Has anyone purchased and used the Scatter Tool available from Hivewire? Does it workthe way it say it does? Cheers

So far all I get is a Python error and it fails to see anything I have on my scene. I posted a query over at the place of purchase.

I think it'll be very useful. There are a lot of options but the videos on the product page will cover them plus Ken is working on a volume scatter option which looks good so far. I've just done a very quick test with a few of my own props - 20x trees at about a quarter million polygons each, 40x grass props at a few hundred polys, rendered in Superfly with only 8 samples (v. noisy) at 1400x600 pixels, i7-3930K, 145 seconds at 10Gb RAM. Superfly did take a few minutes to load the geometry :D

I am glad you got it working, it does not work for me at all. :(

@Rhia474 - I'm sure Ken will get this sorted for you and hope you're up and running soon!

Yeah, it references a H: drive in the error message I never in my life had. Weird. I have high hopes for this so I keep my fingers crossed because I really would have a ton of uses for it.

Do you have either the Construct or the original Poser Ground in the scene? I think it looks for one or the other of those - they don't have to be used though, or visible. I'm not sure of that but I'd suggest try adding either one of those and see if it makes any difference?

Yeah, I never use either of those and that's what it was looking for. Le sigh. I can add them then delete the construct and leave the Ground, and then it works. It is a bit clunky that it needs another thing to work, it is not mentioned in the manual that it absolutely needs it, but I can deal. I may suggest to Ken over at the proper place to include a little note for people like me who start from an absolute blank scene and use either BB's or Snarly's ESphere.

Thank you very much for your help!!

@Rhia474 I have my own Startup Scene for Poser, which I have set up to NOT have the Construct in it.

It's really easy. All you need to do is go to Runtime > Libraries > Scene > Poser 11 Environments > Poser 10 Workspace, which happens to be the old Ground we've been using for years in versions older than P11. Once I have that set up in a new scene file, I then save it as StartupScene.pz3 (name it whatever you want) in my Runtime > Scenes folder, where I save all the scenes I create.

Then I go to Edit > General Preferences, and select Launch to preferred scene on the Document tab, as well as Launch to previous state on the Interface tab, and save it. This will make sure Poser opens your saved preferred scene, and ALSO always open it as it was previously, so it always opens the same preferred scene.

Hope that helps.

For me it worked without any problem even with the .zip just unpacked and Poser opening the .py. It works smoothly. Pleasure to work with.

The only (small) roblem I have is that it does not truly do what the name suggests: scatter, so arrange randomly. It can copy props or figures on a random vertex in the geometry of the 'scatter plane'. The number of objects of a type you can attach is limited by the number of vertices, and objects are arranged along the edge loops. If on a regular mesh the number of vertices is large relative to the number of objects placed on it, the end result will have a good feeling of randomness, especially if you choose somewhat irregular shaped objects to scatter and apply rotation. (Not the spheres I used on a low poly ground surface LOL!)

Alternative is of course to use a Delaunay tri-mesh for the ground object. You then have scattered vertices to begin with, and result will not look regular at all but the area will just fill up nicely when the number of objects approaches the number of vertices.

@FVerbaas - would some controls for offsetting scattered objects in x, y and z be useful? I might suggest that in the thread at HW. Also, the polygon reduction feature might be useful to change the arrangement of vertices on an object used for a scatter plane?

Yup, I know how to set up a scene to launch as preferred, I just set it up and prefer it with nothing on it so I can add whatever environment suits my art experiment of the day best. :) I can add the workspace construct if I decide to use the scatter tool for nature scenes, that's a good suggestion.

I got it to work after I figured the specific workflow it demands. Thank you all for being super helpful.

Hi everyone! I would like to thank Caisson for letting me know of this thread, so I can assist anyone who has questions or issues concerning the Scatter Tool.

@Rhia474 First of all, thank you for the feedback! It just happens I didn't know it was possible to create a default Poser scene where we don't have a default 'GROUND' plane. I've jumped to that conclusion when I tried to delete it, or even to rename it, and Poser wouldn't let me. I've even tried to do that with Python, and Poser would crash. From that I understood that we MUST have either the default ground plane, or the new Construct because Poser didn't let me remove or even rename it.

Now I see it its [somehow] possible to get it removed, though I didn't see why people would do that since we can make it disappear by pressing CTRL+G, which is a Poser shortcut dedicated just for this purpose. So the intention was not to make it mandatory that everyone should have the ground plane present - I just didn't know it would be possible to remove it, or why people would want to do that.

So I have decided to make the default GROUND (be it plane or Construct) the default scatter object just because I believed it would always exist, and it would be convenient to have a default already set. Thanks to your feedback, I will add this info to the documentation. ^____^

I already have an expansion for the Scatter Tool on the works, where we will have MORE options and capabilities. You can follow the development at the Hivewire3D forums.

@caisson: The idea came to my mind also. There is a control for scaling jitter and for rotation jitter, so no idea why not some form of movement jitter would be possible. I tried to fool the script by moving the origin of my prop and force movement via rotation, but no avail.

Reducing the polygons of the scatter plane does not change the positions of vertices, it only takes some out, so your rows will still be there but be incomplete. The difference wit the full mesh may not be that large.

The good old Poser deformers (magnet, wave) and morph brush may be more effective to break alignment. You can also do the scatter in a few steps, say use five passes of 10 instances instead of one of 50 instances, and move, scale or rotate the scatter plane between the passes. The scatter plane is only used to give xyz coordinates and normal direction during the scatter action. There is no further connection between the grouping and the scatter plane. Alternatively move the grouping.

Now that I think of it, the current setup may not be that restrictive.

@FVerbaas: That is correct - the tool will automatically reposition the scattered object's origin because, by default, Poser will place it at the object's center, and we need it to be at the base.It tries to automate everything that can go wrong the best it can. Nonetheless, this may fail if objects were not modeled at the origin, or not centered. It can only assume things were modeled "properly".

Positional jitter will be added in the next update, along with some other goodies. For example, the tool will no longer loose scene tracking when closed. Tracking information will be dynamically rebuild upon the next launch, and maybe it will be an optional feature when scattering, for when people actually want objects to fall over previously "used" locations. It will be enabled by default.

Another upcoming feature is volumetric scattering, where we scatter inside a volume instead of just on the surface. This will generate its own scattering positions dynamically, with options for 3D jittering position, rotation and scale, plus an offset distance between the objects. You control scattering position and distribution by resizing the bounding box.

@Ken_1171: thank you for noting the issues. I am a total self-taught person and I like an absolute blank canvas upon which I can start the experiments in arting. :) I got your tool working and now just need to figure the right props to use to render something acceptable. Thank you for making it!!

Rhia474 posted at 10:31PM Wed, 13 May 2020 - #4389002

Yup, I know how to set up a scene to launch as preferred, I just set it up and prefer it with nothing on it so I can add whatever environment suits my art experiment of the day best. :) I can add the workspace construct if I decide to use the scatter tool for nature scenes, that's a good suggestion.

I got it to work after I figured the specific workflow it demands. Thank you all for being super helpful.

Glad to hear you got it working. I have to wait for some spare cash (hopefully next week) before I can play with it, but I'm really liking what I'm seeing folks have come up with.

Rhia474 posted at 9:35PM Wed, 13 May 2020 - #4389044

@Ken_1171: thank you for noting the issues. I am a total self-taught person and I like an absolute blank canvas upon which I can start the experiments in arting. :) I got your tool working and now just need to figure the right props to use to render something acceptable. Thank you for making it!!

I share your preference, for my own default Poser scene also has nothing on it, except for the Poser ground, which I can quickly get rid of with CTRL+G when needed.

I am glad the issue was quick to figure out and resolve. I would appreciate if you could please confirm that it was resolved at the Hivewire3D forums, because people may see it as an open ticket that was never resolved, which is bad vibes for a tool that was just released. A lot of people go there to follow the development, you know. ;)

A good point, I will report there. Thank you again!

Hallo, ich bekomme das Script nicht zum laufen. Die GROUND Platte ist eingeschaltet, trotzdem wird sie nicht gefunden. Ich habe Poser 11 in der deutschen Version, läüft es mit der deutschen Version nicht ?

Please pardon my Google translate German:

Hallo, können Sie uns den genauen Namen Ihres 'GROUND' zeigen? Wenn es nicht genau 'GROUND' ist, funktioniert es möglicherweise nicht. Eine Bildschirmaufnahme würde helfen.

Danke für die Antwort, ich benutze auch den Google-Übersetzer. Ich füge die Bilder bei

@elli009 .. Just quick suggestion till it is officially looked at.. Before using the scatter tool, double-click on Name: Grundlache (under Interna lName) and set to GROUND and see if the tool will then work for you.

Thanks @bwldrd that's a very useful workaround. I've been working on a macOS version of the UI for the Scatter Tool in the hope that mac users will be able to use it as well. Ken1171 will have a definitive answer, but it's almost certain that the external name of the prop is what's being matched presently, so changing the external name to 'GROUND' is 99% guaranteed to allow it to work. I have already made the suggestion that Scatter Tool can look at Locale string resources for the different language versions of Poser and compare against them.

[@elli009: Vielen Dank an @bwldrd, das ist eine sehr nützliche Problemumgehung. Ich habe an einer macOS-Version der Benutzeroberfläche für das Scatter-Tool gearbeitet, in der Hoffnung, dass Mac-Benutzer sie auch verwenden können. Ken1171 wird eine endgültige Antwort haben, aber es ist fast sicher, dass der externe Name der Requisite mit dem übereinstimmt, der derzeit übereinstimmt. Daher ist eine Änderung des externen Namens in 'GROUND' zu 99% garantiert, damit er funktioniert. Ich habe bereits den Vorschlag gemacht, dass das Scatter Tool die Zeichenfolgenressourcen für das Gebietsschema für die verschiedenen Sprachversionen von Poser anzeigen und mit diesen vergleichen kann.]

Oh dear. Changing my Poser language to German reproduced the problem, but changing the name of 'Grundflåche' to 'GROUND' didn't allow Scatter Tool to run. This will have to wait for Ken1171's attention.

[@elli009 Ach je. Durch Ändern der Poser-Sprache in Deutsch wurde das Problem reproduziert, aber durch Ändern des Namens 'Grundflåche' in 'GROUND' konnte das Scatter Tool nicht ausgeführt werden. Dies muss auf Ken1171s Aufmerksamkeit warten.]

an0malaus ,danke fürs ausprobieren.Kann man denn die Poser-Sprache in der deutschen Version in englisch ändern ?

Thank you @an0malaus for letting me know of this issue with the German version. I will address this right away.

I would also like to take the opportunity to ask people to post any issues at the official thread at HiveWire3D because that will get to me faster. There you can also follow the development and new features introduced in the upcoming 1.1 version, as well as tips and best practices shared by me and members from the community. :)

Good news! The Scatter Tool has been updated to version 1.01 and now supports German and Japanese languages for users from the respective countries. The update was sent to HW, and should replace the store version soon. This is a minor update just for language support, and it is not to be confused with update 1.1, which will be coming later on with many new functionalities.

Just keep an eye at HW's product updates thread for the update.

elli009 posted at 4:46PM Sat, 23 May 2020 - #4389939

an0malaus ,danke fürs ausprobieren.Kann man denn die Poser-Sprache in der deutschen Version in englisch ändern ?

You can change Poser to English by going to Settings (press CTRL+K), interface tab, where you will find the language selection option. Once the language is changed, you will need to restart Poser for it to take effect.

You can do this while we wait for HiveWire3D to make the 1.01 update to become available at the store. It now supports English, German and Japanese.

an0malaus posted at 8:47PM Sat, 23 May 2020 - #4389913

I've been working on a macOS version of the UI for the Scatter Tool in the hope that mac users will be able to use it as well.

Thank you for doing that! I was going to ask if anyone's got it working on a Mac, since the product page just says "not tested on Mac." So I'm glad to hear you're helping out with a Mac-friendly version!

perpetualrevision posted at 12:00AM Sun, 24 May 2020 - #4389985

an0malaus posted at 8:47PM Sat, 23 May 2020 - #4389913

I've been working on a macOS version of the UI for the Scatter Tool in the hope that mac users will be able to use it as well.

Thank you for doing that! I was going to ask if anyone's got it working on a Mac, since the product page just says "not tested on Mac." So I'm glad to hear you're helping out with a Mac-friendly version!

Oh yes, we are working on the MacOS version, and it has been more work than expected. Still moving forward with it, thanks to help from an0malaus, since I don't have a Mac. Just today I have already released update 1.01 to support German and Japanese languages. It's coming along, and version 1.1 will offer a few new functionalities, like scattering over custom groups, positional jittering, surface offset, and more! ^__^

Hallo Ken_1171, vielenDank für Ihre Hilfe, ich habe Poser jetzt mal auf Englisch umgestellt und das Scatter Tool fuktioniert jetzt einwandfrei. Da ich aber kein englisch kann freue ich mich auf das Update 1.01 für die deutsche Sprachunterstützung.

elli009 posted at 1:29PM Sun, 24 May 2020 - #4390019

Hallo Ken_1171, vielenDank für Ihre Hilfe, ich habe Poser jetzt mal auf Englisch umgestellt und das Scatter Tool fuktioniert jetzt einwandfrei. Da ich aber kein englisch kann freue ich mich auf das Update 1.01 für die deutsche Sprachunterstützung.

You are very welcome! The 1.01 update is already going through store processing, so it should become available anytime now. Right now, if it depended on me! ^___^

I am happy to announce that the Scatter Tool now supports German and Japanese languages with the release of the 1.01 update. The MacOS version is also coming along, and we've got the first release candidate today. It should become available once properly tested.

How can I find that update? This HW store is a bit cryptical.

Go into your account, downloadable products, then download the files again. That's what I just did and the read me states 1.01.

There is also a thread in the forum called Product Updates - Main Notification which can be added to a Watch list.

Thanks. Pretty complicated method, though.

Can't disagree ;)

Danke für den Hinweis,habe mir das Update heruntergeladen und ich finde die Update-Methode von HW auch ziemlich ungewöhnlich.

I have good news again! Update 1.01 has added support for German and Japanese languages, and the upcoming v1.02 will make it compatible with MacOS. Version 1.02 is currently in beta-testing, and should update the store version soon!

Hold on just a little longer, MacOS people! It's almost there!

A lot of people have asked me how can they have more control over WHERE things get scattered. Things like, hey - I don't want grass inside the house, or I only want flowers on this corner over here. By default, the Scatter Tool will use all the available area. For those of you using the default Dome, most likely you don't want scattered objects to go over the walls and ceiling, right?

Can I make it only use the areas I want? And the answer is YES, you can. All you need is the Grouping Tool. So let me show you how it's done in a 5 minutes video tutorial. Place things exactly where you want, quick and easy! Just go to the Scatter Tool dev thread at HiveWire3D and watch my new FREE video tutorial. In addition, there were 4 others before this one, in case you've missed them.

Enjoy! ^___^

Here's a direct link to Ken's tutorial video on YouTube: Poser Tutorial 5 - Precise Scatter Placement as well.