Original subtitles

Hello everyone. My name is George

Slatkovski and today we're looking at GS

Curve Tools version two. Yes, it's like

a major rewrite of everything. Uh most

of the things were moved to compiled

code which means that it will be much

faster and more efficient and there's

like a plenty of new features to

discuss. Uh this will be a little bit

shorter video. I will also upload like a

longer in-depth video. Uh it's like more

than an hour. uh but uh for this one we

will just quickly go through the major

points of this uh update this new

release I should say and uh yeah there's

a lot to discuss so let's get started

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>> Heat. Heat.

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>> Now just a few disclaimers before we get

started. Uh since this uh everything is

now uh compiled code that means that for

now GSC tools version 2 ships without

MacOSS support. Unfortunately, because I

do not have the hardware uh to compile

the code and I'm searching like a local

market for uh good price. Even M1 Max

are quite unaffordable where I live. So

uh unless I can find some something for

cheap or someone sends it to me. First

of all, I need to compile the code for

the second I need to test it before

shipping. So no Mac OS support for now.

Now another very important detail is

that version 2.0 0 of JSCOV tools is not

compatible with version one. That means

that you need to finish all the old

projects that you're working on in

version one and then update for the new

projects to the version two. You can

still open your old scenes. That's not a

problem at all. But you will not be able

to use most of the functions from

version two in version one scene. So

just remember that it's very important.

So the installation process was changed

a little bit but it's now much easier

than before. So before if you have 1.3

uh version you need to go to Maya you

need to press this delete button then

you close Maya and after that you just

uh delete the old JS folder from

documents Maya Maya version and you copy

the new files. There will be a file and

a folder. You copy both of those into

the modules folder. If you don't have

modules folder, you just need to create

it uh in documents Maya Maya version. Uh

Maya, you go to Windows, you go to

settings and preferences, plug-in

manager, and you find GS tools version 2

init plugin. And all you need to do is

you click load it. And after that, it

will automatically install everything

for you. If you need to uh uninstall it

for some reason, you just click it

again, unload it, and that's it. The

plug-in is uninstalled now. So, first of

all, the major optimizations are coming

from the custom nodes that we are now

using in GSCR tools, which means that if

I select this card over here, I go to

node editor and I will expand the node

graph, you'll see that there's like only

three nodes here. which means that uh

this uh generator node this is a custom

node that I've written specifically for

hair cards uh creation this will be

doing the like majority of work and

because it's all contained in one node

it's very fast and very efficient and

there's actually a lot of new

interesting features. Uh we also have

deformer node and also a new braid node.

We will discuss about it a little bit

later but as you can see we have like a

braid over here. Uh so first of all,

let's just go over regular card

features. So uh here you'll find all of

the things that you've used from the

previous version. But there's also

dynamic divisions over here. The length

division is just like let me just show

you real quickly. If I enable length

dynamic divisions, you will see that uh

what I have here. By the way, I will

just show you this a little bit later,

but we now we have sculpting brush as

well. Uh as you can see if I move uh

this over here you will see that the

dynamic divisions they will change

they'll keep the density uh but we'll

also now have a curvaturebased divisions

which means that if I increase the

curvature to something like 0.7

will see of the curve I mean you will

see that now the divisions will be where

they are needed the most and uh this is

very efficient when it comes to poly So

you can not only uh set the dynamic

divisions like based on length, you can

also set the based on curvature. And I

don't recommend to go all way away to

one because the divisions will be a

little bit too sparse when the curve is

not like curved too much. Uh but 0.6 0.5

0.7 is the best value here. So just play

with this value and see what works for

you uh best. Also the new parameter we

have is profile width graph. Uh profile

length was also updated. So let me just

enable the profile a little bit. I will

just add some divisions. Uh profile

length is was now updated. So now it's

like a proper graph nor like fixed

points or or something like it was

before. And now you can just move those

points freely. But you can now also use

profile width graph meaning that you

will be changing the crosssection of the

card and tube over here. Uh if you go

over here and ch start changing the

crosssection you will see that you will

be able to change it to whatever you

want to every shape that you can imagine

with those two graphs which is very

powerful. Now, of course, you have all

of the twists and inverted twists and

all of the graphs uh just like before,

but also there is like a small update

over here to the vertical offset. So,

now you can let me just uh reset the By

the way, you can reset the range or set

to default by right clicking. Um you can

now just use vertical offset as well.

And you can freely switch between card

and tube at any moment. So if I set

profile to zero and go to tube, you'll

see that now we have just like a tube

and we can change all of the parameters

and go to card and so on. So this is one

node. It's very fast and very efficient.

Now, so let's talk about braids really

quickly. If you look over here, [snorts]

I have a braid like this. And I also

have a braid like this. Let me just

enable textures to be able to see a

little bit better. We have braid like

this. We also have those smaller braids.

Those are all procedural objects. That

means that you can just go over here and

will see many parameters that we will

not cover in this video. But anyway, you

can go and play with those parameters.

You can change uh like the um number of

strands. You will need to update your

UVs as well if you're changing the

strands. Just like that.

uh you can change the number of strands

from two to three to four and also for

four strands you have additional uh

variants like uh Celtic braid for

example uh you'll have to change

smoothing a little bit for that uh and

you also have like a flat basket you

need to change frequency because it's

like a a more dense pattern uh but of

course you can play with the clearance

with the all the other settings like

smoothing and stuff and there's also

variations that you can change this like

adding a little bit of randomness. For

example, if I go and increase the amount

over here and change like the pitch or

something, you'll see that the braid

changes a little bit. Let me just switch

to the flat one just for it to to be

able to see better. And uh if I change

this parameters, you'll see that I will

add some randomness, some like uh

messiness to this braid, which is very

important. And of course, if you don't

like this one, this particular seed, you

can just change it uh around. And

there's also like winding, unwinding

here. So, a lot of options to explore.

So, of course, nothing stops you from

from making bigger braids. Uh this is

this small one is just an example. But

of course this braid over here is also a

procedural object that uh can be changed

on the fly and can be extended and stuff

like that because uh the automatic

frequency allows for this extension over

here. So this is very powerful and

useful note to have for all types of

braids. Now since we started to talk

about sculpting uh you will now have a

sculpting brush. You'll have to set your

hotkeys uh yourself uh over here in the

hotkey editor. Uh there are available

hotkeys for changing the radius,

changing uh some other parameters. So

you just go to GS Groove tools over here

in custom scripts. You go to sculpting

and you will see that you can uh have

activation modes for uh like uh

sculpting, move, smooth. We'll just uh

look at them briefly right now. But most

important is resize and selection

resize. So hotkey uh for resize I set it

to B. You will need to set it yourself

because uh JCO tools will not set

default hotkeys for you and remember

that release uh variant of hotkey must

have their own release parameter over

here. So that's the only thing to

remember and they will not conflict with

Maya keys because they are scoped to the

sculpting uh brush and other uh brushes

that we'll explore later. So now you can

just hold uh B and change your width

really quickly. Now uh in order to

select something with the sculpting

brush because it's selection based, you

hold control and you start dragging and

you will be able to select the curves in

the scene and you will see like a small

preview uh what you are going to select.

I can just uh make my selection brush a

little bit smaller and I can select

individual curves. And when I selected

the curve, I can start sculpting it

right away. There are also like marking

menus available for sculpting and other

tools. For example, if I hold F1, you

will see that I can switch to from

sculpt to other uh tools that we'll

explore later. And if I hold F2, it's

just my hotkey, but you can set whatever

you want. I will be able to switch

between the sculpting modes. And now

we're in sculpt mode. But let's for

example uh explore move mode. Now for

move mode to work properly, you first

need to set your base mesh over here. So

as you can see, I have uh body set. So I

can just go over here. And this is like

what it's called. And I can select base

mesh over here. Then I activate sculpt

brush again. And uh the base mesh is now

applied. And now if I want to move

something, I will just uh select this

and I hold middle mouse button. And as

you can see, I will start moving

alongside the surface of the mesh. This

can be changed in the settings of

course, but uh it is nice to have like

to to to really quickly move something

and then when you release uh the move uh

brush over here, it will automatically

switch to previous mode. And uh previous

mode for example was sculpting and I

will just go ahead and start sculpting.

Then I move again start sculpting. So

very intuitive and very fast. Now of

course you don't have to move along the

mesh normals just like I I did over

here. You can just really quickly go to

settings and there are plenty of

settings for sculpting mode over here.

And you can for example just disable

surface move. Uh, and if you disable

surface move, let me just go to sculpt

and I'll start moving with my middle

mouse button. You'll see that it just

moves in the camera plane just like

that. And if you change your camera

view, it will start moving in the other

plane like that. This is very useful to

quickly position stuff. Uh, but uh, of

course, when it's already on the surface

of the mesh, you want to move it with

surface move just like that. Uh, there's

alo also rotate with surface. As you can

see, when I move it, sort of rotates. uh

cases you don't want that so you have a

switch over here to disable the rotation

with the surface and if you disable it

you will see that I will just simply

move on the surface without any rotation

so just pick what you need over here now

another option over here is preserve

length this is just like if you hold L u

key in Maya uh it also works with a

sculpting brush so you don't even need

to touch this you can just hold L and as

you can

It will now preserve the length of this

curve. So it will not change it. Uh and

if you want this mode permanently on,

you can just preserve length uh toggle

over here. Now it will be always on. So

you don't need need to hold L button.

Now other settings over here are

basically changing the like fell off

like influence and strength. So those

like regular brush settings. Uh so uh I

recommend you to set the hotkey right

away and just use B and CtrlB uh to uh

change uh two main brush radiuses

because like uh the skull uh the

selection is a different brush but it's

just bundled into the sculpt brush and

sculpt brush and uh everything else is

uh this one radius that you can find

here like just radius and we also have

smooth mode. So for example, if you want

to uh by the way, I'm changing the

radius with left mouse button and I'm

changing the file off with middle mouse

button. So just so you know, we have

smoothing mode also. So you can just

hold shift and it will start smoothing

your curve. If you want more uh strength

mouse button and up and down. And if you

increase the strength, you'll see that

smoothing will be stronger. So there's

also like uh scale mode that will just

scale your curve just like that. Uh the

selected curves it can be like multiple

curves. There's also extend that will

extend and reduce similar to those two

buttons extended and reduce. It will

also follow the curvature a little bit.

So it's very useful for longer hair.

There's also pull. Uh if you need to

pull something away and towards your

camera without moving your camera too

much, you can just switch to pull mode.

And now as you can see, it will now move

away and towards your camera when you

actually uh sculpting. And the last mode

is uh cut mode. It will just based on

this circle over here, it will just cut

the curve or multiple curves. It doesn't

have to be like one curve. uh it will

just cut them to this circle which is

very very useful when you are working

with longer hair and you just want to

trim it very precisely. Now real quickly

let's talk about templates. Over here on

the top you will see that I have a list

of items. Those are my templates. So

basically if I double click on any of

those you will see I am starting to

select my templates. And uh before you

just uh put your templates in the last

layer in the previous versions but now

you can also store those templates in

this templates bar and those templates

are very useful in other functions in

GSC tool. So it's very important to set

the base mesh and templates right away

as you start your project. And uh of

course you can add one at a time. For

example, if I remove uh those flyaways

over here and I can just click plus and

you will be uh adding one at a time or

you can select everything and add uh

everything there. But then you will have

to manually reposition them uh by

holding left click and just

repositioning like that or by holding

shift and scrolling them left and right

with your mouse scroll just like that.

You can also rename them by

right-clicking and if you want to remove

them, middle mouse will remove them. The

blank cannot be removed. It's like

default template. It will just uh be

either default card or just plain curve

uh depending on the function that you're

using. So now that we know about

templates, let's just talk about draw

and place. Let's start with the draw. I

will just hide everything that I don't

need over here. And I will focus on this

layer over here. This is like a first

layer of uh the groom. It's very ugly,

but it's like holding the dense uh

textures that will just cover the scalp

so you don't see it uh through the

hairstyle too much. So, I will just

remove some of them. Uh just like that.

And we will quickly uh we will quickly

uh just uh redraw them. Let's enable

draw mode. And you'll see that first of

all we have uh mesh and depth mode. We

will quickly switch to mesh mode. And we

will use thick template. This is the

thick template over here. If I just uh

uh unhide them, you'll see this is this

thick one. I will just hide them again

just for for us not to be uh confused.

And in draw mode, all you need to do now

is draw. Just like that. You'll see that

first of all there's a problem. We have

like this uh clipping with the mesh.

It's not a problem at all. We can just

increase the offset to something like

0.3. And now we will have a perfect

drawing over here. It will also orient

the mesh to the surface of the base

mesh. So uh the card will be oriented

automatically. This is controlled by

this parameter over here. And the offset

will not affect the first CV because I

have start CV selected. That means that

offset will be filtered uh for that CV.

And as you can see if I go to the mesh

mode over here, you'll see that the

first one is touching the mesh basically

and every other CV is a little bit

offset from the surface of the mesh. So

and just like that we quickly drawn the

first layer like few strokes. The cards

are already there. Of course, they are

just regular cards. So, you can go ahead

and uh change to sculpt node and you can

just sculpt them however you want. You

them a little bit. Uh you can go over

here and orient to normal again. You can

just change this all again. And let's

just orient everything just like that.

And uh this is the power of draw. Uh

there also depth mode. So in uh in mesh

mode that we used uh the draw will just

cling to the mesh completely. It will

not leave the surface of the mesh. But

if you want to start from the mesh but

then go outside you can just go to depth

mode and it will change check the depth

and uh based on that if I just ch change

to some something like flyway a uh it

will be able to grow from the mesh to

the ser to uh the scene just like that.

And you can just quickly do something

like this which is very very useful uh

for some flyaways and basically

everything that is not uh like stuck to

the surface of the mesh like this first

layer. And of course as you saw I was

using templates. You can disable use

templates and that means that it will be

just creating like a plain Maya curve.

This is very useful for some XGen

workflows for example. you can just

quickly quickly draw on the surface of

the mesh your guides and then convert it

to xgen guides and stuff like that. But

uh for uh hair cards of course you want

to use templates. Now place is another

creation method that you can use. It's a

tool uh just like draw. And as you can

see you will you'll see like a stem and

the radius. The stem is basically what

you you are going to uh get the curve

and the radius is the influence. So it

will look at other curves in the radius

and it will be influenced by them. So if

for example I have one curve over here I

will just make it longer and if I go

near it you will see that I am

influenced by this curve. If I click to

create just like that you will see that

I'm going to use my templates. I'm going

to use this newly created curve from the

place brush. And just like that I have

new curves in place where I want them.

Uh there are many options over here. The

most important one here is interpolate

orientation. So if you see I when I move

uh from this point to this uh the curve

itself is blending with this original

If you don't want that, you can just uh

uncheck interpolate or now it will be

perfectly blended with those uh original

curves. And if you want that rotation,

if you for example working some on some

other sections, uh you can just enable

this interpolate orientation and now it

will be rotated with the surface of the

mesh. So depending on the effect that

you want. Uh other options are just the

same as draw, use base mesh, use

template and auto orient to normals. You

can enable or disable those if you want.

Now over here you have options uh that

are can be controlled by the hotkey that

you set in the hotkey editor. I set it

to B. And if I hold B and uh hold my

left mouse button and drag like left and

right, you will see that I will change

the length of the curve over here. And

if I uh drag up and down with left mouse

button, I will change the influence uh

of this curve. Let me just disable

interlade orientation so it's visible.

Uh if I hold B and drag with uh my

middle mouse button, left and right will

uh change the influence radius and up

and down will change the root f fall

off. So you can like have this effect

where the root is not exactly following

the curve. It's like like there's like a

falloff which is very nice effect

sometimes if it's not too

overexaggerated like I have like now

right now. Uh so just something like

this will be very nice to have. And of

course now that's it is in place you can

just go ahead and adjust it with the

sculpt brush really quickly. Now value

twist and width are controllers for your

curves. So value will be able to change

the value that you want. orientation. If

I hold the hotkey that you need to set

once again uh uh and uh in my case, it's

F2 and I hold left mouse button, I can

change the twist really quickly. Then go

back to orientation to back to width and

then I can just switch to sculpt and

then I can just uh change or orientation

back to sculpting and so on and so

forth. So very fast. Just remember

middle mouse button is uh used to change

this. Uh we also have like twist and

width. Those will affect the graphs. If

we go to for example twist, you'll see

that we have points on the curve. Those

are points on the twist curve graph over

here. And if I hover my m mouse uh over

it, you will see that I have like a line

connecting uh my mouse to those points.

That means that I will influence this

point when I drag my middle mouse button

towards and away from it. Now, if I want

to twist the tip of this card, for

example, you will see that I will start

twisting just like that uh with my

middle mouse button and I can twist this

part over here or this part over here.

And of course, if I drag with my left

mouse button on those points, I can move

those points. So, I can twist exactly

where I want to. Uh or if I left click

on the empty space, I can create new

points and then twist those as well.

Just like that. And if I hold control

and I click on those points, I will

remove them. Absolutely. The same goes

for the width. For example, if you want

to change the tip over here and you can

add point over here and change the width

over here and move those points a little

bit. Uh this will all will be dynamic

and update in real time. and just hold

control to remove those points. Of

course, you cannot have less than four

points because that's the minimum that

the graph allows. So again, don't forget

to set your marking menu in the hotkey

editor. There's also like dedicated

hotkey for every tool to switch between

them to switch between uh sculpting

the hotkeys in the world, you can just

set them there or you can create your

own marking menu if you want because

those commands are basically callable

from Maya. Now the template button over

here will uh basically create templates

on empty curves or it will or it will

transfer those template parameters not

like the entire like the entire

template. It will not replace your

curve. It will transfer the template

parameter onto the selected curve. So

let's just go and explore it really

quickly. I will create an empty curve

over here. I will create a normal select

a normal template over here or even

braid thin and I will click template. As

you can see now it transferred this

template on this empty curve. However,

if I for example go to uh this one, uh

if I have already uh created something

and I select this curve that already has

the geometry on it and I go to like uh

something else, for example, thin, I'll

click template and this means that it

will just transfer the UVs, the

parameters, everything from that

template template to this card, but it

will not replace it. That means if I for

example have a braid and I will then

select the thin template it will not it

will only transfer the parameters and uh

in case of uh the braid it will be like

just UVs as you can see now I've

transferred these UVs over here uh which

is not like desirable for uh braid but

it can be very useful for various uh

card types. If you want to swap them

around really quickly, you just select

them, you press template, and it will

transfer the parameters from the

template to those cards. So, another

major change is for the UV editor. Now,

we have this lettuce mode over here. If

I select any uh curve over here with the

card, you'll see now that I have like my

regular uh UV rectangle over here. But

we can also now change the latice um of

this like UV card. It's not like

individual UVs like you have in the my

UV editor. So don't think that you can

just uh do something like this and move

it around. You can, but you should not

because this is like basically offsets.

So you set your uh UV card somewhere

that you need and then you use the

latice for fine adjustments. So let me

just in uh add uh some points of the

over here and I can just move my latice.

As you can see, it will automatically

update update in the viewport just like

that. So I can change how my procedural

card UVs are generated based on this

latice. And of course you can uh either

just reset it or you can resize it on

the fly and just change it once again to

what you want. There's two modes, local

and global. uh with um for example

global

if you have multiple cards just like

that uh and they all have like uh

[snorts] those latises on each card uh

you don't want to like try to uh edit

every point manually. You can multi

select of course but that's still not

that useful. You can go to global mode.

You can resize global latice like a

deformer to the points that you want.

And now it will just uh use this global

latice this controller to control the

points of each individual card. And of

course this is ephemeral meaning that it

will not uh like uh be persistent only

local latice is baked into the uh card

itself. The global is just like a gizmo.

But once again uh be careful with the

latice mode. Do not just go ahead and

change it like that. If you want drastic

movements, rotation or something else,

move uh rotate and scale is your go-to

tools, do not use lettuce for that.

Lettuce is just for small offsets when

you actually have your card set. Now,

really quickly, let's go over the new

conversion function over here. Uh it's

menu over here. And we will start from

geometry conversion. That's what you had

before to curve. Now it's uh in this

convert window. It's exactly uh the

same. And if we select uh the cards over

here that you will see that just

single-sided geometry cards, nothing

else. Uh they're not like connected to a

curve or something. You can select

those, you can convert them really

quickly and you will see that now you

have uh like completely functional GS

tools uh cards that you can use all of

the functions and before they they were

just like a geometry cards, one-sided uh

geometry cards. It also works on tubes.

So if you have like a um a tube over

here, you can just convert it to uh the

tube really quickly. Just like that. Now

another mode is xgen conversion. Yes,

you can now just take xgen descriptions

and convert them to cards uh tubes

templates and just plain Maya curves uh

in one click. If I select this Xgen

description over here and I will select

for example cards. I will select orient

to normals. This is like additional

function. Now my sphere over here is set

as base mesh over here. You see aim mesh

over here. And I will click convert. And

that's it. You I will get cards that are

convert converted from the XGen

description automatically oriented to

the surface normals and ready to go.

Let's just undo this. and uh for example

select templates and select the long

braid as template. Uh this will create a

lot of braids but it's still quite fast.

As you can see now we have braids where

we had xgen guides and any interactive

description guides uh will work. You

just need to select them and click on

convert. And of course you can just

convert them to regular curves. This is

extremely fast command. it was uh

written specifically for GS curve tools

because for some reason Maya doesn't

have an ability to convert uh

interactive description to uh individual

curves like that at least I don't know

uh about it you can like export a lambic

uh cache and then import it but that's

like very annoying to work with uh here

you have just one button it converts to

curves it's a custom command it's very

fast uh it actually works with xgen API

eye under the hood. So, it's very nice

to have. And of course, edge to uh curve

was moved over here as well. This is

very simple command. You select uh some

edges. Uh they can be unconnected edges

just like that. Uh you select this, you

select cards uh or even templates. You

set convert and it will just convert

those edges to curves and to templates.

So, let's quickly look over the fill

plus. You can find it over here and uh

it has a lot of options but don't be

intimidated by it by it. All that you

need to know is that it can create

curves based on the selection uh in

volume. So you can just select any uh

number of curves. Uh of course they

should be somewhat like coherent

selection. You can just select the

entire groom and expect good result. But

for example I have this uh cur uh

selection over here. And if I click fill

plus, you'll see that it will add uh the

uh curves in between those selected

curves. And of course, apply template

because I have template selected over

here. There's a lot of options that you

can explore. For example, like dimension

will change how those are distributed or

inter interpolated the neighbors and

stuff. Uh the most important thing is to

remember is that you also need to set

the mesh over here, your base mesh that

affects the collision detection. So uh

you don't want to create a new curves

that are just like inside the geometry.

So this al algorithm will just look at

the base mesh and if it detects

collision it will just move the points

so they are no longer colliding with the

mesh because if I just uh undo this and

I disable uh like uh base mesh

completely over here you will see that

some of them start to uh like intersect

with the mesh. And if I uh select the

base mesh once again, select those

curves over here and uh click fill plus,

you'll see that now there's no

intersection. It uh intelligently like

detects collision. There's also other

modes, but you can read about them in

the documentation. So this is very

useful for shorter hair, for beards, uh

for stuff like that. So for longer hair,

it will be a little bit harder to

control. uh but uh nevertheless

something like fur for example will

benefit from this greatly and of course

I cannot cover every small option and

parameter in the new uh tools that I've

added in version two so you can just go

to the documentation the link is in the

description or on the screen over here

and you can read about everything so uh

you want to read about templates here

are the templates you want to remind

yourself how layer system works You just

read about layers collections here they

are uh like uh bind unbind and unpack

everything is here. So uh just go to

online documentation and uh read. All

right. So this will be it for this

shorter video for JSC tools version to

release. If you want like more details

there will be a longer video. There is a

documentation. So I hope that you will

enjoy this update. I cannot wait to see

what you will create with GST tools

version 2. And uh if you have some

suggestions or comments or you just

excited about the tool, don't forget to

uh leave a comment and of course like

this video, share with friends and yeah,

thank you for watching. See you next

time.