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preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 9:34 pm
by big K
is there a wy to set the preview quality in the internal material editor?
(i know where to set this in the standalone material editor, but this does not seem to affect the internal editor.

cheers
michael

Re: preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 10:11 pm
by JDHill
Click on the top node in the layers tree to see the material-level properties; there you will see a 'Target SL' slider. The plugin stores this on a per-material basis, and you can set the default for new materials in the Maxwell page of your Cinema preferences.

Re: preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 10:25 pm
by big K
just found it, thanks a lot !

now i have problems to import a material from the mxm database.
what is working is if i choose import mxm and then browse with windows explorer to the mxm file and import it.
but what i am not able to do is use the mxed browser and select a maaterial to be imported to the c4d material.
what am i supposed to do ? has this changed from previous versions (i just upgraded to v2)

Re: preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Sat May 01, 2010 12:02 am
by JDHill
From the MXED browser window, you can drag materials into Cinema -- you have to drop them on one of the material previews; either the one in the plugin's material editor, or the one in the attributes manager for an existing material. You can't drop them in the Cinema material manager -- it will try to open the MXM as if it were a file you could edit in Cinema, which is useless, because you obviously can't.

If you want to replace the state of an existing material, you would either want to use the material editor menu's MXM Options > Import MXM Data, or use the material's MXM Link field to link it to a different MXM file.

Re: preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Sat May 01, 2010 12:49 am
by big K
thanks for the info.

mmh a little odd, that it only works as you described.
i would expect more a behavior like when you open a c4d maxwell material and use the material wizard with MXED, where it asks if you want to replace the current material. if you say yes, it replaces the old material and if you say now it creates a new material.
so if you browse the mxm database and select a material it should ask the same question, i think.

but i am sure i will get used to it.

Re: preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Sat May 01, 2010 1:27 am
by JDHill
I can alter how it behaves in a future release. There were quite a few changes in this area in the last two plugin versions.

Re: preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Sun May 02, 2010 8:08 pm
by big K
that would be cool, thanks.
i could even live without the question if i want to replace the material, as long as cinemas undo would work and get my old material back, if i accidentally replace a material.
then i could open mxed browser double click on a material and it will be loaded into the opened material. if i have no material opened then it would add a new material to the c4d material manager.
that´s the way i see it most convenient.

Re: preview quality in c4d material editor

Posted: Sun May 02, 2010 8:23 pm
by JDHill
Well, there are some technical considerations preventing it from working exactly like that. Also, it would be a one-mxm-choice operation, which would block the Cinema UI while you were using it -- currently, you can drag multiple mxms (or a whole folder of them, or even an mxs file from Explorer/Finder) into the scene, since MXED just floats above Cinema.

Either way though, I'll check it out and see what I can come up with.