First Thoughts on Lavina

[VelvetElvis]

For a beta version, this piece of software really has been geeking out. I was pleasantly surprised to see how easy it was go to from Max into Lavina. My poor 2080 max-q laptop card that I have on my work laptop was screaming for mercy though. Attached is a screen grab from the project I'm testing it on.

Some random thoughts and wishes after using this for a few hours:
- Mouse look is really clunky if you don't start the walk thought with the mouse centered in your view. Can you add a reset view button or hotkey?
- Scene navigation is also pretty clunky. As I get close to the glass to go inside, it feels like the scene slows way down then springs through the glass.
- Will it be possible to get a 2nd UVW channel to import? We have a concrete tile floor and the concrete texture is on channel 1 and the tile overlay is on channel 2, but they both come in on channel 1. (Still, I was so happy to see that many of the max maps like tile and composite come in!)
- I noticed that while the lights are invisible, they still cast a contact shadow near the surface. If you have a recessed light, you'll see the shadow on the ceiling where the vray plane light is.
- Will mesh lights be able to be imported in the future? We have some neon tubing in this scene that is not being imported at the moment.
- Is it possible to preserve the layers from Max to help organize the scene in Lavina to be able to quickly turn off things like furniture?
- If we turn off refraction, can the object just go invisible instead of black? If I turn them off to just be able to move around a bit better, all of my glass goes pure black.

You all have knocked it out of the park with this program, so keep up the development.

[vladimir.nedev]

- Will it be possible to get a 2nd UVW channel to import? We have a concrete tile floor and the concrete texture is on channel 1 and the tile overlay is on channel 2, but they both come in on channel 1. (Still, I was so happy to see that many of the max maps like tile and composite come in!)

We have this planned, but it has to be done carefully, as we don't want to send UV sets to the GPU that are not actually used by the shader. So, it becomes a little more complicated.

- I noticed that while the lights are invisible, they still cast a contact shadow near the surface. If you have a recessed light, you'll see the shadow on the ceiling where the vray plane light is.

Yes, there are some issues with back-side visibility in general, and visibility to shadow rays when the light is "invisible".
I will log a high priority issue to fix this.

- Will mesh lights be able to be imported in the future? We have some neon tubing in this scene that is not being imported at the moment.

They are planned, but before we include them, we will have to assess how much they affect performance.

- Is it possible to preserve the layers from Max to help organize the scene in Lavina to be able to quickly turn off things like furniture?

I think we already have the "layers" data in the .vrscene file. So it should be possible at some point, but can't promise when.

- If we turn off refraction, can the object just go invisible instead of black? If I turn them off to just be able to move around a bit better, all of my glass goes pure black.

That's an interesting suggestion.
Maybe a completely separate option - "Hide refractive objects" would make more sense ?

Greetings,
Vladimir Nedev

[npg]

- Mouse look is really clunky if you don't start the walk thought with the mouse centered in your view. Can you add a reset view button or hotkey?
- Scene navigation is also pretty clunky. As I get close to the glass to go inside, it feels like the scene slows way down then springs through the glass.

Hi

Are you talking about engaging mouse look with Right Mouse Button (temporary) or with F2 (permanent)? Could you clarify what exactly frustrates you and what you would prefer?

We are aware of the issue when zooming in/out with the mouse wheel and you go through a wall or object. We have some solutions in mind. The slowdown is intentional - the zoom step is a percentage of the distance to what you're zooming in to / away from.

Thanks for the feedback!

[VelvetElvis]

To help clarify the mouse navigation when doing a walk through, if I use the button a the top and click on it it seems as soon as I put the mouse cursor into the actual window it slams my view looking directly down into the floor and I can't recover from that because I can't tell where my mouse is in the space. Maybe just having an option to keep the cursor visible may help? Maybe if it is possible, if you click the walk through button it can auto-center the mouse cursor to the active window or full screen?

Yes, hiding refractive objects would help too. Since we all work on laptops here and sometimes we may not travel with our more powerful eGPU's, we also need to make sure we can run this with some level of success on the laptop 2080 max-q. Refractions are one of the things we can cut out and still preserve the general overall look if we need to boost performance.

[npg]

Ah! I get it - this mouse thing is a bug that we fixed on the first day and we directly replaced the download file without any announcement. If you just download and install Lavina again, this issue should go away.

We do center the cursor when entering Free Look mode (walk through is something else - the recording action on the bottom toolbar and it does not affect the mouse). We also hide it because it would otherwise jitter and get in the way when looking at the image. I think you will find the fixed build more intuitive. It's also convenient to use the keyboard shortcuts for these actions - F2 for free look and Ctrl+Shift+R for recording.

Regarding refractive objects, we do have an option to disable refractions now, which I suppose you have seen, but it makes them opaque, rather than invisible. You are suggesting to have an option to make any refractive object effectively invisible, correct? It sounds like a good idea.

[VelvetElvis]

Regarding refractive objects, we do have an option to disable refractions now, which I suppose you have seen, but it makes them opaque, rather than invisible. You are suggesting to have an option to make any refractive object effectively invisible, correct? It sounds like a good idea.

Yep, currently all of the window glass goes to it's pure diffuse color which in my case is solid black. If I am just walking around or I am doing fast lighting studies I may not want to spend the extra GPU power on refraction at that time.

[Phillip Miller]

Thanks for the comments!

We are working to improve the navigation aspects with the mouse – look for improvements in future builds.

>>Will it be possible to get a 2nd UVW channel to import?
Not every creation tool has more than 1 channel, so that’s why it hasn’t been a priority yet. We will take a look at it.

>> while the lights are invisible, they still cast a contact shadow near the surface
Thanks – we will examine this.

>> Is it possible to preserve the layers from Max to help organize the scene…
We’re limited by what vrscene itself stores, and layers are not exported right now. We will be enhancing the exporters (for things like multiple cameras) so we can take this into consideration when working there.

>> If we turn off refraction..... just be able to move around a bit better, all of my glass goes pure black..an the object just go invisible instead of black?
Could you elaborate a bit more. If you're changing things for easier navigation, isn't hiding the objects an option? Would having easier ways of selecting objects (e.g., by material) and hiding them be of more use?

- Phil

[VelvetElvis]

Would it be possible to generate a report at the end of the export that lists the objects that have an unsupported UVW channel? In Max, we have somewhat complicated materials and it is fully understandable that those may not always translate out. It might be nice to get a report so I can remember which ones I need to simplify.

If layers are hard to export, is there a way you could turn the layer from Max into a group to at least keep the objects together and be able to turn the group off globally? If this is not possible, is it hard to keep the imports together? For example, if I import the base geometry then import the furniture. Could those two imports be grouped separately in the scene list?

Yes, hiding objects by material or tag/keyword like "Glass" would also be an option.

Are there any pointers on the settings in advanced scene settings that you can share? I was looking for explanations on those, but they are not up on the site yet.

Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions. I'm not always sure if I am asking for the moon or a simple piece of code.

[vladimir.nedev]

Would it be possible to generate a report at the end of the export that lists the objects that have an unsupported UVW channel? In Max, we have somewhat complicated materials and it is fully understandable that those may not always translate out. It might be nice to get a report so I can remember which ones I need to simplify.

We definitely need a "compatibility" report for the final version, since we can't realistically support the full set of V-Ray features.
But multiple UV sets is something that has to be implemented anyway.

If layers are hard to export, is there a way you could turn the layer from Max into a group to at least keep the objects together and be able to turn the group off globally? If this is not possible, is it hard to keep the imports together? For example, if I import the base geometry then import the furniture. Could those two imports be grouped separately in the scene list?

Phil has incorrect information. We do have the layers info in the .vrscene files from V-Ray for 3ds Max. Just search for "layer/" in your .vrscene and you will see them.
No need to complicate things here.
We just need a suitable UI for them and we need to figure out how the layer visibility and transform hierarchy visibility could work together.

Are there any pointers on the settings in advanced scene settings that you can share? I was looking for explanations on those, but they are not up on the site yet.

It's best if you don't change anything in there. Some of these options will be removed in future versions.
In some cases, if you see "light cache" artifacts you may have to decrease the "cell size" and/or increase the "sample limit" for the light cache.

Greetings,
Vladimir Nedev

[Phillip Miller]

>> We do have the layers info in the .vrscene files from V-Ray for 3ds Max.

Ah - I'm so glad to be incorrect here! I guess that I don't see them in my exports because I don't use Layers.

[vladimir.nedev]

Yes, hiding refractive objects would help too. Since we all work on laptops here and sometimes we may not travel with our more powerful eGPU's, we also need to make sure we can run this with some level of success on the laptop 2080 max-q. Refractions are one of the things we can cut out and still preserve the general overall look if we need to boost performance.

We have a global ambient occlusion option that's currently hidden from the UI.
It can be combined with the ambient light, reflection/refractions, no GI and no lights to achieve a semi realistic look.
It runs much faster since the GI and lights are disabled.

Do you think it's worth adding to the UI as an option ?

Greetings,
Vladimir Nedev

[cnd7jones]

Vladimir, i think that is a really good idea..Another use case that it would be helpful for is exporting a model with no lighting for just massing study. Especially exporting from Revit with no lights yet it's nice to see some level of shade shadow to get a sense of how a space feels.

[Phillip Miller]

Of course, you do get that pretty easily with just an environment with IBL.

[VelvetElvis]

We have a global ambient occlusion option that's currently hidden from the UI.
It can be combined with the ambient light, reflection/refractions, no GI and no lights to achieve a semi realistic look.
It runs much faster since the GI and lights are disabled.

Do you think it's worth adding to the UI as an option ?

Greetings,
Vladimir Nedev

I would really prefer this option. At least half of our space studies are spaces that have little to no direct environment light, yet are more important to our clients than spaces with large windows.Spaces such as VIP clubs, sports locker rooms, arena event spaces, all have little opportunity for being lit with an environment map.

This feature is what really stands out to me in using Enscape. You can get in and out of the model in seconds with a simple click to use the white model option. There is no need for setup, no need to bring in an environment map or anything. When you have architects that are acting as hovering art directors over your shoulder, being able to explore spaces in real time quickly is an essential feature for any piece of software. If there a plans to tie Lavina into Revit then this feature becomes a must. Typically materials are not in the project in the early design exploration phases, so white models are used heavily.

[vladimir.nedev]

- I noticed that while the lights are invisible, they still cast a contact shadow near the surface. If you have a recessed light, you'll see the shadow on the ceiling where the vray plane light is.

Just wanted to let you know that this is fixed for future Lavina builds. We haven't yet released a build with the fix however.

Greetings,
Vladimir Nedev