[thinkbuild]

Greetings all.

Over the past couple of years I've collected a wonderful collection of materials and put them in various places. Now, its a complete mess.

Needless to say, my material library doesn't work so well anymore ;).
My biggest problem is that I can't seem to get any preview within SU of what maxwell materials actually look like at all when applied. Am I missing something?

Please - someone! Advise me: What should this directory look like:
~/Library/Application Support/Google SketchUp 6/SketchUp/Materials
??

See: http://www.thinkbuild.com/temp/mat-lib-mess.html for a screenshot of mine


I have two questions:

1. How should it look?
>> Maybe, someone could post a screen shot of how it should look?


2. What is the best (suggested?) material application workflow?

thanks very much and best to all,

thinkbuild

[Sheik]

I am not on a Mac, but that shouldn’t make a difference. I am not exactly sure what you meant by not getting a preview within SU.
The way I do it (if that would help):
I have several folders for “automxm” linked materials, like Maxwell Arroway, My Mxm, Mxm Light, etc. I mostly try keeping folder with the same name both is SU and the Maxwell Materials Database, like I have MyMxm in both, so I know where to look for them if I make changes. I try keeping maps in the same folders as the Mxm so moving folders wouldn’t be a problem.
Workflow:
-I make or download an Mxm to the Maxwell MatDb, mostly to MyMxm.
-If the Diffuse map is big (over 600*600) I make a downscaled copy of it in the same folder. I name it with the same name with a _SU ending. (Example: Originalmap_SU.jpg).
-I make a SU material using that map, and give it the correct scale, and save it in the SU installation path under materials in a folder with the same name as the one in the Maxell MatDb (mostly I do that…).
Did that help?
Sheik

[Richard]

What sheik suggests looks like a good workflow!

Personally I don't use the autoMXM feature anymore as I find it difficult to test various materials due to the need to rename. So I just link the materials manually.

I organise all my materials under various categories AGS glass, emitters, brickwork, rendered brickwork, timber surfaces, timber flooring, floor tiles, water etc etc.

In these folders I keep a copy of the material test scene image for visual reference of the material and a folder named same as the test scene image that contains the maps and the MXM and as per sheik's suggestion I create and store in there also a low res map of the colour map or often the bump map (better for accurate map placement in SU) I open the high res map and use the "save for the web" feature of PhotoShop to generate a map of the same pixel dimensions and lower the file size to generally sub 200kb. As you may know large high res maps really can bog SU down.

I add _SU to the map name for easy reference and use this map in the model... It is important to keep the same pixel dimensions of this map for reasons of correct tiling!

Mind you I don't do this for every material I download as many I may never use or have downloaded them for reference of their build.

Another thing I often do for better materials is while I have the colour map open in PS is to add a few adjustment layers (brighness and contrast, saturation and colour adjustment) and generate a few alternative maps that I may find useful for later use. Takes up some hard drive space but saves time later, I also save the PSD file for future tweaking of the colour map should I need it. Five minutes spent at this stage can really boast the level of resources quickly available in the future!

[Zeti Maria Omar]

hi richard, has there been any change to your workflow with thelatest plugin?

[Richard]

hi richard, has there been any change to your workflow with thelatest plugin?

Mate I haven't been using the latest plugin yet as I have been in the middle of a large job and not keen to try and fix what isn't broke until I get that out of the way! I had issues for the first time with installing MR 1.6.1 and the previous plug so went back to v1.5 and v1.8 of the plug.

Will keep you updated - though I cant see any likely change to my workflow as the direct linking is working well for me!!!