographed group and see what happens. I don't know if they will move with the rod when you move it.. It might work if it's parented.

Yes you need to put them in the choreographed group. Constrained is only for where the cloth is to be constrained against a portion of a figure.

Thanks thewebflea and RobynsVeil for the earlier suggestions. Thanks Grappo2000/PhilC, putting the top row of vertices into the choreographed group does the trick.

Grappo2000 - yes, parenting the object to be clothified works and the cloth moves with the parent.

Problem solved - Time to play!

youre welcome :D

A couple of further questions (btw - using the choreographed group does everything I wanted. The questions in this post are just because I like to know the 'why'!     :o)

On re-reading PhilC's statement that "Constrained is only for where the cloth is to be constrained against a portion of a figure." it's a little unclear to me exactly what the criteria are. Can anybody expand on PhilC's comment?

SM's Wrap it Up! Cloth Tutorial gives these definitions:

"Choreographed groups are groups of vertices that won't stick to the figure, but can be animated using Poser's standard keyframe process." ...this sort-of makes sense now. Would I be right to say that the choreographed group don't 'stick' to anything but remain more-or-less static. But if the clothified object (or the object it is parented to) is animated then they move in accordance with the keyframed animation (giving the impression that they 'stick' to the parent).*

"Constrained cloth groups are groups of vertices in the cloth object that will "stick" to items that they collide with- when a constrained group touches an item that it has been set to collide with, it stays attached to that item and follows it throughout the scene" ...I still don't understand why my constrained vertices didn't stay attached to the rod (well, not all of them - see screen-caps earlier). Can anybody offer an explanation?

TIA

Quote - Thanks thewebflea and RobynsVeil for the earlier suggestions. Thanks Grappo2000/PhilC, putting the top row of vertices into the choreographed group does the trick.

Grappo2000 - yes, parenting the object to be clothified works and the cloth moves with the parent.

Problem solved - Time to play!

 

You're welcome :) Glad you got it working.

Vertices in the constrained group will only stick to a figure, not to a prop. If you take the curtain rod into the setup room and add a bone to it then it becomes a figure and constraining will work.

Thanks dadt - I'd half-suspected that the figure/prop distinction might have something to do with it. And if the important criteria for PhilC's statement was that "...Constrained is only for where the cloth is to be constrained against a portion of a figure*, but NOT a prop)*." then it fits.

But I'd ruled that out because (1) in a very old (2002) PoserPros Constrained vs choreographed cloth (nudity) tutorial wdupre (Will Dupre I assume?) stated that "...constrained groups are the part of the fabric that is rigidly attached to a figure or prop by parenting the cloth.", and (2) some of the vertices in my clothified curtain did stick to my rod prop.

However, a lot's changed since 2002, and I suppose some fluke could be causing some of my curtain vertices to stick to the prop. 

I'll try adding a bone just to prove to myself that what you've said is correct.

Yes indeedy, the constrained group works with a figure, but not with a prop.

So I am now master of both constrained and choreographed groups!

Wowser !

i didnt know that

I never tried to put cloth on a prop ..

now i know what to do 

Good info