Public alpha release of IndigoMax

[subpixel]

@Enslaver
Again thanks for all your help. I appreciate it a lot.
I'll look into Muti ID/UV bug, so your scene would help a lot (you might PM it to me).
Also could you elaborate on SSS (it was working for me, though I haven't checked it extensively).

@rawalanche: Follow Enslaver's advice - it's a very good advice indeed No hardcoded limit there (only watermarking)

Thanks to all

[ENSLAVER]

PM sent

re. the SSS - I've found the sneaky spectrum map which does help. Being able to use colours that are greater than 255 seems to have a much greater impact. Before, just using the spectrum colour picker I was getting really weak results. I guess perhaps the standard colour picker for the spectrum needs to be scaled a bit or have some kind of multiplier?

Maybe instead of a colour picker it could just have a drop down menu with the same options as the spectrum map (rgb/uniform/peak/blackbody/bitmap) and then show the related controls to the chosen option.

When a map is selected for the sss spectrum, the colour swatch still has an effect (expected behaviour?).

[subpixel]

I suppose I could add multiplier as Transmittance has.
I would prefer leave spectrum setting to spectrum map, color picker is for fast/lazy users
Thanks for a tip about map and swatch, I'll look into it.

[ENSLAVER]

I suppose I could add multiplier as Transmittance has.
I would prefer leave spectrum setting to spectrum map, color picker is for fast/lazy users
Thanks for a tip about map and swatch, I'll look into it.

Simple+fast is always better as long as you don't lose functionality, elegance! Anyway you don't want to make it too hard for new users/artists or fast/lazy users lol

I think I am lazyfast or fastlazy brb teapot+greeble+sun = scene

[ENSLAVER]

I've noticed that particles using instanced geometry do keep their materials, it's just when using standard particle shapes+material node in particle view that it renders with the display colour.

Just curious - Do particles render as a single mesh? They seem to use a lot more memory than the same amount of objects/polys instanced.

Bump map seems to be a bit out of scale, the lowest possible setting (.001 if you have your decimals set to 3) is still extremely strong.

How do I create a "mirror" material?

[subpixel]

Hey Enslaver,

I haven't addressed particle systems yet, so they're treated inefficiently via mesh geometry flow. The actual mesh recognition of particle system is mostly renderer dependent, yet there are settings in Render node (if I remember correctly), You might consider it as single mesh or split into n meshes, however default is a single mesh. I'm affraid you'll need to wait a bit for enhancements with particles, yet it's definitively going to be addressed sometime.

I'll look into bump mapping settings.

About mirror: You'd need to untick diffuse in reflection group and set specular color to white.
Hope it helps,

[ENSLAVER]

I think the issue is not being able to set the exponent high enough in Max

Indigo 1,000,000
Max 10,000

At 10,000 the rays diverge pretty quickly, making it glossier (is that a word?) =P

[Javadevil]

Is this thread to be best place to find the latest build ?
Any chance of getting an email notification when there's an update ?

[subpixel]

Enslaver: Sorry for that, I'll fix exponent, as well glossiness parameters, thanks for the tip
Javadevil: At the moment it seems a best place for updates (you might subscribe topic). Yet, it's a temporary solution.

Cheers,

[tar_gniK]

Can I ask Subpixel, what is the equivalent of Maxigo Scatter in IndigoMax? If hasn't been implemented already, what are the plans (if any) for this?

[subpixel]

Well, there isn't any equivalent at the moment, also I don't plan to introduce one. However there will be an object IndigoProxy which, will load geometry from a file (much like VRayProxy), which in turn could be scattered with scatter tool or any 3rd party plugin.
Hope it will suffice.

[ENSLAVER]

Can I ask Subpixel, what is the equivalent of Maxigo Scatter in IndigoMax? If hasn't been implemented already, what are the plans (if any) for this?

Well, there isn't any equivalent at the moment, also I don't plan to introduce one. However there will be an object IndigoProxy which, will load geometry from a file (much like VRayProxy), which in turn could be scattered with scatter tool or any 3rd party plugin.
Hope it will suffice.

Instances already do work really well (in terms of memory) inside indigomax. The only problem comes when you have millions of instances, even in boxmode, the viewport and max grind to a halt. They really need to be generated at render time.

You can use the instance painter with indigomax quite well at the moment for planting/etc - Make sure you set the objects to box mode

I've tried Groundwiz Lite and Forest Pack Lite (both amazing tools for scattering or planting, lots of viewport options, camera clipping, only generate at render time) - they do render with indigomax with some strange issues and max crashes on render stop/end. The lite (free) versions have limitations in terms of total objects/polycount. Others like multiscatter only provide support for MR/Vray.


Particles as instances are a great option as they allow a lot of control and can set them to generate at render time, but they can be a steep learning curve (not sure how to make this work yet, particles not fully implemented in indigomax). They lack the ability to scale via maps/edges etc, and can be really tricky to paint even with particle painter.

A proxy object is great for saving resources but the problem comes when you have millions of instances of them in the scene and the slowdown resulting. (The Maxwell proxy object which displays objects as points worked well with previous indigo exporters but causes a crash in indigomax)

My main push for a proxy object came from my love of using plugins like groundwiz, which wouldn't work with maxigo without a proxy object. If we look a long time into the future I am not sure whether users would prefer to use/purchase their own scattering tools or use something like maxigo scatter, it wasn't the best but it did have a couple of the benefits of being able to generate at render time and using shape/mask/scale maps.

What's ideal - I'm not sure, there are probably scattering/planting scripts that I haven't tested yet that may work with indigomax. Depending on if we find one or not, a proxy object might not be enough in the long run. The objects need to be generated at render time rather than having millions of objects in your max scene, proxy or not.

[Javadevil]

Do Indigo proxies work in IndigoRT ?
I'm basically testing the new 3dsmax/Indigo integration since I'm mainly interested in IndigoRT.

Proxy's are the way to go, smaller file sizes, faster saves. With instances you still need one high res mesh in the file and a scene with 10 unique heavy tree meshes 3dsmax can take a long time to save and open.


As far as scattering goes I'm pretty happy with MDO waco scatter.

[tar_gniK]

Well, in particular, there are some parts of Maxigo Scatter that should be migrated to IndigoMax in some form I think, especially the "Use diffuse map" option. Very underrated IMO. I have used it on numerous occasions and it works very well.

For making a grass plane for example, I would rather choose to use an image map with the variations in colour that I need, and then this would be translated to the scattered object. For this particular task, it is much neater than proxies -- for a nice variation in grass via the proxy method, I am guessing that I would need three or four colour variations of the same grass patch, and then scatter, which would not look as natural.

I have attached examples of renders describing what I mean.

The only negative is that using this method limits you to diffuse only. In addition, the scatter tool only works on mostly horizontal surfaces.

I wish this was developed to a higher level; for trees in example, for a nice colour variation among the leaves, you would only need an image map -- but the script would be clever enough to leave branches/trunk etc alone. This way, you would not need "10 unique heavy tree meshes" in the viewport if colour is the only differentiating factor.

Unless you could use proxies to get their colour from an image map....

[subpixel]

Agreed, you've convinced me. It will be implemented coupled with implementation of particles.
Cheers,