Alternatives to itoo forest pack pro?

[DPS]

I have been using FPP for a while - generally it's pretty good and I love that features but I have one problem with it - materials and IDs.

Example - say I have:

4 rocks with unique diffuse and normal maps
4 rocks that have unique normal maps and blended box maps for diffuse.

(In reality I have 20 or so rocks using various methods to get many ubique combos without too much work)

Problem is you need unique material IDs per rock. That's doable but a pain.

Now substitute the above example for vegetation - do I really want to renumber my material IDs for each scene. Say if I want ten individual trees in one FPP object each with 5 material IDs.

So my question is, is there a solution where I can stick any objects in and it respects materials as-is?

[trixian]

This is the only issue I have with Itoo's stuff as well. More specifically, I wonder if this might be that all 3rd party plugin developers have had to invent their own custom material randomization routine as no proper hooks exist besides mat ids in 3dsmax. I think Vray should have some sort of common standardised randomization system for material & texture variation built in so all these separate plugins can work. This way, the guy making the multiTexture map could make it compatible with forestpackpro and multiscatter etc. through Vray's api. As it stands, none of the available systems seem work with each other at all.

[DPS]

I spoke too soon - itoo found a work around for me. And they are hoping to get a more integrated solution in future.

Happy days.

Edit - my bad, I had two itoo problems they helped with one but still need to renumber IDs.

On a similar note - I'd love a feature of named IDs, so you could prefix them with a sensible name and have unlimited number of them.

[trixian]

eh...ok.
Feel free to describe your workaround here so others might benefit, or link to your thread on the itoo forums possibly?

[DPS]

So I had problems with my UVs on some rock objects that I was pretty sure was object ID related. I had specific normal maps and then three options for variations. Two different blended box map diffuse maps, one had a procedural composite map over the top. And then one specific UVed diffuse map.

My UVs were screwing up and I wasn't sure if it was directly related to my original post but here goes with solution:

Add FPP items in order - object 1, then 2, then 3 (IDs are the same)

Consolidate material then re-apply (just incase)

Create your shaders with vray multisubtex and appropriate material IDs. Keep going so you have one shader per FPP item.
Create a new multisubobject material for each shader with one input id of 1 (regardless of what mat IDs are in your vray multisubtex).

Plug each shader into its own multisubobject material and apply each of these to the material slot in the FPP geometry tab.

Now you can see why I was a little confused but it worked.

Hope that makes sense - no web access for two week - stuck using iPhone

[wxyz]

Would this help?:
http://www.vizpark.com/shop/crossmap/

[DPS]

Thanks for the link - any idea how it distributes/randomises?

Itoo can already randomise maps but when using a combination of some random and some specific maps for different objects in one FPP object it gets trickier. I think it's to do with how max treats an itoo object as a single object rather than fully respecting the IDs of any objects that you add.

[trixian]

Actually, I found my self really confused after reading your explanation several times.
This is what I get:
You have x number of rock meshes, each set up to be able to use a given set of normal maps randomly.
Adding them to FPP, you get UV mapping issues?
Does this actually mean that the different rock meshes (that logically would have unique uvs if you are using custom unwrapped normal-maps) are picking the wrong materials when scattered?
Regarding IDs; I seem to remember object ids not working when scattered, but mat ids should be fine.
I'm thinking maybe your material explanation is the one that confuses me.
Would you not just add the meshes into the FPP object and let FPP bake the multisub material for you, and then go in adjusting the settings in the maps if needed?

[DPS]

Hi, sorry you're right my explanation wasn't very clear.

All of my rocks are using their specific normal maps.

Regarding diffuse, I have three sets of variants:

Specific
Another specific + procedural
Blended box maps

And for some unknown reason my specific maps were not mapping correctly. I'm not sure exactly why but the work around did the trick.

I can post some screens on Thursday with the setup if you like. Just rinsed out my mobile hotspot connection but only few days to go...