[jc4d]

Hi all,

Would be nice to have the same IBL texture coordinates like texture tag coordinate system native on C4D. Right now they don´t match so is a little difficult to position the background for example using Screen mapped activated and I noticed that the IBL flip the texture horizontally.

And another thing if is possible to have screen mapped for Reflection and Refraction channels.


Here is a screenshot (better than words)



Cheers
JC

[JDHill]

Regarding IBL mapping, the plugin is just passing your specified values to Maxwell, so in order to reverse the image, it would have to reverse the values you give; I usually do not like doing such things (there are various reasons, some of which are not really obvious), but I can take a look into it and see whether it might be workable in this case, in the future.

For the time being, in the example you show above, the most convenient method of matching the mappings should be to set the Sky object's S.X to -1 and its R.H to -90°; after doing so, a negative Offset X value in the texture tag (e.g. 10%), or a negative rotation in its Coordinates > R.H value (e.g. -36°) should correspond to an equivalent positive Offset U in the Maxwell IBL (36°).

On the Screen Mapping question, this option only exists in the Background channel in Maxwell, so it can only exist in the Background channel in the plugin.

[jc4d]

Thanks, it seems working but... at the moment that you change the scale, then the rotation value is getting out of "coordination" with what Fire see.

Edited: Now doing more tests I can see that if you set a value of 2 Tiles in the texture tag and having R.H -60, then in the IBL channel the Offset U value have to multiply by 2 so putting 120 give the correct look and keeping the Scale U and V in 2.
If you put then value 3 tiles then the degree have to be 60*3=180.

But now, what happens when you set a Tiles X of 1,35 and Tiles Y 2,65?, at this point I don´t know how to multiply it to get the right rotation value into IBL channel.

Cheers
JC

[JDHill]

Certainly, it can be a bit tricky. The biggest problem you will run into is that Cinema's mapping has more freedom than Maxwell's (for instance, by changing R.P or R.B in Texture Tag > Coordinates), so it is easily possible to set up parameters in Cinema which cannot be duplicated in Maxwell. Therefore, if you have to match the two, the way to make sure you can do that is to set it up in Maxwell first (using Fire), and then duplicate that in the Cinema tag, rather than going the other way around.

To set up your example scenario (if I understand it correctly), this appears to be what is needed:

• Scene Object > IBL: Scale U: 1.35, Scale V: 2.65
• Sky Object > Coordinates: S.X: -1 and R.H:-90
• Texture Tag > Coordinates: leave all at defaults
• Texture Tag > Tag: Tiles X: 1.35, Tiles Y: 2.65

At this point things should be matching. Say then that you set Offset U/V to 36° in IBL; convert 36° to 0.1 (36/360), and multiply by the Length X percentage (74.074%) in your Texture Tag, and then make that negative, yielding -7.4%. Doing the same for Offset V, you end up with -3.77% for the Texture Tag's Offset X value. This also should match.

[jc4d]

Wow, is really tricky , I´ll try to do the maths every time... not smooth workflow.

Now my reason for this topic is when there is a really big project and the computer is not the the best, the things start getting a little "slow" when you try to use FIRE, at this point I put a high reflective C4D native material on the windows and turn off anti-aliasing, then a sky object with the same HDR that goes to IBL, and doing quick renders just to "fix" where I need the reflections to show in the final render, then the idea is to translate those sky texture parameters to IBL to avoid using Fire and just launch the final render.

I´m sorry if I try to push a little here but my ignorance about programming is zero.

If doing this changes in the code are really hard and there is no enough demand for this... what about if you could link the sky object to the IBL settings per channel so if you want to change the size for reflection only just link the sky object to the reflection channel and the rest of the channels adopt their own parameters, so in this case the plugin could adopt the Sky object parameters just a little like now if the plugin find the sun expression it gets adopted.

This is a quick sketch of what I have in mind:


Cheers
JC

[JDHill]

The reason it works as it currently does has to do with what I mentioned above: you can do things with Cinema environment that are impossible to duplicate in Maxwell. That is why the plugin drives things the other way around -- you set up IBL in the Scene Object, and the plugin shows you how it will work in Cinema's viewport using the IBL's Viewport display parameter. One doesn't really need any programming knowledge to understand that -- if I put environment links in the IBL as you illustrate above, what should the plugin do when the environment you link is set up in a way that can't be duplicated in Maxwell?

[jc4d]

I see, and of course I understand that there are many things that there are impossible to translate, I was just thinking out loud a way to avoid doing those maths everytime to place my reflections in place for each project and even with huge ones avoid the use of Fire because the preparation and voxelization and so on in order just to move the hdr to fit it in my needs.

My idea was to link the sky object in order just to take and translate the texture placement from C4D to the plugin in order to avoid doing the mats all the time.

Cheers
JC

[JDHill]

Well, I will sure keep this all in mind and see what can be done to make it easier for you.