Chocolate Beans in Glass

In this subsequent tutorial, once again, we will focus on our tasty chocolate beans. We will introduce a further object – a glass with transmissive, refractive material – to the scene, which influences the view on the particles. The perspective of our camera will be subject to variation. Our main focus lies on the difference between the particles’ behavior and appearance on the final images when comparing the scene with and without glass.

At a Glance

What We Will Learn

• Closer look at RelaxCollisions function, incl. dry_run

• Enable/disable scene objects

• Slim down recipe with inheritance

• Use multirun to output image series

• Randomize scene by various parameters

Step 1: Tidy Up!

We start this tutorial by using the inheritance mechanism a little bit different than before: Our recipe from the previous tutorial grew to a proud size of 303 code lines, all together.

chocBeans_table.yaml

# Initializing and seeding
defaults: …
initial_runtime_state: …
# Defining blueprints
blueprints:
  measurement_techniques: …
  particles: …
# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_criteria:
    IsCat1: …
    ⋮
    IsCat8: …
    IsPink: …
  sets:
    Category1: …
    ⋮
    Category8: …
    PinkParticles: …
  feature_variabilities:
    CameraNearTable: …
    InitialParticleLocation: …
    ParticleDimension: …
    ParticleWidth: …
    ParticleHeight: …
    PinkColor: …
    RedColor: …
    OrangeColor: …
    YellowColor: …
    GreenColor: …
    BlueColor: …
    PurpleColor: …
    BrownColor: …
    RenderingResolutionPercentage: …
    CyclesSamples: …
# Procedural steps of synthetization chain
synth_chain:
  feature_generation_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints # MeasurementTechnique …
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints # Particles …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # cam_location_z …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # location …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # dimensions …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # width …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # height …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(pink) …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(red) …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(orange) …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(yellow) …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(green) …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(blue) …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(purple) …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # color(brown) …
    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions # avoid intersections …
    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions # gravity …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # resolution …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate # render samples …
  rendering_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.SaveState …
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether # real …
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether # cat(all) …
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether # cat(pink) …
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesIndividually # pink …

Now – to make navigating and handling the recipe easier and less prone to errors – we want to sort the parts a little bit and shrink down the main recipe to those elements, which are essential and those elements, which we often want to touch.

First, we will create three new files:

• chocBeans_glassTable.yaml, our main recipe

• s_SceneVariation.yaml, scene description, incl. blueprints

• s_BeanParams.yaml, the parameters of our Beads

• s_ColorCategories.yaml, sets and color definitions

As a first step, in our main recipe, we add our usual Initializing and seeding block. Under defaults:, we will now include those three further files (we used the prefix s_ here to mark the files as “supplementary” = not a stand-alone recipe; this naming convention is arbitrary).

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

# Initializing and seeding
defaults:
  - BaseRecipe
  - s_SceneVariation
  - s_BeanParams
  - s_ColorCategories
  - _self_
initial_runtime_state:
  seed: 42

As mentioned above, we want to keep the parts in the main recipe, which we touch more often and outsource the parts, we rarely or never touch after definition. So, we continue in our main recipe and copy over the two feature_variabilities for the features resolution_percentage and cycles_samples.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

# Initializing and seeding
defaults: …
initial_runtime_state: …
# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    RenderingResolutionPercentage:
      feature_name: resolution_percentage
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.Constant
        value: 25
    CyclesSamples:
      feature_name: cycles_samples
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.Constant
        value: 64

We will not need any other process_conditions in our main recipe. However unfortunately, the synth_chain we need to copy over as a whole, since we want to make some changes here. As mentioned earlier, in the current version of synthPIC2, it is not allowed to change/add only single elements of the both lists feature_generation_steps and rendering_steps by inheritance, but only to replace them as a whole. In the latter case – in the sequence defined at the very top under defaults: – every newly introduced list of feature_generation_steps or rendering_steps from a subsequent recipe will completely replace its predecessor.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

# Procedural steps of synthetization chain
synth_chain:
  feature_generation_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniqueBlueprints
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints
      affected_set_name: AllParticleBlueprints
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: CameraNearTable
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: InitialParticleLocation
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: ParticleDimension
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: ParticleWidth
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: ParticleHeight
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: PinkColor
      affected_set_name: Category1
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: RedColor
      affected_set_name: Category2
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: OrangeColor
      affected_set_name: Category3
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: YellowColor
      affected_set_name: Category4
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: GreenColor
      affected_set_name: Category5
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: BlueColor
      affected_set_name: Category6
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: PurpleColor
      affected_set_name: Category7
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: BrownColor
      affected_set_name: Category8
    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
      num_frames: 5
      time_scale: 10
      collision_shape: CONVEX_HULL
    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
      use_gravity: True
      damping: 0.07
      friction: 0.999
      restitution: 0.001
      collision_margin: 0.001
      num_frames: 200
      collision_shape: CONVEX_HULL
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: RenderingResolutionPercentage
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: CyclesSamples
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
  rendering_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.SaveState
      name: state
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
      rendering_mode: real
      do_save_features: True
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
      rendering_mode: categorical
      output_file_name_prefix: all_
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
      rendering_mode: categorical
      set_name_of_interest: PinkParticles
      output_file_name_prefix: pink_
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesIndividually
      rendering_mode: categorical
      set_name_of_interest: PinkParticles
      subfolder: pink

With the main recipe file chocBeans_glassTable.yaml we’re done. Let’s now outsource the rest of our previous recipe file chocBeans_table.yaml. In the newly created, supplementary file s_SceneVariation.yaml, we add all information about the blueprints, the general scene layout as well as the perspective view.

s_SceneVariation.yaml

# Defining blueprints
blueprints:
  measurement_techniques:
    TopCamInAir:
      measurement_technique_prototype_name: woodTable_sideCam
      measurement_volume_material_prototype_name: vacuum
      background_material_prototype_name: wood
  particles:
    Bead:
      geometry_prototype_name: ellipsoid
      material_prototype_name: colored_subtle
      parent: MeasurementVolume
      number: 200
# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    CameraNearTable:
      feature_name: cam_location_z
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.Constant
        value: -35.0

The second newly created supplementary file s_BeanParams.yaml will hold all information, i.e. features we want to manipulate, about our particles.

s_BeanParams.yaml

# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    InitialParticleLocation:
      feature_name: location
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformlyRandomLocationInMeasurementVolume
    ParticleDimension:
      feature_name: dimensions
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistribution3dHomogeneous
        location: 3.58
        scale: 0.6
    ParticleWidth:
      feature_name: width
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: 0.85
        scale: 0.15
        num_dimensions: 1
    ParticleHeight:
      feature_name: height
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: 0.475
        scale: 0.15
        num_dimensions: 1

The last of the three supplementary files s_ColorCategories.yaml defines all the feature_criteria, the sets and the feature_variabilities, which are related to color definition.

s_ColorCategories.yaml

# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_criteria:
    IsCat1:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 1
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsCat2:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 2
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsCat3:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 3
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsCat4:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 4
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsCat5:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 5
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsCat6:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 6
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsCat7:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 7
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsCat8:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InCompartment
      feature_name: location_z
      compartment_no: 8
      compartments_total: 8
      default_return_value: False
    IsPink:
      _target_: $plugins.official.InHsvRange
      feature_name: color
      h_min: 0.945
      h_max: 0.950
      s_min: 0.895
      s_max: 0.900
      v_min: 0.648
      v_max: 0.653
      default_return_value: False
  sets:
    Category1:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat1
    Category2:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat2
    Category3:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat3
    Category4:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat4
    Category5:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat5
    Category6:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat6
    Category7:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat7
    Category8:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsCat8
    PinkParticles:
      criterion: $IsParticle and $IsPink
  feature_variabilities:
    PinkColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.945
        h_max: 0.950
        s_min: 0.895
        s_max: 0.900
        v_min: 0.648
        v_max: 0.653
    RedColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.990
        h_max: 0.995
        s_min: 0.995
        s_max: 1.000
        v_min: 0.448
        v_max: 0.453
    OrangeColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.020
        h_max: 0.025
        s_min: 0.995
        s_max: 1.000
        v_min: 0.895
        v_max: 0.900
    YellowColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.087
        h_max: 0.092
        s_min: 0.945
        s_max: 0.950
        v_min: 0.862
        v_max: 0.867
    GreenColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.321
        h_max: 0.326
        s_min: 0.770
        s_max: 0.775
        v_min: 0.253
        v_max: 0.258
    BlueColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.622
        h_max: 0.627
        s_min: 0.846
        s_max: 0.851
        v_min: 0.547
        v_max: 0.552
    PurpleColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.716
        h_max: 0.721
        s_min: 0.801
        s_max: 0.806
        v_min: 0.348
        v_max: 0.353
    BrownColor:
      feature_name: color
      variability:
        _target_: $plugins.official.RandomHsvColorAsRgb
        h_min: 0.020
        h_max: 0.025
        s_min: 0.796
        s_max: 0.801
        v_min: 0.082
        v_max: 0.087

When we render our newly created main recipe, which contains basically “only” a better sorted version of our recent recipe chocBeans_table, we will find – surprise, surprise – exactly the same output in the folder output/chocBeans_glassTable/<YYYY-MM-DD_hh-mm-ss>/run0/ and its subfolders, as we produced in the end of the previous tutorial.

python run.py --config-dir=recipes --config-name=chocBeans_glassTable

Okay, easy start. Wasn’t it? Just some copy-pasting. In the next step, we will have a look at our main goal in this tutorial. But before we go there, here’s a little overview of the recipe files, which we just created. Take this little summary of the long code blocks’ content from before to recap this first step and to appreciate the possibility to use inheritance for recipes.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

# Initializing and seeding
defaults:
  - BaseRecipe
  - s_SceneVariation
  - s_BeanParams
  - s_ColorCategories
  - _self_
initial_runtime_state: …
# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    RenderingResolutionPercentage: …
    CyclesSamples: …
# Procedural steps of synthetization chain
synth_chain:
  feature_generation_steps: …
  rendering_steps: …

s_SceneVariation.yaml

# Defining blueprints
blueprints:
  measurement_techniques: …
  particles: …
# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    CameraNearTable: …

s_BeanParams.yaml

# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    InitialParticleLocation: …
    ParticleDimension: …
    ParticleWidth: …
    ParticleHeight: …

s_ColorCategories.yaml

# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_criteria:
    IsCat1: …
    ⋮
    IsCat8: …
    IsPink: …
  sets:
    Category1: …
    ⋮
    Category8: …
    PinkParticles: …
  feature_variabilities:
    PinkColor: …
    ⋮
    BrownColor: …

Step 2: What to Achieve and How to Approach

As promised, let’s try to envision where we’re going here: We first just took the recipe from the previous tutorial. We sorted it into several helper/supplementary files for the sake of being able to keep the overview and to still be able to handle it.

Next, we want to introduce a further object, namely a glass. We place this below our chocolate beans to catch those falling particles during the physics simulation.

Then we will have two cases for our synthesized particles: The first without, the second with the glass, which was introduced to the scene.

We will compare these two and focus on some questions.

• “How will the particles’ movement differ between the cases with and without glass, starting with exactly the same location of each particle?”

• “How do the particles behave, assuming different physics?”, i.e. different parameters of the RelaxCollisions function.

• “How will the particles’ appearance differ with and without glass?”

• “What’s the influence of the gravity?”, i.e. changing the gravity vector

• “How many chocolate beans are good for us?”

We do this rather detailed investigation of how exactly the particles fall, since this is our last fine-tuning step, before we go into “series production”, i.e. batch processing to output multiple randomized images – all of course from chocolate beans and with every feature restricted only to the allowed ranges, which were specified by us.

To actually do something in this step, let’s at least prepare the scene for the experiments with parameter variation, which we will perform in the next step. We will first “activate” the glass. To our supplementary file s_SceneVariation.yaml, we will add two more feature_variabilities.

s_SceneVariation.yaml

# Defining blueprints
blueprints:
  measurement_techniques: …
  particles: …
# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    CameraNearTable: …
    ShowGlass:
      feature_name: glass_hide
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.Constant
        value: False
    CollisionGlass:
      feature_name: glass_collision
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.Constant
        value: True

In our main recipe chocBeans_glassTable.yaml, we add the corresponding feature_generation_steps, because our main recipe holds the complete list of feature_generation_steps. Let’s add the two TriggerFeatureUpdates directly after our two InvokeBlueprints steps.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

synth_chain:
  feature_generation_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints …
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: ShowGlass
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: CollisionGlass
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate …

Executing the recipe will output the rendered image showing our chocolate beans captured by the glass.

Okay, the glass is there, but the view isn’t nice. To change this, let’s just remove (or comment out) the corresponding TriggerFeatureUpdate step from our list of feature_generation_steps.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

synth_chain:
  feature_generation_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints …
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate …
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: CollisionGlass
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    # - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
    #   feature_variability_name: CameraNearTable
    #   affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: InitialParticleLocation
      affected_set_name: AllParticles

If you like, you could also remove the feature variability from our process_conditions in the file s_SceneVariation.yaml. However, you could also just leave it there. Doesn’t matter, it’s personal preference depending on how keen you are with tidying up (or if you purposefully want to leave those code snippets for later playing around & fast access to change those features once again).

We will change two more things. First, let’s turn on the dry_run for our second RelaxCollisions function again: We want to see how the particles are falling in the next step!

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions …
    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
      use_gravity: True
      damping: 0.07
      friction: 0.999
      restitution: 0.001
      collision_margin: 0.001
      num_frames: 200
      collision_shape: CONVEX_HULL
      dry_run: True

Second, we comment out the categorical rendering steps for the moment. We are not interested in those at the moment. But don’t worry, we’ll turn it on again, later in step 4.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

  rendering_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.SaveState …
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
      rendering_mode: real
      do_save_features: True
    # - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
    #   rendering_mode: categorical
    #   output_file_name_prefix: all_
    # - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
    #   rendering_mode: categorical
    #   set_name_of_interest: PinkParticles
    #   output_file_name_prefix: pink_
    # - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesIndividually
    #   rendering_mode: categorical
    #   set_name_of_interest: PinkParticles
    #   subfolder: pink

If we would turn off the particles for a second (just for this one render: comment out the InvokeBlueprints of our particles and the TriggerFeatureUpdates for color), we’d see our glass on the table – with well positioned camera view. Everything is prepared now for the next step with experiments to investigate parameter variation.

Step 3: Playing God and Change the Physics

If you commented them out to see only the glass in the last step, comment them in again, the lines for InvokeBlueprints of our particles and the TriggerFeatureUpdates for color.

Now, you are free to change and play around with some parameters. You could try the following variations (see also subsequent images):

• Simulate with and without glass (try different combinations of ShowGlass and/or CollisionGlass).

• Use our previous parameters of RelaxCollisions, try changing parameters of RelaxCollisions, e.g. play around with damping, friction and restitution. Try new parameters mass, gravity. (Hints: leave dry_run turned on and keep SaveState in rendering_steps to observe the effect. A smaller value for num_frames is advised. When doing large parameter variation experiments, multirun should be used, see next step.)

• Let the particles fall sideways… everything possible! Therefore, you would need to change the gravity vector – keep in mind: this should be input as a list.

• You could try more particles & longer (num_frames) simulation time.

The example images show the behavior of our chocolate beans, when a glass is present and when there is no glass and the particles can freely distribute on the table. Furthermore, the third image shows how the particle appearance would look like if there would be a physical (CollisionGlass), but not a visual (ShowGlass) influence of the glass. This case is quite interesting: It demonstrates, how our particles would look like – placed in the same position, but if glass would be invisible. Meaning, if there wouldn’t be the refraction of the glass, which distorts the particles’ appearances and eventually moves/changes the information of each particle (i.e. colored pixels) to different pixel locations in the final image. If your use case would be, e.g. to measure the 2D projected area of those chocolate beans with a certain color in the final image, the influence of how strong the glass distorts this truth could be quantified. The last image shows the result if our particles would fall sideways, with a different gravity vector applied, see code snippet below.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions …
    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions
      affected_set_name: AllParticles
      use_gravity: True
      damping: 0.07
      friction: 0.999
      restitution: 0.001
      collision_margin: 0.001
      gravity:
        - +5
        - -5
        - 0
      num_frames: 200
      collision_shape: CONVEX_HULL
      dry_run: True

After some variation of our chocolate beans’ quantity, a number of 500 particles looks quite appropriate, resulting in a completely filled glass and a few particles falling on the wooden table – not too many, just the right amount. Also after tinkering around with the parameters of RelaxCollisions, we seem to have found our final parametrization, see video below (extended to num_frames: 600 as opposed to num_frames: 200 for our final renders) and subsequent code snippets.

s_SceneVariation.yaml

# Defining blueprints
blueprints:
  measurement_techniques: …
  particles:
    Bead:
      geometry_prototype_name: ellipsoid
      material_prototype_name: colored_subtle
      parent: MeasurementVolume
      number: 500

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

- _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions
  affected_set_name: AllParticles
  mass: 0.0012
  num_frames: 5
  time_scale: 10
  collision_margin: 0.001
  collision_shape: CONVEX_HULL
- _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions
  affected_set_name: AllParticles
  use_gravity: True
  damping: 0.07
  friction: 0.4
  restitution: 0.1
  mass: 0.0012
  collision_margin: 0.001
  num_frames: 200
  collision_shape: CONVEX_HULL
  dry_run: True

Step 4: Variation in Series Production

In this last step of our tutorial, we want to go for the fully automated particle generation under (pseudo-)random parameter variation of the scene. We do so, by just simply varying the initial_runtime_state.seed.

But first let’s comment in the categorical render_steps again.

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

  rendering_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.SaveState …
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
      rendering_mode: real
      do_save_features: True
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
      rendering_mode: categorical
      output_file_name_prefix: all_
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesTogether
      rendering_mode: categorical
      set_name_of_interest: PinkParticles
      output_file_name_prefix: pink_
    - _target_: $builtins.RenderParticlesIndividually
      rendering_mode: categorical
      set_name_of_interest: PinkParticles
      subfolder: pink

Furthermore, we will add several new feature_variabilities to our s_SceneVariation.yaml file.

s_SceneVariation.yaml

# Defining blueprints
blueprints:
  measurement_techniques: …
  particles: …
# Physical boundary conditions
process_conditions:
  feature_variabilities:
    CameraNearTable: …
    ShowGlass: …
    CollisionGlass: …
    CameraRotation:
      feature_name: cam_rotation
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: -0.0523598775598299
        scale: 0.10471975511966
        num_dimensions: 1
    CameraAltitude:
      feature_name: cam_altitude
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: -0.15707963267949
        scale: 0.314159265358979
        num_dimensions: 1
    CameraAzimuth:
      feature_name: cam_azimuth
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: 0.0
        scale: 6.28318530717959
        num_dimensions: 1
    GlassRotation:
      feature_name: glass_rotation
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: 0.0
        scale: 0.698131700797732
        num_dimensions: 1
    TableRotation:
      feature_name: table_rotation
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: 0.0
        scale: 6.28318530717959
        num_dimensions: 1
    WoodTexture:
      feature_name: texture_seed
      variability:
        _target_: $builtins.UniformDistributionNdHomogeneous
        location: 0
        scale: 1000
        num_dimensions: 1

…and we need to trigger those in our main recipe file chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

chocBeans_glassTable.yaml

synth_chain:
  feature_generation_steps:
    - _target_: $builtins.InvokeBlueprints …
    ⋮
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: BrownColor
      affected_set_name: Category8
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: CameraRotation
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: CameraAltitude
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: CameraAzimuth
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: GlassRotation
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: TableRotation
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.TriggerFeatureUpdate
      feature_variability_name: WoodTexture
      affected_set_name: AllMeasurementTechniques
    - _target_: $builtins.RelaxCollisions …
    ⋮

These new feature variations will introduce random variations of the camera angle and the rotations of the glass, table and wood texture of the table. As a final measure we increase the RenderingResolutionPercentage and the CyclesSamples to get a high-resolution image as output.

To call the execution we now execute our recipe as we normally do with the addition of the argument multirun

python run.py --config-dir=recipes --config-name=chocBeans_glassTable --multirun initial_runtime_state.seed="range(10)"

The number in brackets behind range can be set to the desired number of output images. The images below show some example images of our fully automated series production of chocolate beans, whereas all captures are unique and randomized in various parameters.