[Ernesto]

Hello, although I am not using Maxwell Render 2.x yet, I wonder if you could tell me wether this is possible or not in Maxwell Render 2.x:

I would like to create a totally transparent material, that would be partially emitter, based in an Image map (mxi)
The emitter part of the material should be transparent too, so that it would not block any other light from other lightsources.

A possible use for this could be a transparent touch screen like the following:

The new samsung transparent leds screen.

Or these clasic handwritten transparent signs, that are self illuminated


I was not able to do that in Maxwell 1.7. The problem I have found in certain versions is that the emiter part of the material cannot be made transparent at all! I could make the not emiter part of the material totally transparent, but not the emmiting pixels.
In case of an emiter material which is not based in image map, that IS possible. I could verify it by using the multilight feature, and when the light dimmer is switched off, nothing was visible, but when it was on, I could see the emiter surface. Another way to verify this is creating a material ID mask, in the case of a plane emiter (not based in image map) it is not registered in the mask map at all!
In the map based version, a shadow that matches the emitting pixels could be seen in the material ID mask no mater the intensity of the light source as it is dimered in multilight.
In other versions of the material that was really transparent even in the emiting pixels, an issue seemed to appear when a light source is seem through the transparent plane. It seems that the transparent part of the material is only transparent to global illumination but not to another light source. Anyway this was really complex, and tricky, but I was told that V2.x materials are much easier and simplier than V1.7

Well I hope someone has the solution!

Thanks in advance

Ernesto

[Mihai]

With the layer system in V2, it would simply be a matter of changing the layer weight. Set it to 50% and all bsdfs/emitters in that layer would be 50% transparent.

[tom]

Ernesto, we have a DEMO version here:
http://www.maxwellrender.com/index.php/ ... e/download

[Ernesto]

Thanks, I will!

One more question, Tom: Is it possible to install Maxwell Demo 2.x in the same machine where I have Maxwell Render 1.7?

Ernesto

[Ernesto]

With the layer system in V2, it would simply be a matter of changing the layer weight. Set it to 50% and all bsdfs/emitters in that layer would be 50% transparent.

That is interesting...
If I set it to 100%, would I be able to see the emiting light?

[tom]

Is it possible to install Maxwell Demo 2.x in the same machine where I have Maxwell Render 1.7?

Yes, no worries.

With the layer system in V2, it would simply be a matter of changing the layer weight. Set it to 50% and all bsdfs/emitters in that layer would be 50% transparent.

That is interesting...
If I set it to 100%, would I be able to see the emiting light?

No, you don't need it. Layer weight could be at 100%. What you need is a ghost BSDF and it works as you say unlike it gets totally disappeared in 1.x series.