Hi im new to fumefx and have been trying to render out a simple tyre smoke simulation in shot. Im using mentalray to render this scene where I have finalgathering turned which is using a HDR map for illumination. The problem im having is that the smoke doesnt seem to be getting any illumination, it just renders out with varying levels of black dependant on the smoke denisty. Is there a setting I have missed in either mentalray or the fumefx? I have tried turning on multiple scattering which seemed to crash mentalray everytime and ive also tried the illumination map which also crashed out ( I think you prob have to use direct lighting with illumination map but im not sure)
Could anyone give me some tips here as I would really like to get past this problem and get to blowing stuff up.:twisted:
Mentalray and Fumefx help needed
Also does FumeFX support raytraced shadows? Or do you have to render with Shadow maps only? I cannot see anything about this on there website.
If Mental Ray is your only option I would opt for scanline and a skylight with an enviro map and comp it. If you need the GI from MR then just render a GI pass and forget the rest.
Oh and Yes Fume supports Raytraced shadows. Generally though your best option is to use the ABshadow map.
Thanks for your reply im just wondering how to enable ABshadow maps? I cannot find this option in my lights or in the Fume options dialogue or in documentaion. Ive had some success with FumeFX and MR in as much that ive managed to illuminate the smoke using the illumination map settings which looks ok but definatly no good enough to integrate over backplates/footage etc so im going to look into comping out passes and go this route.
Q: In relation to illumination maps if you change the illumination map settings do you have to recalculate the simulation from scratch? when I change these settings my smoke goes black until I recalculate the simulation again.
Q:Whats the workflow to get multiple scattering working? This seems to crash max everytime.
Q:Can you download simluation presets anywhere? Ive found a few on the net but just wondering if theres maybe a good resource somewhere.
Also if I use FG and mapped skylight in max the fume fx clound renders black unless I turn up the ambient colour in the Render tab. Is this the way your supposed to use Fume? I thought it was ray marching under the hood so im thinking its rendering black because of ray depth maybe or some other setting that I have missed.
Ok ive got another question lol. What is the FumeFXMR output shader for? Again theres nothing in the docs about it and it seems to mirror all the settings in the Fume properties.
Thanks for your reply im just wondering how to enable ABshadow maps?
You need to have Afterburn installed.
Q: In relation to illumination maps if you change the illumination map settings do you have to recalculate the simulation from scratch? when I change these settings my smoke goes black until I recalculate the simulation again.
No, Illumination maps are calculated at render time.
Q:Whats the workflow to get multiple scattering working? This seems to crash max everytime.
It is my guess that this is related to Mental Ray, scanline works just fine.
Q:Can you download simluation presets anywhere? Ive found a few on the net but just wondering if theres maybe a good resource somewhere.
Not to my knowledge, since simulations tend to be fairly specific to circumstances the only real presets that would make any sense would only be good starting points, you would more than likely be adjusting most of the parameters again anyway, also presets do not hold source objects or source keyframes, they do however hold grid keyframes.
Also if I use FG and mapped skylight in max the fume fx clound renders black unless I turn up the ambient colour in the Render tab. Is this the way your supposed to use Fume?
This is why I suggested using Scanline, I have not been able to produce any type of enviromental lighting with MR in fume with the exception of use a standard light and a projector map. Not to say that it can’t be done, someone else may have a solution, I don’t know of a technique. Vray and finalRender on the other hand are straightforward and simple to achieve enviro illumination.
What is the FumeFXMR output shader for?
The Map is there to authorize network rendering of Fume and Mental Ray, there are no user definable settings for it other than Authorization. AFAIK the Shader and all of the parameters are set by the plugin when you have extra FumeFX MR render licenses and network render, I don’t have any of these licenses so I cannot tell you for sure, but all of the parameters match the Fume UI params so it is an educated guess.
Mental Ray support is included since it is a “base” part of max, it works, and I am sure if you have spent a lot of time with the two you can achieve reasonable results. Myself and many folks I know only use scanline, vray, and fR as they have much broader functionality and have been in the pipeline much much longer.
Master Zap would have to give you the complete lowdown on Fume and Mental Ray. 
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