CDRDA wrote: ↑Mon Jan 29, 2018 4:22 pm
Hi Mihai,
I was only able to catch the last 15 minutes of the first episode unfortunately, but what I did see, was very informative, even the banter in between, so great job at setting this up and I am looking forward to the next episode!
I think some sort of short discussion regarding material setup would be most useful. In particular, pros and cons of using additive layers versus a single layer with 2 bsdf elements, one for the base and the other to control the roughness/reflectivity etc. A while ago I saw a Next Limit webinar where, Dario I think it was, discussed the benefits of this way of building materials as being more efficient than additive layers and working on the principle that one layer equals one material. I assume the single layer+2 bsdf is the general solution for use with the GPU renderer given its current lack of support for additive materials.
I find multiple layers to be more versatile, but perhaps I don't play with the weight variable correctly. Most objects in the real world are not a single material. They may start out that way, but over time, it changes as they age. Metal with rust or oxidation is just one example. Glass is never perfect, there are always imperfections, smudges, fingerprints. Even if you don't see those things as obvious artifacts, they effect the reflections. I believe that if an input is used, it should be mapped and masked if necessary.
There are two ways to think of rendering and I find that most working with Maxwell are limited to one way...
The first is to make something that is believably perfect. We all do this sometimes, but for people doing product rendering, or even arch viz, the goal is to create a material that seems real but that is perfect. I've worked as a commercial photographer and that is often the goal of commercial retouching, to correct all the tiny, barely noticeable errors so that the photograph makes the product look believably perfect. This is how I see most folks working.
The second way is to make something perfectly believable. Not simply Pottery Barn Catalog believable, but really believable in all context. This is how most visual effects artists work. It's funny, I spent the first half of my life trying to figure out how to remove imperfections and now I'm spending the second half of my life figuring out how to add them.
Making a material that looks like wallpaper is not hard and can be achieved in a single layer. Making a material that looks like wallpaper that has been hanging in a cheap motel since the 50s is a different task. This is why many folks are looking to integrate with programs like Mari, Substance and Quixel. In addition to those, and Maya, I'm constantly running Z-brush, Mudbox (though less of that now), Vue and now Marvelous Designer. All in an effort to create a photorealistic surface. It has taken me a while to fully realize this in Maxwell (certainly longer than it would in other render packages, like V-Ray or Arnold) but the results are fantastic.
If you're going to be doing a class on material creation, then I don't think simply showing how to do a base layer and a gloss layer is enough. What is really needed is a resource to say, "ok, you're making a wood surface with a warn varnish? Here's how the reflections need to be controlled using the Nd,K values, R2 and Fresnel. Here's how you determine that in a physically correct manner." Because if you can't do that, then what's the point of using Maxwell, you could simply use a different render that makes "cheating" easy to do.
If someone just needs to know how to make a clean plastic with a reflection, that's easy and can be found all over (though admittedly, resources for Maxwell are pretty scant compared to most others).
I would love to see how others handle grass and hair. I just did a render where I had to make a "fur blanket" that will be used in a much larger scene. I was able to control the fur fairly well using a grass extension, but I would have much preferred to be able to groom it using Xgen. These are the kinds of developments I hope the folks at Next Limit are working on. Better integration with Maya would be wonderful as well, though I don't see that happening as most people using Maya seem to have moved past Maxwell. Apparently it integrates well into Cinema 4D though.
I think the problem here is that all the links to the RAL Library pointed to the old Maxwell Materials site.