ctrl_buffers

#261

k, sleeped well, checked again, and still can’t find a real way to Output
the Primarybuffer with the same naming structure like the Buffer…
Off Course I can name it in the Renderglobals… But yeah that did’t help.

  By now it seem to me I always getting this:
Base.Color =  Lambert ( getting color )          = RenderglobalsName.iff
  Layer_1 = Blinn ( getting Specular )             = MyObject.Specular.iff
         Layer_2 = Usebackround ( getting  Shadow )  = MyObject.Shadow.iff
  
  Yes I can get this working via naming my 
RenderglobalsName.iff as MyObject.Color.iff 
and then switching the Names via a RenderLayerOverride if I need.

Because there are always more then one Object in a scene.
But this way, all in all is shhhiiiit. To much work for just an Correct naming structure.

 SO my question again :) is there another way... to set my Name for the Primarybuffer
 Not via the Renderglobals?
#262

Hi.

I’m trying to make a network for outputing separete passes of misss_fast_skin (unscattered diffuse, epidermis, subdermal, back and specular, by just setting one’s weight to 1 and others - to 0) through ctrl_buffers and I’m having strange issues with bump. When I assign single misss to my object I get normal results and as soons as I plug my shader through ctrl_buffers, I get two problems:

  1. bump is somewhat blurred - it looses details, they become broader etc. Nasty results. Raising lightmap samples/resolution, render sampling - doesn’t improve anything.
  2. with each additional buffer activated (I need the same bump on diffuse, epidermis and specular), bump becomes more pronounced as if it’s results are layering onto each other from each buffer, so I have to lower it’s value. Anyway, that blurred result is very annoying.

Without bump all passes seem to be identical.

Can anyone explain wtf? Here’s the example:

left: original bump, just a misss assigned to geom with diffuse weight = 1 and all other weight’s = 0
right: the closest result through ctrl_buffers - I had to unplug all buffers (well, I’ve left with this diffuse at render.buffer and epidermis at 1st). There’s a noticable blur in wrinkles and a lot of pores are gone.

#263

And here’s my shading network for ctrl_buffers.

Maybe I’ve forgotten or overlooked smth? I’m fighting with it a couple of days already and my head is burining (so that’s why I’ve forgotten to thank Francesca for these shaders…)

Francesca, big thanks for your plugs! :scream:

#264

On the SG node of the ctrl_buffer have you turned on “Export with Shading Engine”?

Bump can often go weird on MR shaders unless you turn that on.

#265

Yeap, “export with SG” is checked. Anyway, I experimented with it on and off - no differences in this case, as well as I remember…

#266

pm a scene… cannot recreate on the fly your situation.

ciao
francesca

#267

Francesca, thanks for the help offering, but it seems that I’ve resolved the situation - that was all my overheated head :smiley: I just assigned a simple lambert to the hand and checked what kind of bump I’d get with it… Actually, ctrl doesn’t give blurry result, but vice versa I was getting crisp result from plain misss :slight_smile: (I just liked it more and subconsciously decided that this one is right ;))

And Jozvex was right - the whole thing about “export shading network” checkbox - it was checked for ctrl’s SG, but it wasn’t for misss’s, that’s why it was crisp - that weird bump behavior :wink:

So, I’m glad that it was my mistake and problem resolved nicely :wink:

P.S. “But maybe and this is just an illusion”, as Kafka wrote :smiley:

P.P.S. If you want to check that “bump additives” I’ve mentioned - I’ll PM you now a link to the scene - just start disconnecting bump from epi and spec and the result of diffuse’s bump will diminish (I was increasing bump_depth from -.075 for all ctrl network to -.2 for single misss to keep everything somewhat equal). That’s not crucial, of course, but pretty annoying - when I want to tweak a separete misss and render just it’s result I have to temporarily turn bump up and then turn in down for all-fbs render. Maybe you’ll have some ideas how to improve this situation. Thanks.

#268

My good god is this a cool treat! But is it normal to need an extra boost in the anti-aliasing dept? A normal min/max sampling of 0/2 producess slightly rough edges while 1/2 gets them pretty nice. I read the posts about the edge interpolation and haven’t touched the user frame buffers in the RG and I have ticked the coverage option, but I think that just relates to texture filtering? Thank you so much for your contribution!

#269

OSX version yet? :sad:

#270

Hi,

Thank you francesca for all your hard work. And to the rest of the contributers for their efforts.

I am having a problem getting this setup…

I have the downloaded files setup within maya7 ( that seems to go alright) I have followed the tutorial by Kristijan but am falling short of achiving this setup.

When trying to drag and drop the shadow collecting Surface shader node to the Buffer_store buffer1 texture tab, maya produces the connection editor and I am unsure what Im connecting…

I have tried both with maya 6 and 7 to get this working but am a little confused as to which instructions relate to which version and weatehr or not I should be using the mix8layer at all?

I have read through this thread 3 times and am just not able to make any headway atm. If anyone has any help for me or example with maya7, I would most appricate it.

I downloaded the example file Buffer_Method_1 ( thanks for that ) and it seems to work on maya6.5.

Altthough the outputted files are not named in any useful way… I saw an earlier post about that…

Thanks

matt

#271

hi all
just out of curiosity…anyone ever tried to pipe the output buffers into different channels of *EXR?
would be nice to know the result and settings…
maybe some guys from D2 that has that integrated into their pipeline?
tnx all

#272

I suppose you should write your own Output shader that will write to exr format what you want .

#273

I fear that…
puppet your shader are awesome tnx a lot man!!
mmmhh I ll try to custom an output shader
should be easy since I have very limitated programming skills…
would do with mel?
LOL

-a

#274

No such thing for Maya 5.0 is there?

God i need to upgrade.
Iest

#275

upgrade would be nice
check at the beginning of the thread

-a

#276

Totally agree on the upgrade.

I’ve read the thread, still can’t see any Maya 5.0 version. Where about at the beginning is it? a Post by who? This looks to good to miss
Thanks
Iest

#277

1000 thanks for what might be the single most useful maya/mr shader. Going cross-platform with this would be incredible. Thanks again! :thumbsup:

#278

Hi,

After some headscratching I managed to get this working on maya7.0. Thanks Fran, this is a great shader workflow.

I wonder if any one has had success with using multiple objects with multiple shaders setups? any suggested workflows?

Also has any one got refraction working?

matt

#279

I should have been releasing this way earlier, somehow I didnt find the time. Many things have been added and improved, some things have been removed. However, in the end it’s still basically the same as here.

Maya 6.5 only, and it’s still the old zDepthDOF shader.

Dont be mad if it’s not working 100% for you. It’s rather a very personal put-together of various shaders and features of mentalray. Think of it as an example of what you can do with mr phenomena. It’s absolutely no rocket science. 90% of the credits go to the guys and girls who wrote these nifty shaders.

Enjoy.

#280

due to high request I added full support for the coverage
and label buffers.

[img]http://img272.imageshack.us/img272/2535/gardencov7tm.jpg[/img]

[color=Silver]just add to the scene a buffer_api geometry shader.. by default all the 
objs in the scene will get their label. goto your render camera and add 
an output pass, set it to coverage, file mode, mentalrayAlpha(st), type 
a path.[/color]


[img]http://img272.imageshack.us/img272/602/gardenlabel5lz.jpg[/img]

do the same for the label/tag channel by getting an output pass.. set it 
to label, file mode, mentalrayTag(tt).

[color=DeepSkyBlue] goto rendersettings->mentalray->customentities->passCustomLabelCh

[/color]
[color=LightBlue]:: maya7.0 only ::[/color]

ciao
francesca