CGarchitect.com Reviews Xfrog 3.5

Greenworks Xfrog 3.5 and Xfrog Plant Libraries

By Jeff Mottle (jmottle@cgarchitect.com)

Jeff Mottle is the President and Founder of CGarchitect.com and is the North American Creative Director for Smoothe


Introduction

For those of you that have been in the industry for a while, Greenworks should not be a new name to you. They have been around since 1996 when they first launched Xfrog 1.0 for the Unix and Sun crowd, followed by a Maya version only a few years later. Eight years later Greenworks now has several different applications and a large collection of tree and plant libraries supported by all of the top modeling and rendering packages.

For those of you that may be a bit newer or have simply not had a chance to try this amazing little program, let me introduce you to one of the more powerful organic structure modeling applications around.

In this review I will be taking a look at the full version of Xfrog 3.5 standalone for the PC. Xfrog 3.5 is a modeling and animation system that specializes in the generation of complex organic structures. While the scope of this review will only encompass Xfrog 3.5 an a select collection of libraries, it is worth noting that have also just released Xfrog 4.0 an integrated version for both Mac and PC versions of Cinema4D. You see the full line up of products and supported application on their website: http://www.greenworks.de

Xfrog 3.5

Xfrog 3.5 – Interface

The main Xfrog interface is divided up into six sub windows. The Hierarchy window, the Model view window, the Parameter editor, Libraries window and the Animation editor.
The hierarchy window is very much like a basic schematic editor in many 3d applications and is where you assemble the various components and primitives that make up the organic structures that you will be creating.

Hierchy Window

The model view window is simply the window where you actually visualize your creation and move around it. You don’t actually ever interact with the model in this window as everything is controlled through the other windows. The parameter editor is where you set and adjust the various setting for your components and primitives. If you plan on using Xfrog to its full capacity you will be spending a great deal of your time here.

Xfrog Interface

The settings found in the parameter editor are very encompassing and will take you a bit of time to figure out. There is a lot to play with and it can be quite overwhelming at times. The physics of nature is apparently not that simple. Using the interface itself is a breeze to work your way through, but understanding the implications of each button, slider and graph editor will not be something you pick up in an afternoon. While you can simply set ranges and adjust sliders for basic adjustments, if you so choose, there is the power to input anything from complex mathematical functions to applying cosign curvature transformations to the Z axis of a leaf or branch. The one thing that I found really useful in the interface is how easy it was to adjust slider ranges. Typically a slider might be given an arbitrary value from 0 to 1 or some other set value. In Xfrog, you simply need to click the start and end range numbers at either side of a slider and you can input your own ranges based upon the accuracy of the adjustments you want to make.

Parameters Window Range Adjustment


Parameter Editor Window

Moving back to the last two sub windows: The Libraries window is where you will find all of your primitives and components that you insert into the hierarchy window. The final window is the animation editor where you can create keyframe animation of the structures you create, or animation the growth of one of your creations.

Creating Structures

As I alluded to earlier creating structures in Xfrog can be a daunting task. The power is there to create virtually any organic structure found in nature, but creating what you see in your minds eye will definitely take some practice. This is one of those programs where you will undoubtedly read the manual from start to finish and one where you hope the documentation is well thought out and presented. I was very glad to find that the users guide was one of the most thoroughly written documents I have seen for a 3d application, although I wish they had also provided a CHM version that could be accessed from the application, instead of only the 129 page PDF file. Regardless, I was able to work my way through most parts of the program with out any problems. I’m not sure I will ever figure out how the mathematical functions that are applied to certain transformations work, but for those of you with less mathematically challenged minds than mine, you might find it quite interesting to delve into further. Once you have made your way through the users guide, there is a very good selection of tutorials on the website that step you though many of the processes that you will need to know to get you on your way. As with the users guide I found the tutorials to be equally well written.

User guides and Tutorials

In Xfrog you can animate some pretty impressive pieces as virtually every setting is animatable. Currently you can export animation directly into all supported applications (Maya, Lightwave, C4D, and 3ds max 5). Exporting to 3ds max 6 is still not supported due to a code change that had caused havoc with a lot of third party developers. The only way you can export an animation in 3ds max 6 is to sequential 3d file formats or to sequential images.

Sample animation files

Exporting Xfrog models

Once you have created an Xfrog model you have several different methods to get your model into your rendering application. The program supports seven export formats including OBJ, DXF, LWO, RIB and 3DS. Once you have saves to one of these formats you simply need to import your file into your favorite rendering program. There are however a few catches with exporting your files this way. With 3ds max in particular there are issues with the 3DS format and how textures and opacities are mapped. Fortunately there are maxscripts included to solve this problem, but it is worth noting that you will usually have some clean up to do once you get your model into 3ds max.

The second method, and by far the most preferred, is to simply use one of the Xfrog plugins. There is currently plugins for Maya, 3dsmax 4, 5 and 6, Lightwave and Cinema 4d r 7 and 8. These plugins enable you to import an Xfrog (XFR) file directly into your application. This allows you to import the models and textures exactly as you see them in Xfrog.

Render from 3ds max 6 w/Vray


Wireframe view from 3ds max 6

Using Xfrog in Production

While the power of Xfrog is definitely remarkable, I’m not sure I would find myself building trees from scratch for my next rendering project unless the time and budget allowed. Fortunately Greeworks has a collection of 17 Plant and Tree libraries each containing 60 models. I had a chance to test 6 of them and I was delighted to find that unlike most of the other tree and plant applications I have tested, the quality of each Xfrog model is consistently very high. The construction of each model is constructed with a combination of high-res modeling as well as billboard textures.

File Size

As one would expect from a collection of trees and plants that are almost entirely modeled, the face counts can be quite high and range from tens of thousands of polys to hundreds of thousands of polys in each model. Within Xfrog they do have a decimation tool that intelligently reduced your poly count, but even the simplest models still were at least several thousand polys each. In experimenting with the decimation process I discovered that the only way to export a decimated model was to use the importer. In my case the 3ds max importer as that is all I tested. Exporting a decimated 3DS file came in at the original size. However with the careful use of the Optimize modifier I was able to get the ply count considerably more while still maintaining a decent appearance for long distance shots. If you are really keen on tuning your models to a specifc size I would probably suggest looking at Greenworks XfrogTune application which gives you much more control over the decimation of your models than you will get from a max modifier or the simple slider control within Xfrog.

Poly Decimation Slider
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pricing

Xfrog is quite reasonably prices considering how powerful it is and their tree and plant collections are more than competitively priced for the quality you are getting.
At the printing of this review Xfrog 3.5 Full was selling for $259 US with each Tree and Plant library selling for $119 with Bundles also available. Check out the Greenworks site for full pricing details. http://www.greenworks.de

Conclusion

I’ve tested most of the commercial tree and plant applications out there over the past few years and I have to say I was pretty impressed with the capabilities of Xfrog. The closest program I would compare to Xfrog to in terms of it ability to create organic structures from scratch would be SpeedTree and I have no problems saying that Xfrog beats SpeedTree hand down with its ease of use, quality of documentation, not to mention accuracy. In terms of flexibility for varying levels of detail, I still think programs like Bionatics NatFX are a bit more powerful out of the box, but factoring in Xfrog’s great price it would be a tough call as to which one might win. In a direct comparison I think you would need to analyze your project to determine which features you are going to require, which plant or trees you need to depict and if you intend to animate them.
Overall I would rank Xfrog as one of the best programs and given the choice between the applications out there would only put Bionatics in the running against Greeworks. See my review of Bionatics NatFX.

PRO

- Very Powerful organic structure modeler
- Very good library quality, consistency and selection
- Excellent documentation and tutorials

CON

- A bit overwhelming to create structures from scratch
- Needs support for 3ds max 6 animation
- Should come packaged with XfrogTune

 

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