Marionette Introductory Tutorials

[PVA - Jim 2,365]

The first series of Marionette tutorials is live!

 

Each part has its own exercise file to start from. Some of the chapters start with the end file from the prior chapter, but all chapters' files have been provided to make things easy on the viewer.

Please let us know what you think and what else you'd like to see in future training content!

[Kevin McAllister 1,127]

Thanks Jim!

Kevin

[Kevin McAllister 1,127]

These are a fantastic introduction! I've played around with Marionette a fair amount and I learned a few more of the nuances. I hope there are more in this series soon.

Kevin

[twk 227]

Good stuff.. thanks Jim

[zoomer 871]

Great !

[Neil Barman 161]

Jim, those tutorials are great! They're a superb series for gradually building up basic skills with Marionette and also for showing the power & versatility of the new feature. I've already binge-watched and rewatched them!

I can hardly wait for Season 2!

Thank you!

-Neil

[Tom Klaber 699]

+1

Season 2 would be great.

[rDesign 433]

Not to take any pressure off of JimW and a second batch of Vw Marionette tutorials, but Jonathan Pickup's one-hour recorded webinar on Marionette just showed up on Novedge's YouTube channel.

[bcd 268]

excellento Jim thanks

[Bas Vellekoop 160]

Really enjoyed watching! Looking forward to season 2!

[Jonathan Pickup 241]

The purpose of my webinar with Novedge was to show people that know nothing about scripting or marionette to get started, kind of like before Jim's tutorials.

I have stated to play with Marionette and it seems very easy to create flexible objects. I have shared one of my objects in the Marionette Resource Sharing:

https://techboard.vectorworks.net/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=218555#Post218555

[sbarrett 199]

Hello all - if there are specific nodes that people are having trouble using or certain types of definitions people are looking to make, we could use suggestions for the next tutorial. Topics could be, for example: 3D/Solid geometry, referencing and searching documents, an in-depth look at the Data Flow nodes, etc. Feel free to let us know what you want more of!

[rDesign 433]

@sbarrett: after watching Jonathan Pickup's intro webinar, and looking through the nodes list myself, it seems that there is no Node for inserting a light inside a Marionette object.

I don't know if it wasn't included because it would require Renderworks, but an 'Insert Light Object' node would be high on my wishlist for needed nodes.

[bcd 268]

Is there a node to call up a dropdown for 'Set Class'?

[sbarrett 199]

We don't have a dropdown menu for classes yet, but we do for layers. There is a set class node in the attributes category (instead of the classes category) - I think this location is debatable. If you combine it with a class list node and an integer node, you can input the index of the class. Its not ideal but it is a stop gap.

[Bas Vellekoop 160]

Hi!

I was wondering if there could be made a tutorial about duplicate/rectangular arrays.

At first very simple, just some columns and rows of points, rectangles or circles.

I was trying to create something like that from scratch but wasn't able to accomplish it.

Would give me some insight in the basics

Thanks!

[rDesign 433]

@Bas : take a look at Jonathan Pickup's 'Intro to Marionette' webinar that I linked previously; He demonstrates how to make a linear array of objects inside a Marionette network. It might get you started on how to extend his network into a rectangular array.

Not to take any pressure off of JimW and a second batch of Vw Marionette tutorials, but Jonathan Pickup's one-hour recorded webinar on Marionette just showed up on Novedge's YouTube channel.

[PVA - Jim 2,365]

Jonathan Pickup's tutorials are excellent. I can not stress enough how important it is that anyone interested in Marionette watch them. He not only gives you practical examples, for the topic, but also explains the concept of graphical scripting, which is important since it is so new to so many of us.

[Bas Vellekoop 160]

@rdesign: The linear array is not the problem.

I am not able to make a rectangular array. What i got was only one row and one colum, and the row was full of stacked rectangles

@ jim: The tutorial from Jonathan i watched, that was pretty much how far i came on my own as well

[rDesign 433]

@Bas: try the first .vwx file in this post named 'MT-21-How to create a grid of objects.vwx':

My journey through Marionette [Re: Luis M Ruiz] - #217462

[Bas Vellekoop 160]

Great thanks!

Missed that one

[Neil Barman 161]

Hello all - if there are specific nodes that people are having trouble using or certain types of definitions people are looking to make, we could use suggestions for the next tutorial. Topics could be, for example: 3D/Solid geometry, referencing and searching documents, an in-depth look at the Data Flow nodes, etc. Feel free to let us know what you want more of!

Sarah, you read my mind... I would LOVE an in depth look at the Data Flow nodes. While I have been able to decipher many of the other nodes I have attempted to use, I'm not quite sure what to do with the Data Flow collection. (Even just knowing what a "list" is right off the bat would shed some light on this.)

Many thanks in advance,

-Neil

[sbarrett 199]

Thanks for the feedback Neil - I agree that we should look more closely at data flow nodes because they are the category that is most fundamental to visual scripting and probably the most obscure category for non-scripters.

[AlanW 512]

All these comments and feedback are great and I think its going to snowball as we understand it all better.

Thanks to all.

Jim, Re Part 6 Tutorial

Within these networks I seem to see new nodes that are not in my SP2 file.

Splay_offset and Poly SetClosed which are called up as marionette-Maths. I cant seem to find them there, but I find a similar one Set Closed 2D poly in the Marionette-Geometry 2d. Also Create Polygon,(maths) similar to Polygon 2D (Marionette-Geometry 2d).

I see you used the poly ones in the Frame_profile and the Maths ones in the Curb_Profile.

Are these are new nodes, or am I missing something?

If they are new, would it be possible to highlight these so we can add them to our library please and delete the redundant ones.

Also I cant seen to use the marionette Debug within the wrapper node to check the data flow. Should I be able to do this? Only by pulling the network out of the wrapper totally can I click on the wires to see the flow data.

Also what does the Splay offset do in the Curb Profile? If I delete it it appears to make no difference to the resultant profile. You have set all the nodes for the polygon by each x,y and it closes, so not sure.

Thanks.

Edited December 11, 2015 by Alan Woodwell

[sbarrett 199]

Hi Alan,The person who created the original definition in this tutorial was a champion scripter before Marionette, so some of the nodes he simply wrote on the fly instead of looking for them in the library. Poly SetClosed is an example of that. I would continue to use the ones that are actually in the library. Sorry for the confusion. It is also not possible to debug a definition INSIDE a wrapper so yes you do have to unwrap the definition before debugging it. I will check with the engineers as to why this is necessary because I would like to debug a definition inside a wrapper as well.

Hope that helps!