Maxwell Render | Official public forum

ptex support !

Definitely!

I can render objects just fine which were textured with PTex and exported from 3DCoat.
Just curious - what are you missing here? An option to automatically merge the separate UV-sets
which get created for areas with increased/decreased Pixel-Density, or?

Holger

I don't miss anything. I just didn't know that Maxwell supported ptex texturing. Glad it does!

If I am not mistaken any renderer should be able to interpret these textures as well as
they typically also can deal with Pelt or Atlas - or whatever Unwrap-based-mapping.

Special to Ptex maps is:

1) They are not at all human readable (true for all channels) that makes also the use of the Simball
inside the Material-Editor totally irrelevant. One more good reason to look forward the Interactive Viewport-Preview!

2) As soon as zones of different resolution get created several UV-Sets per Object are required.
One might think of a Maxwell Ptex-Material which unifies all the Channel-Maps "under one Roof".
Example:
A Closeup-Shot of a Lizzard with Hand-Painted Scales gets created. While for the Body a 2K map might be
enough one wants more Detail in the Face. No problem with Ptex - however - here it would be handy when
the Skin of the Body and the face could live inside just one mxm.

Generally looking at Ptex and how one could optimize its handling greatly made sense imo.
There's already several commercial painting apps out which write Ptex: Mari, 3DCoat, Mudbox...

Polyxo wrote: Generally looking at Ptex and how one could optimize its handling greatly made sense imo.
There's already several commercial painting apps out which write Ptex: Mari, 3DCoat, Mudbox...

Another App to be added to the list of Ptex authoring tools:
Blender http://vimeo.com/13859283
Anybody listening?

Searching for a hint on future Ptex support in Maxwell, I came across this thread, and need to add my two cents.
Blender supports Ptex, that's correct. But to say Maxwell does, because it renders the UVs created by 3D-Coat is wrong. True Ptex don't need UVs.
Nevertheless it's nice to hear, that these UVs render fine. Had issues with that in Houdini. But that was before the 'real' Ptex export in 3D-Coat.

IMHO
Lorenz

Lorenz25 wrote: Blender supports Ptex, that's correct. But to say Maxwell does, because it renders the UVs created by 3D-Coat is wrong. True Ptex don't need UVs.
Nevertheless it's nice to hear, that these UVs render fine. Had issues with that in Houdini. But that was before the 'real' Ptex export in 3D-Coat.
Lorenz

Hmm, I don't have a lot of theoretical background on UV-mapping but 3DCoat doesn't create anything one could call conventional UV-Set when painting in
Ptex mode... But of course "some" kind of non human readable grid is used to spread out the bitmap-information extracted from the 3D-model.
How is what Blender does differerent?

Better late than never, but add MEEE TOOOO to this thread.

Great then, I didn't know Ptex works perfect with our present Maxwell Render.

Polyxo wrote:I can render objects just fine which were textured with PTex and exported from 3DCoat.
Just curious - what are you missing here? An option to automatically merge the separate UV-sets
which get created for areas with increased/decreased Pixel-Density, or?

Holger

it all depend on your Ptex resolution... I myself can render simple Ptex directly in Maxwell.. BUT the thing is.. Ptex can produce several maps... not a problem with color maps.. but with Displacement... because we can have only one disp map/mxm...

so I vote for Ptex support too... hehe

I'll throw in my vote on this one too, add native support for Ptex. It's the way of things to move in a not to distant future.

/ Magnus

Hervé wrote:
it all depend on your Ptex resolution... I myself can render simple Ptex directly in Maxwell.. BUT the thing is.. Ptex can produce several maps... not a problem with color maps.. but with Displacement... because we can have only one disp map/mxm...

so I vote for Ptex support too... hehe

Yeah, in my later posts I said exactly that... Optimization for Ptex would mean an elegant solution for the Zones of different resolutions inside Ptex (resulting in several maps).
Also map-inversion (in the case of specular maps can cause issues as one can not simply invert Ptex - analog to Normal-Maps.
But I wonder: Is there a specific reason that you use displacement (assuming you are exporting from 3DCoat) - have you ever tried 3DCoats fabulous Normal-Map output?
Renders five times faster with great results in my experience.

Well in the company I work for, we prefer disp maps.. it's just not the same thing...

Polyxo wrote:Is there a specific reason that you use displacement (assuming you are exporting from 3DCoat) - have you ever tried 3DCoats fabulous Normal-Map output?
Renders five times faster with great results in my experience.

There are some things you can't do with normal maps. Normal maps employ a shading effect, while displacement creates actual geometry.