[kami]

Hi JD.

I just wanted to post some thoughts on the new plugin. I've used it a lot in the last few days/weeks and I'm very happy with most of the changes. I also have a few questions concerning the current workflow.

Some of the best changes are the new Camera Options. I really like all, that's new about it, especially the Heads-Up-Display and Auto-Exposure. It's really a simple way to play with the DOF. The three modes to adjust the size of the images are also great.
But there's one thing, I dislike: When I load a named view, adjust it a little and then save it under a different name, I always have to adjust all camera settings again. I know, i can avoid this by just updating the old position, but sometimes it's nice to keep the old settings... just in case. Or if you'd like to make several very similar shots of one object.
A question about the DOF though, not concerning the plugin... Is it really correctly calculated in mxcl? I just took a rendering with the focussed object in the foreground at about 2m distance. the background is at 6m and even with an f-stop of 1, which is pretty heavy, the background is just slightly blurred... if i compare this to my DSLR it seems much too sharp, but i inted to make a comparison where i try to reenact a taken picture.

Then i noticed a bug on the "Date and Time Settings". When saving those Settings, it always changes the time from a.m. to p.m. It would also be simpler for me to work in the european way with a "24"h mode.

My next question about the workflow is concerning the dependance between the camera and the other settings (like time, environnement, render settings). I mostly do archviz and try to keep the whole object in one rhino-document. When I want to take different points of view, it's often necessary to adjust the illumination & rendering settings for each camera. The way it is now, I have to change a lot of tabs by loading/savig presets (time/date, environnement, output and render settings)... Is there a simpler way to do so? Or couldn't all other settings be depending on the selected camera?

Well, maybe my workflow isn't the best ... ?

I just wanted to give a feedback on the actual plugin which I like very much! Hope, you appreciate it and sorry for my bad english.
Greets,
Kami

[JDHill]

Hi Kami,

You may want to look at the Bugs topic from time to time - I try to keep a running list in the first post. There are some glitches I've found with Cameras and Named Views, and they'll be fixed shortly - they're meant to work basically the way you describe. As to your question about the accuracy of Maxwel DOF, I would suggest you ask about that on the regular forum, since I have never personally tested this.

About your a.m. vs. p.m. issue, I am not able to repeat this behavior - if you could send me a .3dm which does, I would appreciate it. About using 24h time, this has been asked about before, and I meant to add it - but did not remember until just now. The 0-24.0 decimal time scale is the native format used by Maxwell - that is exposed in the 'Time of Day' parameter.

As to your last question, you're basically asking to be able to save multiple versions of the file in the same file - but with the twist of keying the version on a Camera. Sans the link to a Camera, this basic idea has been discussed before, and it is possible to do, but I have not worked out any UI or workflow for making it happen yet. Associating sets of parameters with saved Cameras is an interesting approach, let me know if you have any other ideas regarding this.

Btw...being a mono-lingual English speaker, I don't think yours is bad at all. Really, I would not have guessed that it was not your native language - it hadn't occurred to me until you mentioned it.

Cheers,

JD

[kami]

Hi JD,

thanks for your answer and thx for complimenting my english.

I do try to look at the bugs topic from time to time, but I lost the overview lately...
I'll try to reproduce the a.m.-p.m. bug and will send you an e-mail in the next days.

The DOF-accuracy has to be reviewed first. Hope I can do this too in the next days.

About the Camera<->All Settings link: Unfortunately, there isn't a great solution in my mind, but I will think about a way to make a clever relation between them.
But it would be just for all Maxwell-Settings. So maybe a simple "Save All Presets" would do it. It's not really necessary to have multiple scenes in the same file. I just group all objects which are only needed for some views and switch them off, if I render another view.

Thanks JD. You're doing a really great job with this plugin. I worked with Cinema4D some time ago and I wouldn't be able to switch back, just because of the Rhino Plugin!
Greets,
Kami