PhysAssist - Documentation

PhysAssist is intended to be incredibly easy to use, but please read this to familiarise youeself with the basic functionality.

# --------- SET UP --------- #

Setting up PhysAssist is as easy as adding any python script to Blender:

1. Go to File --> User Preferences --> Add-ons
2. Click "Install From File"
3. Navigate to the directory where PhysAssist is placed, and select the .py plugin.
4. Hit Enter or click "Install From File"
5. Check the box next to "PhysAssist by Moby Motion" to enable the plugin
6. Click "Save User Settings"

That's it :)

# --------- WHERE TO FIND IT? --------- #

PhysAssist can be accessed from the physics tab of the toolbar.

1. If you don't see the toolbar to the left of your 3D view, press "t" while your mouse is hovered over the 3D view.

2. Navigate to the "Physics" tab

3. Enjoy!

# --------- HOW TO USE --------- #

PhysAssist was built from the ground up to be as intuitive as possible.

The best way to learn it is by experimenting to get the best results.

1. The dropdown box at the top lets you choose which type of tower you want to build

2. Different types of towers have different settings - for example, when building a "Classic KEVA" tower you can adjust the X (width), Y (depth), and Z (height) measurements of the building. However when building a "Round Tower", it only makes sense to change two variables: X (circumferance) and Z (height).

3. Choose your dimensions by changing the available variables.

4. The button below will give you a real-time indicator of how complex your structure is going to be. Depending on your computer, you may want to limit this. You will learn over time how many objects your computer can handle, and how long building will take. Most will take seconds.

5. To build your tower, just hit the "Build" button! You don't need to worry about any of the physics settings like mass, collision shape or margins. This is all handled for you by PhysAssist.

6. (Optional - if you would like to create a projectile to knock) Check "Advanced Settings".

7. You'll now see two new boxes. On the right, you can select which frame to fire the projectile. By default, it will fire the projectile on the first frame of the animation.

8. Once you've decided which frame to fire on, just hit "Create Projectile" to add it.

9. Hit Alt-A to see your animation come to life!

# --------- UNSTABLE TOWERS? --------- #

If you're getting bouncy towers, or towers that fall by themselves, this can be fixed by increasing the "solver iterations". This can be done by going to the "scene" tab of the properties window, and looking for the "solver iterations" setting under "rigid body world". This is set to 10 by default, but I find that's not nearly high enough. I usually set mine at 100 to start with and increase it if necessary.

# --------- WEIRD LOOKING TOWERS? --------- #

If you are getting weird problems, like towers not looking like they are supposed to, you should try two things:

1. Make sure you are trying to build the tower on frame 1. If you created a tower on a different frame by accident, delete the new tower, go back to frame 1 (a useful shortcut for this is shift + left-arrow), and create the tower again

2. Make sure there aren't already baked physics settings for your scene. If there are, go to the scene tab in the properties panel and "Free All Bakes". Now go back to frame one and try simulating again.

# --------- FEEDBACK AND SUPPORT --------- #

The best way get in touch is to go to my blog post at www.mobymotionblog.com/physassist and leave a comment below. I will endeavour to respond to all questions within 48 hours.

Feel free to leave feedback, for example feature suggestions.