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1) How do you change the scale of the world coordinate-based procedurals? With the 'detail' value?

2) Shouldn't the documentation specify which procedurals are 2D and which can be 3D? The documentation says "World coordinates: This method uses instead world coordinates of the scene and does not rely on any UV sets. It is the method most suited for procedural textures because the texture will map seamlessly across the object, no matter its shape or inherent UVs." This implies that all procedural textures are best mapped using 3D. But then the docs go on to describe some 2D-only textures as "procedural."

3) Shouldn't at least the checkerboard and circles have a 3D world coordinates option? I could see those textures being defined as a function of (x, y, z)

4) When procedurals are stacked, can I multiply one layer by another? (blend modes?)

5) Why is the preview in Studio so different in look and scale from the render when using world 3d coordinates?

6) The stack completely mystifies me. It seems all backwards.

Checker 0.0
Marble 90.0

Gives you 90% checker mixed with 10% marble????!?

edit:

I don't mean to come across as short. I'm just trying to get a lot of ideas down fast as I think of them.

What software are you using ? Maxwell Studio or you're doing it in a plug-in version.

As for plugins … I'm using Maya .. and I can't even find procedurals I mean we have lot's of Maya native procedurals .. but I don't think the'll work with Maxwell .. at least they weren't.

And I don't think there is a 3D texture in Maxwell … I think that it all 2D based UV mapping. So it also important how you've mapped your object .. and the size of your UV. For procedurals .you don't need much world coordinate system, as they are mainly just generic pattern .. noise and etc. So I guess it's mostly for visual workflow.

If you want to have stacked procedurals, you've got to have stacked materials … or in Maxwell's case - stacked layers inside one material .. for now there is only two types of blending mode .. Additive and Normal .. probably two mainly used ones in production Actually I would add "Overlay" thing .. but I don't think it suits math behind the shared system.

Cheers.

Thanks for bringing these questions/comments up.
I would also like to see an illustration (in the docs) which explains how exactly the World coordinates mapping works.
Is that some kind of shrink wrapping?

world coordinates don't work with repeat under projection properties

Polyxo wrote:Thanks for bringing these questions/comments up.
I would also like to see an illustration (in the docs) which explains how exactly the World coordinates mapping works.
Is that some kind of shrink wrapping?

In world coordinate mapping the procedural texture is a function - a recipe - that uses the x, y and z coordinates of a point as the ingredients from which the texture is made. That means points that are close in space will have colors that are similar, even if they are on different objects (as long as the seed is the same)

It's like using the surface of an object to carve into and reveal what's inside a block of solid texture. Like carving a bar of marbled soap.

Nasok wrote:What software are you using ? Maxwell Studio or you're doing it in a plug-in version.

As for plugins … I'm using Maya .. and I can't even find procedurals I mean we have lot's of Maya native procedurals .. but I don't think the'll work with Maxwell .. at least they weren't.

And I don't think there is a 3D texture in Maxwell … I think that it all 2D based UV mapping. So it also important how you've mapped your object .. and the size of your UV. For procedurals .you don't need much world coordinate system, as they are mainly just generic pattern .. noise and etc. So I guess it's mostly for visual workflow.

If you want to have stacked procedurals, you've got to have stacked materials … or in Maxwell's case - stacked layers inside one material .. for now there is only two types of blending mode .. Additive and Normal .. probably two mainly used ones in production Actually I would add "Overlay" thing .. but I don't think it suits math behind the shared system.

Cheers.

3D texture is there on a few textures. You have to use the studio. There is a pulldown on some that switches you from UV to world space.

For Maya users you have to reference the texture:
http://www.maxwellrender.com/forum/view ... 01&t=41461

I have actually started switching more toward studio and away from Maya because the procedural workflow isn't there, as I understand it.

Thanks for the explanation!
Ok, this sounds indeed like a 3D or UVW texture. I can imagine how this can work with colours which
are supposed to blend in some form to some marble like effect. But does such work with connected
patterns too? In what way does the Emitter work? Is it a point source, which emits to all sides or?

Polyxo wrote:Thanks for the explanation!
Ok, this sounds indeed like a 3D or UVW texture. I can imagine how this can work with colours which
are supposed to blend in some form to some marble like effect. But does such work with connected
patterns too? In what way does the Emitter work? Is it a point source, which emits to all sides or?

I think as it stands now it works with marble-type textures only. But is should be possible to code solid volumes full of alternating cubes and make 3D checkerboards, or solid volumes packed with color spheres and make 3D dots of some kind. I guess.

Polyxo wrote:Thanks for bringing these questions/comments up.
I would also like to see an illustration (in the docs) which explains how exactly the World coordinates mapping works.
Is that some kind of shrink wrapping?

This illustration is shown on the first page of the Procedural docs......

http://support.nextlimit.com/display/mx ... l+Textures

Mihai wrote: This illustration is shown on the first page of the Procedural docs......
http://support.nextlimit.com/display/mx ... l+Textures

This picture even to people with certain background only shows the difference between
a box-mapped and a somehow uniformly textured object. The image contains no information
about the way this (world coordinates) mapping principle works.

1) How do you change the scale of the world coordinate-based procedurals? With the 'detail' value?

Yes. In world space since it doesn't have any UVs to determine over which area it should tile, the detail is used for "scaling". Detail setting for the procedural is like a repetition of the formula, in decreasing size.

2) Shouldn't the documentation specify which procedurals are 2D and which can be 3D? The documentation says "World coordinates: This method uses instead world coordinates of the scene and does not rely on any UV sets. It is the method most suited for procedural textures because the texture will map seamlessly across the object, no matter its shape or inherent UVs." This implies that all procedural textures are best mapped using 3D. But then the docs go on to describe some 2D-only textures as "procedural."

Documentation updated to mention that only Noise, Voronoi, Marble have World coordinates mapping. I think it was decided like this because the other procedurals would make sense applied to 2D coordinates. But we can add World Coordinates to others if needed.

4) When procedurals are stacked, can I multiply one layer by another? (blend modes?)

Procedurals stacked don't have any blending modes, only opacity.

5) Why is the preview in Studio so different in look and scale from the render when using world 3d coordinates?

Because it only takes into consideration 2D mapping. Maybe this can be improved and show both 2D and 3D mapping in Textured view.

6) The stack completely mystifies me. It seems all backwards.

I agree it seems to work a bit strange now. It would be easier to just make them work like the current Layer opacity works.

As for the the 2d and 3d preview I would say it would be good to have a preview checkbox in a way that we could see the result of opacity/blend upon several layers both in 3d and 2d. That would give us total control to what we are editing...
Yes, the stack similar to the current layer opacity would help!
Cheers!

Correct me if I'm wrong: with World Coordinates if you move the object the texture changes as it is fixed to the world origin, right?

Documentation updated to mention that only Noise, Voronoi, Marble have World coordinates mapping. I think it was decided like this because the other procedurals would make sense applied to 2D coordinates. But we can add World Coordinates to others if needed.

Would be nice if bricks procedural was in fact 3D as bricks are. This way you'd have side faces showing the thinner brick faces while top one would show the top of the brick. Although it wouldn't look good at corners unless bricks were square.... Well... maybe it could be solved by applying the material per wall, cutting at corners. That's a problem I always have when making brick walls: you need to add a top piece (coping) to hide mismatching texture.