V-Ray Material Library sample refresher script

[scb-vray]

Sure - I will send right away.

[^Lele^]

thanks ever so much!

[olly]

Thanks for the great work on this ^Lele^ and the VRML devs. This library is a very welcome feature and being able to add to it, makes it even better.

^Lele^
If you are planning on releasing hotfixes here, would it be possible to display the currently installed version number in the script UI?
It would be handy to know if an update was needed or even hint if one is available.

@ VRML devs
Would it be possible to add removal of user added materials into the VRML UI. Maybe a right click on the material to remove?
There are bound to be a ton after running this script on some max/mat files and this feature would be a nice time saver and improve UX a lot.

A possible bug:
When I double click a material, to launch the large preview, I can't always close it with the "X". Sometimes it works, sometimes I need to give the OS focus to some other window and then go back to max and retry and if all else fails I have to right-click the title bar and choose close.
This is happening to me in max 2021.1, vray 5 update 1, build 3, win 7 pro.

Cheers,
Olly

[^Lele^]

Thanks for the great work on this ^Lele^ and the VRML devs. This library is a very welcome feature and being able to add to it, makes it even better.

^Lele^
If you are planning on releasing hotfixes here, would it be possible to display the currently installed version number in the script UI?
It would be handy to know if an update was needed or even hint if one is available.

You're very welcome.
I'll definitely add the version number for the next one i'll publish here.
The idea was to *not* update here again, alas, i made a blunder after the other, and this was a decent backup plan.
The hope is for the next hotfix to contain the last script version, and from there on, any updates will come with standard V-Ray updates, in case.

[olly]

That's great thanks ^Lele^

Will the "enhanced" version be integrated into the script that ships with the vray installer? Or are you developing this as a separate tool?
I think being able to select different lighting setups and sample geometry is very useful.
I also like the "save the current scene's materials and render their samples" tool, which seems to be missing from version 1.x+?

Are you still taking suggestions on features for the either version?
If so, I have a few:
Enhanced version: It would be nice to select and generate a custom set of previews by checking the lighting/geo types to include. The sets could then be displayed when previewing or hovering over a swatch.
Specify a user LUT or VFB layer tree to be used when saving the thumbnails.
The option to specify custom geometry for the previews as .vrmesh file.
Add material from selected object to the library.
Add materials from current scene or selection to an existing mat file.


Are you still intending to suspend the VFB history when generating the thumbnails?
The history does fill up rather quickly at the moment, in both versions of the script.


Cheers,
Olly

[^Lele^]

Ah, you refer to the one i had briefly up with the multiple choices for lighting and samples?
That was a proof of concept, and somewhat a departure from canon.
There are plans to extend the material preview and general lookdev functionalities, but it's a bit too early to know what will make it as a feature.
All your suggestions are great, and are noted (as in, we've got them in our development docs), thanks ever so much.

The "canon" script, which is currently at v 111 is going to be integrated into the material library, yes.
I noticed the issue with the history, but currently there is no MXS hook to be able to turn auto-saving off: i'll throw it in as soon as we have one.
For now, the only way to do so is to turn off the history (or the autosave, as one prefers) before running the script.

[olly]

Thanks again - I look forward to seeing how it develops

[JezUK]

Is there a way to make a folder when 'Adding to Library' ?

I would like to structure my material libraries and keep them separate/outside of the main "V-Ray Material Library" folder and in their own folder (e.g. one for Poliigon, one for Arroway) etc etc.

I just don't want a jumble of different material libraries mixing up with the main Chaos supplied materials.

[JezUK]

A couple more requests please (by the way, this script is absolutely fantastic!);

1) Is there a way to free up the RAM during the running of this fantastic script please ? I have a lot of wood materials and during the processing of those, I watch my available ram go down and down until all of it is eaten up by the processing of this script (and then it failed - due to running out of ram). Is there some way that used ram can be released rather than added to during processing ?

2) Would it be possible to append new materials (that have been added to a material library) rather than recreating all materials in that library from the beginning? Say I have 30 wood materials in my poliigon_wood.mat and I go and purchase another 4 from Poliigon. I'd want to add just those 4 new ones and not redo the original 30 that have already been processed.

Many thanks.

[^Lele^]

Is there a way to make a folder when 'Adding to Library' ?

I would like to structure my material libraries and keep them separate/outside of the main "V-Ray Material Library" folder and in their own folder (e.g. one for Poliigon, one for Arroway) etc etc.

I just don't want a jumble of different material libraries mixing up with the main Chaos supplied materials.

This is currently not possible, due to the way the library works.
It would take some important changes in the library code to enable this, but i'm entirely in agreement as to its usefulness, and will campaign with the devs to get this through (with what results, though, i can't say. so, no promises.).

1) Is there a way to free up the RAM during the running of this fantastic script please ? I have a lot of wood materials and during the processing of those, I watch my available ram go down and down until all of it is eaten up by the processing of this script (and then it failed - due to running out of ram). Is there some way that used ram can be released rather than added to during processing ?

I can possibly unload RAM after each render, as currently i only do so after a .mat or .max file has been processed.
I am entirely unsure if this would help in your case, however.
Are you doing this with a material library? If that is the case, could i get a copy of it in mail (even without textures.)?

2) Would it be possible to append new materials (that have been added to a material library) rather than recreating all materials in that library from the beginning? Say I have 30 wood materials in my poliigon_wood.mat and I go and purchase another 4 from Poliigon. I'd want to add just those 4 new ones and not redo the original 30 that have already been processed.

Set "overwrite Preview Files" to "Never".
Feel free to save the setting as default if it's something you happen to do often.
This is in fact the way to refresh matlibs when material are added.
If they have also been changed, i'm afraid reprocessing of all materials is the only way.

[JezUK]

This is currently not possible, due to the way the library works.
It would take some important changes in the library code to enable this, but i'm entirely in agreement as to its usefulness, and will campaign with the devs to get this through (with what results, though, i can't say. so, no promises.).


I can possibly unload RAM after each render, as currently i only do so after a .mat or .max file has been processed.
I am entirely unsure if this would help in your case, however.
Are you doing this with a material library? If that is the case, could i get a copy of it in mail (even without textures.)?


Set "overwrite Preview Files" to "Never".
Feel free to save the setting as default if it's something you happen to do often.
This is in fact the way to refresh matlibs when material are added.
If they have also been changed, i'm afraid reprocessing of all materials is the only way.

Hi Lele,

Thank you for your help - points noted.

Regarding point 2), that would be brilliant, thank you. Yes, I am processing via a .mat file - I am sending it to you now in the next 5 minutes (to your email).

Many thanks

[^Lele^]

As of Hotfix 2, and this post, the scripts mentioned in this thread are outdated, and have been removed.
Please make use of the Chaos Material Library's own button (Add to Library) to run the latest version.
Refer to the docs for usage scenarios and limitations.

Feedback and suggestions can be posted here as usual.

[JScullin]

Hi, I had some questions:

• Where do you add metadata to the material to be able to search it?
• Does using the "Use real world scale" function only work in metric?
  • Is it just looking at the .mat name and turning it on for every map?
  • What if I have maps at different scales in other UVW channels?
• How should a RWS material be set up when submitting using the add to library tool?
  • Adding it to the file name produced an inaccurate/unusable browser preview but correct in the material editor
  • Having RWS off renders the preview correctly, but not in the material editor

Thanks in advance. This looks incredibly useful once I understand some details.

[^Lele^]

• How should a RWS material be set up when submitting using the add to library tool?
  • Adding it to the file name produced an inaccurate/unusable browser preview but correct in the material editor
  • Having RWS off renders the preview correctly, but not in the material editor

Would you be so kind as to send me an email with the details of what goes wrong?
Ideally, i could do with a copy of the materials and their maps, so to reproduce the issue on my side.

[JScullin]

Thanks. Sent along the .mat file and some details.

I also wanted to add that when importing the materials to the browser library it's not updating the material with the new bitmap paths, but it is moving the bitmaps to the new location.