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I seem to be having difficulity in understanding how to properly apply a material that contains a texture map. For example, if I apply Arroway's concrete-19 to a .6 meter square part and ask Maxwell to adjust the scale (via Adjust to object), I get a .248, .070, and .248 scaling. On the other hand, according to the Arroway documentation, concrete-19 is a 6 meter x 6 meter texture (at least for the full-res version). Based on that, the seemingly correct scaling would be (approximately) .100 for all elements. Even if we assume that this is a 1m x 1m map, then .248 is incorrect as well. It should be .56. Additionally a perusal of virtually all the texture files, sets Tile X and Tile Y at 1.00. This would (I assume) imply that all of the texture maps represent one square meter. Clearly this is incorrect. Look at Arroway's Boards-01. This is, if nothing else, a non-square pattern and it is certainly not 1m x 1m. Finally, while Arroway does give the size of the textures in their documentation, I do not see this information given for any of the materials that people have graciously contributed to this site.

So my question is, does anyone know how these concepts -- texture size, UV scaling, and adjust to object, real scale, etc. -- really work? I'm sure that there is a method to all of this madness, but I've yet to get my arms around it.

Any and all help would be most appreciated.

Saludos,

Ken

purCAB wrote:Finally, while Arroway does give the size of the textures in their documentation, I do not see this information given for any of the materials that people have graciously contributed to this site.

These are interesting questions, and there are certainly a lot of issues to be discussed here. Just a quick question to your remark about the size of the textures in the library: do you mean the actual size of the texture maps in pixels, or the size/scale of the material they represent? A lot of materials have information about scale represented.

Additionally a perusal of virtually all the texture files, sets Tile X and Tile Y at 1.00. This would (I assume) imply that all of the texture maps represent one square meter.

AFAIK: only if Real Scale is checked! Otherwise this just means that 1 unit in the UVscale is 1 "texture lenght/height"

Kurt -- Thank you for the input.

I was referring to the size that the textures represent physically -- not pixel size or resolution -- and how to properly utilize that data in Maxwell. For example according to Arroway's notes, their concrete-19 texture represents a 6m X 6m physical area.

Given the current structure (unless I've missed something), the only way to transfer physical size information would be via some sort of readme or help file. Based on your comments that a lot of materials have scale information included, I guess that I've just had some "bad luck". I rechecked my last four downloads (all of which have textures) and none of them contained any texture size information. The alternative is to assume that all maps (unless specified otherwise) represent a 1m X 1m area. But again, based on the samples that I have downloaded, this does not appear to be consistent.

Ken

But another thing to consider is what size you'll be rendering at. If you want to keep things "real" and place that 6mx6m real size texture on a wall, but you do a large closeup render of it, it might not look good enough and you'll have to start tiling it anyway.

But another thing to consider is what size you'll be rendering at. If you want to keep things "real" and place that 6mx6m real size texture on a wall, but you do a large closeup render of it, it might not look good enough and you'll have to start tiling it anyway

OK, but how? With what tile size? Real Scale? What is the approach, etc.?

Ken

Hmm, well lots of questions First, the default 1 tiling you see in the texture picker doesn't mean it assumes all new textures are 1mx1m. By default, Real Scale is not checked, so what the 1 tiling means is simply the texture will be shown once on your object.

If however you turn on Real Scale in the texture picker, the objects UV set will update so that it's 1m in scale. If your object is 5m in scale, and the tiling is set to 1, this will make your texture tile 5 times. Tiling of 0.5 with with Real Scale checked is telling it to "make each tile 0.5 meters" and so on.

I think what you're confused by is texture size, when you should be thinking instead of how the UVs of the object are set up.

For example, you have a 6mx6m plane, and you have UV mapped it so that the UV stretch across the entire texture area. You apply the Arroway texture (which they say is the equivalent of a 6mx6m area) to the plane, leave Real Scale off in the texture picker, and the result is you have mapped that entire texture to the plane, and you will get the most "credible" results, meaning whatever spots and grooves the texture has won't appear too small or too big for that 6m plane.

But what if you had UV mapped the plane so that it's UVs only cover 1/3rd of the texture area? In this case applying the same texture will make 1/3rd of the texture appear on the full 6m wall.

So the texture size itself is irrelevant, you have to consider how big is your object, and how is it UV mapped to figure out the correct tiling, the correct Uv set scaling, and if you want to use Real Scale or not. Like I said, Real Scale scales the uv set so that it's 1m, no matter how big the object is. This is useful if you want to make a reusable tile material for example, you can just apply it to any size object and the tiles in the material will always have a fixed scale.

Mihai -- thanks so much for your help.

Unforunately, I'm still struggling. The only variables that seem to affect the texture are the projection type and the scale. I tried a whole variety of different settings for the material -- Tile X, Tile Y (.05, 1.0, 2.0, 5.0), and Real Scale (on/off) -- and none of these seem to make any difference to the size, shape, appearance, etc. of the applied texture.

Sorry for being so obtuse, but either I'm missing the boat entirely (quite possible), or something is not working as advertised.

Ken

It might be a viewport update issue, because changing the tiling, without changing anything to the uv set, should change how the texture is applied. If you have a mat with several textures applied, after changing the tiling, click the eye icon in the material manager and choose that texture to be displayed in the viewport, and the correct tiling should be shown in the viewport. You could also do a test render to see if the tiling has in fact been updated.