Point Sprite of Praview for Visualizing Real Size of Particles

Submitted by NTT1508 on Tue, 11/25/2014 - 23:16

Hi all,

I am playing with LIGGGHTS to simulate some particles. My problem is that I cannot visualize actual size of particles on Paraview (I am using Paraview 4.1 provided by Thirdparty2.3.0). I followed some guides regarding Points Prite Plug-in on Paraview and I am only able to see sphere particle as a ball but unable to change their size to the real input. I selected Point Sprite representation, and on Point Sprite panel at left, I selected Point Sprite Mode: Sphere (texture) and scale by Constant Radius. Whenever I change to Scale by Radius (to adapt with actuall input size), the following statement appears.

ERROR: In /home/thanh/OpenFOAM/ThirdParty-2.3.0/ParaView-4.1.0/VTK/Rendering/OpenGL/vtkOpenGLProperty.cxx, line 231
vtkPointSpriteProperty (0x429b730): Shaders are not supported by this context.

I cannot beliew that Paraview-4.1 is limited in the respect while I see many successful simulations and discussion regarding rendering actuall size of particles on Paraview even on lower version. I suppose some unexpected error of Paraview happended. Could anyone give me a hint on this issue? I believe RICHTI can solve my problem very well :).

Thank you,

Forums:

NTT1508 | Tue, 11/25/2014 - 23:26

Addtionally, I tried to use Paraview on different computer for the same source of VTK files and I dont get such problem. It works well to show particles with different size. that is possibly due to Paraview installation. Does anyone have any suggesstion to upgade, Paraview bug check and repair or remove-reinstall again in this case? I heard about Paraview 4.2 with some improvement from version 4.1. Do we really need to upgrade 4.1 to 4.2?

richti83's picture

richti83 | Wed, 11/26/2014 - 18:41

Hi,

this error occurs when you don't have a proper openGL Display Driver installed. When you have a NVIDIA card, Download the latest proprietary driver from NVIDIA website.

sudo service gdm stop

or

sudo service lightdm stop

when you are on ubuntu / fedora / whatever with gnome desktop manager.

In a tty log in and:

cd Downloads
chmod +x NVIDIA*.run
sudo ./NVIDIA*.run

REBOOT.

This should solve this problem.
I would NOT update to PV 4.2 because of a bug in Pointsprite Plugin:
http://www.paraview.org/Bug/view.php?id=15017

I'm not an associate of DCS GmbH and not a core developer of LIGGGHTS®
ResearchGate | Contact

c.beaulieu's picture

c.beaulieu | Mon, 08/21/2017 - 23:27

Hello,

I had the exact same error on my laptop when I try to visualize two sizes of spheres with the Point Sprite module. However, I am using Windows 10, 64 bits with an Intel(R) HD Graphics 4600 card... Do you see a solution for me? I have an OpenGL version 4.3 installed and I don't know how to update it. Or if it possible to update it...

Thank you very much

Christine Beaulieu
Polytechnique Montreal

NTT1508 | Fri, 11/28/2014 - 01:34

Hi Richti,

Thank very much for your suggestion. I tried with your command but it didnot work well in my case. I searched around then downloaded, intalled the lastest version of NVIDIA driver.Paraview with Point Sprite now works as a charm.

I am creating cluster of particle on my LIGGGHTS. What I normally do on PFC is that I generate a group of balls with specific properties (radius, id, coordinate...) then assign the bond to their contact. I believe it must go on the same way in LIGGGHTS. I look into Manual of LIGGGHTS but not find exactly what command should be good for such work. My ideas so far can be (1) generate atom by create_atome command and group them then (2) define their bond by fix_bond_create. However in this command, I cannot see how to define bond properties such as kn,ks (or kt) which are representative for bond strength. Can you help clarify my such confusion ?

Additionally, I create primitive walls (for a box in side domain) and generate particles in the box. The particles contact with bottom wall and bound (as normall). However, for the side wall, I cannt observe the same behavior though I change boundary condition (f,m,s,p). For fixed condition, balls go through the side wall and disappear while m boundary, balls expand the side wall by contact force. Why I define the same boundary and wall conditions among x,y and z directions but contact behaviours are different between bottom and side walls ?

I am looking forward to your advices,

Thank indeed,

richti83's picture

richti83 | Fri, 11/28/2014 - 10:31

Hi,

to 1: AFAIK in PFC clusters are rigid bodies (no forces between particles in a clump, instead all contact forces contribute to the center of mass) in LIGGGHTS you can use fix rigid to clump particles. In the public version only the lammps fix rigid is included which does not respect the overlapping volume of spheres in a rigid (leads to wrong inertia,mass and coefficient if restitution). Ask DSC GmbH about the commercial multiphere package.
When you need bonds (forces between partcles in contact direction which can brake) you would need a granular bond package (there is an implementation in the forum and another in the polylin fork at github, I worked with the polylin in the past). When you have installed granular bonds you can set kn,ks with the bond_style argument and create_bond with the create_bond command.

to 2: without the input skript I can not tell whats going wrong, normely the primitve walls works like a charm, see examples/moving_mesh_gran/ how they are used

Best,
Christian.

I'm not an associate of DCS GmbH and not a core developer of LIGGGHTS®
ResearchGate | Contact

NTT1508 | Mon, 12/01/2014 - 05:13

Thank Christian,

Yes PFC treats particle clumping as a rigid body. It is also able to create cluster of particles with specific bonding assignment. I would like to create bonding among particles of specific group. Granualar bond package might be helpful to my case. I move the topic to LIGGGHTS USER forum that might be attractive to other members too.

Best wishes,

Nathan,