window glasses

[fabrizzzio]

Hi guys!
I'm working on a scene where I have some windows. The glasses I want to do with Vray MAPs to use with VRAY (free version). The problem is that I never set up glass in VRAY and this is a very complex scene.
What settings I have to use for a good-looking glass?

I need some help please.
Will be really appreciated.

[losbellos]

so, its very easy, you put a vraymap in the reflection/refraction slot of your standard material. (default vraymap settings is REFLECTION) so get into the refraction one and set the vraymap to refract.
Then swicht to the reflection's vraymap and on the filter color map's put a fallof map with fresnel option, basicly thats it.

If you want a specific color the easiest way just set your diffuse color to whatever u want, and then decrease the refraction value so that u can see some color of the glass. (100% ref means full transparent)

here is two example the dark colored one (well its quite dark greyish) and the full transparent.
Good luck!

http://losbellos.artshost.com/index.html
--
I forgot to add that u better uncheck the cast shaodow option in all window object properties. Otherwise it will cast black shadows...

[fabrizzzio]

Thanks a lot losbellos. The images are great!

It's really interesting that what you said about if the glass cast shadows, they will be black.
Please read this thread I post in CGTalk...
http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=84028
There Ill explain the problem with more details but with standard raytracing max engine.
It looks that it's the same problem you talk about (black glass)...

...

[fabrizzzio]

Update!

Hi again.

Here's a test render for the windows.



As you can see there's no environment reflection in the glasses.
Just black.
I don't know why.

There are VRay Maps in refraction and reflection slots and the material is a standard max material with specular: 250; glossiness: 75; opacity:0 and I use for the VRay Maps the parameters that losbellos post.

Please Help!!!!

It will be really appreciated.

[metroberlin]

i normale use a standard material. shader blinn, ambient colour black, diffuse dark grey, specular white, opacity 4-8, specular level about 80-100, glossiness about 50. you can also use the antisotropic shader. but normaly blinn works better.

in the reflection slot a vraymap with a folloff map in the "filter color" slot. falloff map from dark grey to light grey. reflection value about 80-85.

in the refraction slot the same but without falloff. of course you must use a refractmap as a vraymap

i tried a lot of materials for my arch. renderings, but this one is the best so far. i takes a little longer to calculate, but i think it´s the best result for windows. you have a great balance between refraction and reflection,it casts a transparent shadow and there´s enough light for the gi.

[fabrizzzio]

thanks metroberlin!
I think that the settings I used are close to that you name. Because the problem was in the reflection slot, I thought, in one of my tests I didn't use refraction, but the problem was still there.
I can't get the reflections of the environment that I want.

It's getting me crazy...

I'll been trying...

[fabrizzzio]

Hi guys... I'm again...
now rendering.

Just a question:
I've got a scene with 300.000 polycount. I use VRAY shadows and one material for glass with VRAY MAP
I use VRAY for render (free version)
Settings:
Antialias: -1; 3
Irradiance Map: High quality
Environment: 1.0 skylight
Indirect Illumination: First bounce 1.0, second 0.5
the rest of the params are the default one.

Well, last night I spent 10 hours (in a PIII 800 Mhz system with 256MB RAM) in 800 x 700 pix resolution, and when I woke up this morning, nothing happened. The VFB was black, and no image there. The system was processing in that moment.

I wonder if it was no enough time, or maybe there was a problem.
I made a lot of test with simple geonmetry of that scene, and there was no problem. The problem, is that I can't spend 12 hours every time I need to do a high quality test render.

I need your opinion please.
What could be the problem? The scene? the render?
maybe the settings?

I'm shocked...

[natty]

Hi fabrizzzio
sounds like to me that you are running out of memory.
have you tried increasing your paging file size........
Natty

[losbellos]

decrease the settings, try -4/-3 (low/very low) and see what happes. (you will get faster feedback) What is on the screen 10 hours is too long even you have not much memory... 300.000 poly isnt that much...

[fabrizzzio]

Many thanks Natty and losBellos!
You're helping me a lot.

Natty: that's a good point. How can I do that?

losBellos: I think too that there are not too much polys. I rendered the same scene using a great quality (even more in some aspects like irradiance map quality for example) and the longer time it took was 3 hours 56 minutes. But it was using standard max shadow map option. In the last option I tried VRay Shadows to try correct some problem with glasses.
As you can see, I thought that the problem was something related to VRAY shadows, when I use a little geometry it render fine.

[fabrizzzio]

it's me again...

well, just to say that I tried as you said losBellos, with low presets and take off AREA SHADOWS. The render was done in 30 minutes. I think that the area shadows are the problem.
What can I do to create softer shadows with VRAY SHADOWS?

...It's getting more and more interesting

[losbellos]

nothing....(except using area shadows.. U can use max advanced ray traced shadow with jitter edges. That makes the edges softer, try on somethig else firs and see how it works then try on your scene.

What do you have on the snene actually if you could wrinte on it or drop an image I could be more specific.

Also try to change the QMC parameters (especially if you have outdoor scene) like amount:1 noise:0.01 min samples: 30, this in many cases produce very little visual difference, but renders much faster, at least for preview is great!