[REQ] Section Object

[StompinTom]

looking at this exit portal stuff, im wondering if, using a similar principle, a new "section" object type could be created, which takes into account all the lighting behind this object but renders the geometry invisible. say, from the direction of the normal everything is chopped off.

or, the way i understand precedence to work, the material with the highest precedence occupies the volume in space, so what if this somehow got extended to "solid" materials too? say if a 'void' material had a higher precedence than a diffuse material.
so itd be a bit like doing booleans within the renderer. is this at all possible?

now, i know this will get the usual "why dont you chop it up in your modeling program? Indigo is supposed to be reality! what a useless request!" but IMO it would make sense to have a flexible section/clipping tool that would make it easy as 123 to make great colored plans and sections without having to mash up your model each time.

[Kram1032]

not that it makes sense, right now, but later, after an improved world system, that entirely works, such a thing might be cool with the earth-ball, for adding things like, seas, lakes, .... which are beyond sea level (and with that, you could use alpha as a "cut" material, by simply setting the precedence, very high

[CoolColJ]

Maxwell and Fry render both have that

it's in Sketchup as well, so I'm guessing if you use the Sketchup section cut, Indigo will render the result. It's non destructive as well

[StompinTom]

aie. so it could be an exporter thing? not just clipping, but 3d clipping volumes, like if you want to cut a section through a spherical form or something? hm.

[CoolColJ]

In Sketchup you can slide a section cut object around and it cuts away the model in realtime

I haven't tried to export out a scene with this in place to see if it renders like this in Indigo, but I don't see why not. I will test it for ya!

[suvakas]

But what if you want to cut the whole scene with millions of polys and 1000s of models?
Then a camera clipping would be the way to go.
Not a feature i would use very often though...

[CoolColJ]

put all the models in different layers, turn off the ones that you don't need to see while placing the section plane, place it, turn them back on export out

or use proxy objects and section plane those

well Sketchup is a modelling program, but so different from anything out there, the section planes go hand in hand with all the other things it doesn't. It's no big deal for it.

Maxwell and Fry do have Z-Clip feature, which I haven't tested


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BTW the section cut that is displayed in Sketchup isn't exported out to Indigo! Bummer, would have be cool

[suvakas]

And it would really work for millions of polys? Cool

or use proxy objects and section plane those

For some reason i don't think it would work. (never seen Sketchup in my life though, but i think Whaat is only replacing the "proxy" with real model in Indigo. So you cant cut the model by cuting the proxy..i think.)

But ok. This is really only a messy workaround for the StompinTom request. And since it's not even my request (and i don't have a need for this tool at the moment), then i don't really care

[StompinTom]

i just like the idea of having plans and sections that show more than just line weight and measurements. realistic renderings with all them caustic effects and global illumination look so cool.
and by cutting it in the modeler, you end up with a model that is *actually* cut along a plane. your interior would be lit up by the sun because of the chopped up walls and such, for example.
or, ideally wed just have render baking for Indigo. thinking out loud.

[Whaat]

BTW the section cut that is displayed in Sketchup isn't exported out to Indigo! Bummer, would have be cool

It would be cool! It's not worth my time to code this feature (I don't think I could anyway...) It makes more sense if it would be built into the Indigo code.

[CoolColJ]

yeah it looks so nifty in Sketchup!

It's a great feature for modelling as well, cutaway a scetion to reach some inner areas etc

I don't think any other modeller has this