We’ve received many questions from folks wondering how the Warps and Flag plug-ins are different. Perhaps I can shed a little light on what these plug-ins do.

First, let’s start with the simple answer: 3D Flag creates cloth animations that are completely real-looking. The cloth responds to wind and gravity in ways that are beautiful to watch and would be impossible to animate by hand. 3D Warps creates bends, twists, tapers and ripples that are very controllable. 3D Warps does not attempt to replicate natural phenomena, it is made to do graphic-style distortions to a 3D surface. For instance if you want to add a curve to a background image you’d use 3D Warps. There’s no way you could do it with 3D Flag, just as there would be no way to simulate real cloth by stacking a few warps.

The longer answer:
The 3D Flag plug-in creates its motion using calculations pulled from physics. You control the input parameters such as wind speed, gravity, weight and stiffness of the cloth, but when it comes to the final shape of the cloth, that’s all done for you. In a way a 3D Flag animation is a lot like the domino effect. You set up a lot of dominoes, knock one over and see what happens to the rest.

The 3D Warps plug-ins are a completely different beast. 3D Warps are all about “control”. There are a variety of warp styles built in which will do specific things such as create a bend, or a twist, or pond ripples. You get very detailed controls over things like the diameter and position of the bend curve, the exact amount of twist, or the height and wave length of the ripples. Up to three warps can be combined. This can create distortions that are hard to image before you see them.

Can you use the Warps plug-ins to do the flag effect? No. You can stack several warps and get a shape that looks flag-ish, but when moving, it doesn’t have the natural, organic flow that real cloth has. It would also be just plain impossible to animate the effects of wind as the flag drops and raises and folds over on itself.

So there you go. When you need something to look like real cloth use the 3D Flag plug-in. When you need to do other types of shape-changing distortions to your images, use the 3D Warps plug-ins.

Best,
Zax