[Soc-2016-dev] Weekly Report #03 and #04 - Sculpting Tools

[Campbell Barton]

Hi students/mentors, I've talked with Kairong on IRC, regarding this
being a late start and the technical questions.

Kairong's aware such a late start jeopardizes chances of passing
mid-term, but he's still interested to continue development.

Also, comment about suicide wasn't at all serious but it's not
appropriate to make such throw-away comments here.

On Sun, Jun 19, 2016 at 6:36 AM, Kairong Jiang
<cecil.ini.jiang at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I deeply apologize for not sending weekly report last week. I totally
> underestimated the workload of these last few weeks of this semester, and I
> want to kill myself now for not starting earlier on the project while the
> deadlines are still far away.
>
> Nevertheless, after a few days of all-night working (and some classes laid
> off), I managed to get over with some course projects and pushed a little
> further the silhouette brush. Still the progress is not close to what I have
> expected, but I think I'm almost, if not already, over the hardest part.
> (And the summer break is almost there!)
>
> I did the following after last weekly report and have some questions to ask:
>
> * I tried to add the Silhouette brush as a brush tool and make it listed in
> the brush selecting panel. I haven't code the real execution function yet
> but I want to make it "usable" first so that I can know what my code is
> doing. However, the buttons on the brush selector page are not generated
> separately as I thought. They are generated automatically through
> "template_ID_preview" function, which, to my understanding, searches the
> "brush" property of Paint and generate one button for each sculpting Brush.
> Therefore I need to add the Silhouette brush as a property of Paint. I read
> all the DNA, BKE and RNA sources that are related to brush, paint and
> sculpting, and I have added new entries in the enums defining sculpting tool
> types. But I never figure out where and when the brush data is generated.
> After reading lots of code and documents, I think maybe it has something to
> do with readfile.c since data is read and linked there, but I got so many
> small pieces and wasn't able to get them together. I have been stuck there
> for some time and could use some help and explanation.
>
> * As for the functionality of the tool, the first thing is to calculate the
> nodes within the stroke. Unlike other sculpting tools, the nodes need
> changing can only be known after a stroke is finished (the user releases the
> mouse click), and it is not as simple as "finding nodes within a selected
> area".
>
> I am considering two ways to do the silhouette brush. The first is, as I
> described in my proposal, to draw a line as the new silhouette and deform
> one side of the line, and nodes that are on the side of the object are thus
> selected to be modified. Another approach is to use it as a normal brush
> (with brush size), and the nodes within the brush area are marked. Then we
> apply surface change after the stroke. This way node selecting is simpler
> but it is harder to apply surface deformation since the chosen area may be
> more unpredictable and irregular. I tend to stick to the way proposed, and I
> would like to hear Campbell's advice.
>
> The thing is I haven't done much during the first month and it was partly
> because of some unexpected accidents but mostly because I didn't put my
> focus and attention on the project enough. This shouldn't continue since
> there are only two months left and I am at least 2 weeks behind the
> schedule, and the final exams are coming. I plan to finish the silhouette
> brush by the end of the mid-term evaluation, and I hope Campbell might give
> me a pass (｡ŏ﹏ŏ).
>
> Next week I shall finish the tool button and node selecting.  I'll also
> figure out the practical way to deform the surface, and do the mid-term
> evaluation.
>
> Regards and apologies,
> Kairong Jiang
>
>
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-- 
- Campbell