Problems with Composite Material in 3dsmax 5

[Dave Black]

Try a mix material with the .tga mask in the mask channel. One channel is the blue, the other is the .tga color file. Works alot better.

If, in the future, you decide you want to have 2 materials with different parameters, instead of 2 maps, you can use a blend material. Works like the mix map.

Hope that's of some help.

-3DZ

:D

[zeroping]

thanks for responding so quick,
strangely enough i don't seem to have a "mix" material, so i figure that "Blend" is the one i should look at This works ok, but it seems to change the colour of my foreground image, regardless of whether its premultiplied or not.

Its strange, why have a composite material that doesn't work? Any more help would stop me from freaking out and smashing my monitor :)

zeroping

[zeroping]

oops, now i see how to get to mix. i'll try that now.

thanks again!

[Dave Black]

My fault. I said mix material, instead of mix map. I'm very sorry. It's deadline day today, so my brain is a bit scattered. Please accept my apologie.

Hope it's all work'n out for you.

-3DZ

:D

[zeroping]

nope,
that doesn't seem to be working since it won't stencil properly. i'm going to explain what i'm trying to do.

i've got a blimp with a large reflection map and bump map on the body. that is the base material. now i want to put text and a face onto the blimp, and be able to position them separately.

when i tried using the mix material, i turned tiling off on the text, which caused the underlying blimp reflection texture to be cut off where the text's tiling ended.

confusing and frustrating.

thanks for any help

seth

[Dave Black]

Are you working with a properly UV unwrapped mesh? If not, this is part of the problem...sort of...

Is your mask black and white with proper contrast?

Sounds like you are using a color map for the mask...Hmmmm...

-3DZ

:D

[gaggle]

Just a quick ponder, are you sure you're using the TGA's alpha-channel? Does that material work if you copy it to a standalone slot and apply it to the blimp? Ie you'd just get the sign I suppose, floating in mid-air.

The composite-material does work, or at least I've used it before without havint to go through too much physical pain.. it sounds odd if it wouldn't work for you. I think it's Discreet's intention that the Composite material is indeed what should be used when you want a decal on top of another material.. at least I can't come up with any other use for it :)


As a backup plan, Blend oughta work for you as well. Material 1 is the blimp-material, Mat2 is the Decal, and the alpha-slot gets treated with the TGA alpha channel.
Or so goes the theory.

[zeroping]

hello there!

it looks like the problem was that i didn't use just a black and white with alpha tga for the opacity map. i thought it would ignore the colour value and just use the alpha. silly rabbit. hopefully now i can get this damn blimp done already!

Thanks for your help guys

seth

[Dave Black]

WAIT!

Max WILL ignore the color!!!

What it won't do, is use an embeded mask. It just has to be a seperate file.

-3DZ

:D

[CGTalk Moderation]

This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.