vray edge texture

[Armada01]

I'm trying to get soft edges on a cushion without modeling them. Vray edge texture might do that.

I this case I'm not trying to round the edges of the cushion (let's say a slab) itself. I did model that. However, I''ve created separate sides for the fabric to emulate how the cushion would be stitched together in real-world. To get more realism, I'd like to add a bevel to the edges of each fabric part (depicted in colors). Since modeling all that would take too much time, I'd like to use the edge texture.

However, does the edge texture apply also to edges of surfaces, or do you need a polysurface with side surfaces for it to work?

[Micha]

I think in your case you need solids. You could try the Rhino _OffsetSrf and choose solid and change the dir to inward. If the V-Ray bump edge effect doesn't look good, you could enable the Rhino softedgening. So, you could real round edges at the render mesh.

A third way, but I never used it so much, could be the shutlining feature of Rhino. But I'm not sure I will work here, if you have separate surfaces. Anyway, the shutlining is a nice tool and maybe you have overseen it yet and so you could discover it.

[Armada01]

Ok, thanks, I'll try creating solids, see if that's a quick fix

I know shutlining. Sometimes a bit iffy. In this case it doesn't seem to work as the line is on the edge of the surface. I guess it needs to be on it, which would mean offsetting the curve etc etc... just becomes too much work again... ('d have many cushions, all with many fabric panels to do)

[Micha]

I tested the shutlining method, since I need the cushion look from time to time too. I don't split the object and so the shutlining works. Maybe the default mapping should be replaced by the V-Ray triplanar mapping. Also I'm not sure how to get cleaner engraves. But for small engraves it could be better looking.

[Micha]

Nex test - sides extracted plus solid offset. Left image - softedgening. Right image - V-Ray edge bump.

[Micha]

Here I tested displacement based on the edge texture. Only working in CPU mode.

[Armada01]

Thanks for the test! Seems like better results are obtained with edge softening on actual geometry.

How did you control the texture mapping in case all was joined into one solid (like, when applying shutlining)? I do all the texturing in Rhino, no UV mapping based on unwrapping. (I'm a designer, not a CG artist, keeping things simple). Just wondering, since this is (I assume) a quick show-and-tell test.

I also tried the shutlining yesterday on a glossy surface without texture, and it works fine, although my machine goes near crashing when it's meshing, but once it's calculated, it's stable. (See image below, the central hockey-stick shaped line)

[Micha]

The texture mapping was quite good looking as I used the shutlining direct on the NURBS object which I got by _tsConvertToRhinosurf.

Do you know the triplanar mapping of V-Ray? Maybe this could help you for complex shapes too.

[Armada01]

Unfortunately I didn't buy T-splines at the time it was still available. Nice tool for making cushions and pillows :/ Too bad Autodesk decided to sabotage the Rhino-users by taking it off the market...

Anyway,...I tested the triplanar and shutlining from my end, and outcome is quite good! That might be a real timesaver! Thanks for the tip.

And yes, best kept for small engraves. like 2mm. It also helps to select the third shutline option (softer engrave) to avoid the texture being deformed and getting patterning near the shutline. (second picture)

[Micha]

Maybe the Rhino SubD tool of Rhino 7 will help you, it's in beta now.

[Armada01]

There are some downsides to the shutlining, although at first glance it seems a time-saver:

First of all it takes a loooong time to even get one line to shutline. If you're doing lots of cushions with many curves, it can takes very long.
Sometimes Rhino just looses the shutlining, like setting it to "off" (same goes for the edgesoftening). Very annoying if you need tet all objects "on again" Especially if it starts recalculating everything again.
You can't copy/paste nor mirror shutlines. Major drawback. Doing one cushion can take a long time. Doing the same cushion twice for left and right side of a symmetrical model is senseless. Also trying to recover an already shutlined object from another (older) file after your current file has gone weird, don't work, since it doesn't handle copy/paste.

All in all, the shutlining seems to muvh of a hazard to me to be used... a pity, cause it could have been powerful

[Micha]

If you like you could post at the Rhino forum about it. I like the idea of the shutlining too and maybe the team can enhance the code.

I'm curious to see the GPU displacement working. I hope there is a bug only and it will work.
https://forums.chaosgroup.com/forum/...ng-in-gpu-mode

[Armada01]

That would be great! At the moment it's just way too unstable. Most of the times it crashed...

But maybe even better, some sort of "edge" softening in vray, maybe on on surface edges (no need for solids) and just beside the edge also an engraved stitch. Then finally one could make cushions with realism all in one go! What a time saver that would be!

Maybe I'm dreaming here....

[Armada01]

I had a quick glance at Rhino 7 SUBD, but it's far from ready.
The switch between Nurbs and SUBD isn't what it should be and UI is nearly non-existent. For doinf basic shapes, maybe, anything more complex... well no.

Not diving into that for the time being as I'd spin off on a tangent that could take a week to come to a conclusion! But thanks for the tip!

Seems like Autodesk / Alias has taken the T-splines to a new level:

https://discourse.mcneel.com/t/alias...d-fyi/84493/11

That damn prohibitive Alias pricetag for anyone not working at an OEM car brand! :/