Custom Indigo Material

[fused]

hi all,

i'm currently engaged in a heavy rewrite of cindigos material related code because i implemented a custom material for indgio. heres what i will look like.... sort of:

customIndigoMaterial.png (54.23 KiB) Viewed 7336 times

theres still a lot of stuff left to do. its really late, just wanted to show it off
cant say much more. if you have questions, just ask!

oh and if you are a vrayforc4d user: yes, it does support camera mapping

[PureSpider]

Nice news, as usual

oh and if you are a vrayforc4d user: yes, it does support camera mapping

[OnoSendai]

That looks great, Fused
Is this kind of dialog similar to how the native c4d materials are configured?

[fused]

That looks great, Fused
Is this kind of dialog similar to how the native c4d materials are configured?

Yes

[zeitmeister]

This could be a very major step... I would appreciate this! Is it similar to custom materials like we know from VrayforC4D?
Looks very good!

But what about complicated materials?
In my case, I often used phong, diffuse transmitter, blend this two ("blend1"), specular material, blend it with blend1 in a new blend material ("blend2"), and finally blend this in a final blend material with alphamap ("blend3").
Lots of material to create here... I think it could be very complicated to transfer this in a single custom material.
PERHAPS, if you could implement a blend channel. Or a custom blend material. I don't know...
but there is a strong need for such complicated, nested materials.

But I have no idea how to solve this in an ergonomic GUI.

[fused]

This could be a very major step... I would appreciate this! Is it similar to custom materials like we know from VrayforC4D?

yes, but in some way its better (camera mapping works hehe)
also, rendering with c4ds internal renderer doesnt just give you white unshaded materials. it will not be a perfect representation, but its at least a rough preview.
and on top of that i will add a way to bake the uvs of texture tags with custom indigo materials because the standard way to do that (tags->generate uvw coordinates) will fail with custom materials (since c4d is a bit stupid and always handles custom materials as volume shaders internally, which dont need uvs).

edit: hm.... actually my uv coord generation would work with any kind of custom material, also vrays, but i think im strictly prohibiting that. im not doing their work!

Looks very good!

thanks!

But what about complicated materials?
In my case, I often used phong, diffuse transmitter, blend this two ("blend1"), specular material, blend it with blend1 in a new blend material ("blend2"), and finally blend this in a final blend material with alphamap ("blend3").
Lots of material to create here... I think it could be very complicated to transfer this in a single custom material.
PERHAPS, if you could implement a blend channel. Or a custom blend material. I don't know...
but there is a strong need for such complicated, nested materials.

blend channel? hmmm... currently the material has an alpha channel which allows you to easily make null material blends. it would be quite easy to add a link field where you can drop a material to blend with, awesome idea!

a blended material would still require two materials then.
well, at least not three

But I have no idea how to solve this in an ergonomic GUI.

me neither, but i definitely know which way not to go
*eyes vrayforc4d*

[Phoenix]

But what about complicated materials?
In my case, I often used phong, diffuse transmitter, blend this two ("blend1"), specular material, blend it with blend1 in a new blend material ("blend2"), and finally blend this in a final blend material with alphamap ("blend3").
Lots of material to create here... I think it could be very complicated to transfer this in a single custom material.
PERHAPS, if you could implement a blend channel. Or a custom blend material. I don't know...
but there is a strong need for such complicated, nested materials.

blend channel? hmmm... currently the material has an alpha channel which allows you to easily make null material blends. it would be quite easy to add a link field where you can drop a material to blend with, awesome idea!

a blended material would still require two materials then.
well, at least not three

I'm not absolutely sure if it satisfies all the needs for an indigo blend material but perhaps C4Ds own Fusion-Shader could be abused and exploited for blend material purposes?

[pixie]

blend channel? hmmm... currently the material has an alpha channel which allows you to easily make null material blends. it would be quite easy to add a link field where you can drop a material to blend with, awesome idea!

a blended material would still require two materials then.
well, at least not three

I'm not absolutely sure if it satisfies all the needs for an indigo blend material but perhaps C4Ds own Fusion-Shader could be abused and exploited for blend material purposes?[/quote]

Or layers...

[fused]

the fusion shader blends shaders, not materials.

[zeitmeister]

Awesome!
A blend material channel would make sense... but only, if you can place Indigo custom materials here, too, for sure. Not only textures.
The first blend slot here could/should be occupied with the actual material itself.
GUI-design here could be very close to the fusion shader... everybody knows it and it seems to me the best thinkable and ergonomic solution.
Think about it!

also, rendering with c4ds internal renderer doesnt just give you white unshaded materials. it will not be a perfect representation, but its at least a rough preview.

All in all this sounds really good, plus, regarding the commercialisation of Indigo, like a very professional integration.

[PureSpider]

I'd do it like the fusion shader but as an own mat type.
You select "Blend" from the dropdown list and then you can drag materials into x (user selects how many boxes he needs) boxes on the right and set their individual blend values in %.

[fused]

Awesome!
A blend material channel would make sense... but only, if you can place Indigo custom materials here, too, for sure. Not only textures.
The first blend slot here could/should be occupied with the actual material itself.
GUI-design here could be very close to the fusion shader... everybody knows it and it seems to me the best thinkable and ergonomic solution.
Think about it!

Of course you can use indigo materials there. You will also be able to use c4d materials, which will then be converted on the fly. theoretically you could also use other custom materials there, eg vray materials, but im not going to write conversions for other than c4d materials, they will end up grey.

it will roughly look like this:

link field for material
blend factor (will be disabled if shader is set)
blend shader/texture
step blend checkbox (only when shader is set)

And i also think it is the best solution (short term, that is). The "multi blend material" pure mentioned (which was requested by Pilbuz for sketchup quite a while ago) is also nice and will definitely come at some point (as i already told him a cuple of times ).

All in all this sounds really good, plus, regarding the commercialisation of Indigo, like a very professional integration.

Thats where i want to go: professional integration

[zeitmeister]

Forget the "like", it's just because of my poor English.

[fused]

yeah, thought so and edited it before you answered ^^

[Phoenix]

Or layers...

For C4D itself I also prefer the layers shader over the fusion shader but i think the way the fusion shader works is much closer to the operation method of the Indigo blend material.

the fusion shader blends shaders, not materials.

Yes, but if you would realise your scheduled"Indigo Material Shader" as a channel shader too (like it's with C4Ds own Lumas Shader, which exists as a material and as a channel shader for using it in other materials also) that shouldn't be a problem, should it?