Material/shader editor as part of the gui ?

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WytRaven
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Post by WytRaven » Fri Feb 20, 2009 12:47 pm

benn I have no doubt that is what you are aiming to achieve and I agree that that would be great in the end but my response to neo above is an aggregate one due to his consistent lack of putting in the work to use indigo as it is now. Have a look around the forums and you will quickly see what I mean.

On the subject of a material editor in the gui you also find that there has been previous discussion on this, where I believe someone even began mocking up an interface, and in that discussion I suggested exactly that; that any gui for indigo should provide a scene editor/visualiser (where one could move objects about, temporarily disable them, change indigo render settings, etc) and material editor. So it is not that I disagree with what is being suggested I simply disagree with neo's attitude toward indigo, it's developers, and dedicated users.
:idea: "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds..." - Emerson 1841

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Post by crojack » Fri Feb 20, 2009 12:56 pm

benn wrote:To be honest - we are aiming to make Indigo a 'push this button for a great render' application. That's part of what this beta group is about. Opening up Indigo to people who are great modellers but not hardcore hackers - that seems like a wonderful goal to me.

:)
right but there still needs to be knowledge of materials and how to set them up. I think Indigo's approach is great, it does one job, render, and ti does it great. I stayed away from rendering for along time because I did not want to put the time into learning a modeling program different than the one I already use, Sketchup. With Skindigo, I have everything I need.

What neo seems to want, evidence is all over this forum, is a renderer that will somehow know what it is he wants and produce it without him doing any work.

I'm all for more materials in the dB to use, and a more simplified way of producing great results. IMHO, skindigo does this great and is getting better. I have tried the other exporters for sketchup and skindigo is by far the easiest and most intuitive to use. I am certainly more of the modeller than the hacker, a lot of what people say on this forum goes straight over my head. So, making things easier is wonderful and i'm all for it.

What is bugging WytRaven (I think, correct me if I am wrong) and me and many others on this forum is multiple posts by neo that generally go nowhere, have no purpose except to get somebody to do his work for him, confuse issues, bring up issues already addressed, and generally pollute the forum without giving back or trying to help or even trying to learn (which is probably the most annoying)

can't wait to get home and try the Beta!!!


WytRaven, you comments are well put and I don't think it makes you look like a bad guy at all.

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Post by crojack » Fri Feb 20, 2009 12:57 pm

ahh, you beat me to it WytRaven :D

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WytRaven
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Post by WytRaven » Fri Feb 20, 2009 1:25 pm

crojack wrote:What is bugging WytRaven (I think, correct me if I am wrong) and me and many others on this forum is multiple posts by neo that generally go nowhere, have no purpose except to get somebody to do his work for him, confuse issues, bring up issues already addressed, and generally pollute the forum without giving back or trying to help or even trying to learn (which is probably the most annoying)
I believe that is what is generally known as "hitting the proverbial nail on the head" ;)
:idea: "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds..." - Emerson 1841

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Post by Zom-B » Fri Feb 20, 2009 4:46 pm

thanks Raven, you are my Hero!!!1!
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Post by sk2k » Fri Feb 20, 2009 6:53 pm

*Thread derailed* Thank you all. :D

I see nothing wrong with suggesting things that "could" improve Indigo or any other app. It's a bit rude to give neo a slap for suggesting/wanting something altough i can't see the usefulness of having a Fryrender Swap equivalent in Indigo.
In every community (can someone say Blender? :) ) you will have peoples with wishes and suggestion on how to improve the app. Most of these suggested features were seen in other apps.

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Post by neo0. » Sat Feb 21, 2009 8:34 am

I think wytRaven might be having another bad day and in doing so forgot that indigo, in effect, has zero documentation. :lol:
right but there still needs to be knowledge of materials and how to set them up. I think Indigo's approach is great, it does one job, render, and ti does it great. I stayed away from rendering for along time because I did not want to put the time into learning a modeling program different than the one I already use, Sketchup. With Skindigo, I have everything I need.
..Learning something with no documentation (with nothing to go off of, could be a bit of a challenge) is no easy challenge. Since Indigo renders unbiased and thus takes a lot of time, trial and error seems like a bit of a tall order.
What neo seems to want, evidence is all over this forum, is a renderer that will somehow know what it is he wants and produce it without him doing any work.
No. I want an easier workflow with less guesswork. Simple as that.
I'm all for more materials in the dB to use, and a more simplified way of producing great results. IMHO, skindigo does this great and is getting better. I have tried the other exporters for sketchup and skindigo is by far the easiest and most intuitive to use. I am certainly more of the modeller than the hacker, a lot of what people say on this forum goes straight over my head. So, making things easier is wonderful and i'm all for it.
Sure, if it's an IGM, but if it's a pigm, it's a whole different story. "It's possible" shouldn't be the goal here. Having to convert everything to a zip file and edit code manually isn't exactly a user friendly system. The focus should be on using the materials in your scene, not getting them to work.
What is bugging WytRaven (I think, correct me if I am wrong) and me and many others on this forum is multiple posts by neo that generally go nowhere, have no purpose except to get somebody to do his work for him, confuse issues, bring up issues already addressed, and generally pollute the forum without giving back or trying to help or even trying to learn (which is probably the most annoying)
Are you referring to the material requests? If so, that's what a request means. :roll:

I help where I can, like in that topic thread where that dude had a diffuse of homer that he was trying to get to work

I do a lot of brainstorming for new ideas that can help indigo be a better renderer or push the envelope, the issue with this is...? Having a more efficient, user friendly UI does not equal "doing the work for you." You still have to model correctly and create materials. However, if it can preview your mats for you, it makes creating materials alot easier.

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Post by crojack » Sat Feb 21, 2009 9:33 am

neo you need to learn how to do the basics first.

I knew absolutely nothing of rendering before I started using Indigo and now, I know a little. How did I learn? I read through these forums and made sure I searched for the topic I was trying to learn about before I posted. This also greatly helped to eliminate the "guesswork".

As far as the easier workflow, I find doing everything is sketchup and than exporting/rendering is about the easiest workflow there is. If you don't like it, go find one that you like.

a pigm is just a packed igm.

I have never had to hand edit a file.

There are also some great tutorials by Whaat and an FAQ started by Pibuz.

Spend a little less time posting and a little more time reading, I can 99.9% guarantee that anything you want to know about Indigo and Skindigo is in the forums and has been addressed before.



sorry for the threadjack, sk2k.

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Post by pixie » Sat Feb 21, 2009 10:15 am

Please someone slap me! neo0. is on the beta group? He has to be the antithesis of beta-testing... :roll:

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Post by Marcofly » Sat Feb 21, 2009 11:25 am

Hi folks!

First of all, a big THANK YOU to benn that's putting great effort in this project!

Your goal of opening up indigo to great modellers, benn, is shared by the vast majority of us! Fused has done a GREAT job with cindigo, and i tried to give him in the past some advices to make it 'architect-friendly'. But the feedback from architects unfortunately shows that Indigo in their opinion is complicated! they don't need special features like fry swap or a thousand buttons on the GUI. They need a simple, quick and easy way to show their work to the customers, and they can't do it atm with Indigo, because the time that you spend in creating and testing the mats (compared to MR or Fry, for example) is simply too much.

Don't forget that a material editor would also make easier to create a material library (one of the most interesting things of Maxwell)..

Greets from Italy!

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Post by Zom-B » Sat Feb 21, 2009 8:30 pm

sk2k wrote:I see nothing wrong with suggesting things that "could" improve Indigo or any other app. It's a bit rude to give neo a slap for suggesting/wanting something altough i can't see the usefulness of having a Fryrender Swap equivalent in Indigo.
Sorry m8, but you simply don't have the overview about this "situation"...
Just lay back and enjoy the show 8)
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Post by neo0. » Sun Feb 22, 2009 6:50 am

The guesswork lies in the material creation process. :wink: You have to perform several costly unbiased renders until you get it right usually. With radium style previews, you can by pass all those "final" renders.

How did you avoid editing the pigm file by hand? What exporter are you using? I never say the "import pigm file" option..

Reading through forums doesn't replace actual documentation FYI.
As far as the easier workflow, I find doing everything is sketchup and than exporting/rendering is about the easiest workflow there is. If you don't like it, go find one that you like.
I just had to quote this because it's the "antithesis" of where you are misunderstanding me. I like indigo much better than any other renderer. I might have said that before, but that still doesn't mean that we shouldn't try to find ways to improve it. TBH, that's exactly the reason why i spend time brainstorming ideas for indigo. Because I like it.

I don't know.. I guess you think that anyone who provides feedback on something is "bad" and doesn't like it?
Please someone slap me! neo0. is on the beta group? He has to be the antithesis of beta-testing...
You'de never have seen this coming, but ya know what, pixie? I agree completely. Haha, I mean, who would have guessed that you'de see "feedback" and "beta test" in the same sentence?

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Post by crojack » Sun Feb 22, 2009 9:49 am

I use sketchup and skindigo, never had to edit anything. why would you hand edit the pigm file?

You're right, forums don't replace documentation, I think they are better!
Even the most complete document isn't going to teach you everything about making a great render, ie good modeling skills, material settings/creation, it's just going to tell you how to use the program.

I think you should spend more time learning sketchup/skindigo (if that's what you want to use) and Indigo and less time brainstorming ideas to make it better.

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Post by Whaat » Sun Feb 22, 2009 10:10 am

crojack wrote:I think you should spend more time learning sketchup/skindigo (if that's what you want to use) and Indigo and less time brainstorming ideas to make it better.
+1!! Many of the features you request in the forums are already there. You just don't take the time to learn how to use them.

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Post by neo0. » Sun Feb 22, 2009 3:17 pm

The sun/sky brightness may have been already in there, but most of my other things weren't. Here were some of my past ideas :
-Dynamic material previews that adjust to reflect changes that you make to the shader or texture. Status: Not implemented
-Specular reflection for phong materials. Status: Not implemented
-Sliders to adjust blend materials. Status: Not implemented
-Popout adjustments for nested materials (like when you blend a blend material with another blend material, you can just click on a button and then it expands one of the blend materials for you to adjust) Status: Not implemented

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