VrayCurvature Feedback

[soulburn3d]

So glad to see the beginnings of a curvature map inside vray, this is going to rock very hard

I assume we're going to see more features such as...

- flat color
- concave color
- convex color
- Gain
- KFactor
- speed increase

Here's an initial test, it's not there yet, but I'll update the image as more features get added. Thanks again for adding this.



- Neil

[alexyork]

Ooh... interesting. Any documentation/info on this? Looks like a more sophisticated kind of AO. What kind of use cases would there be?

[theedge]

The Boomer Labs map is pretty impressive !

[Jiri.Matys]

Yes, Boomer Labs is much much MUCH better than this. I looked forward for this one from Chaos Group (integration, from Chaos...), but sorry, now Iam testing plugin from Bloomer Labs and I thought VRayCurvature will be something like this. But its not in every way, only few options and result is absolutely not satisfying in lot of situations, where Bloomer Labs rocks!

Hope Chaos Group will work on that, it could be really great map, but now its not and its really slow compare to Boomer Labs plugin.

[vlado]

<shrug> We were asked to port a specific mental ray shader, which is what we did, even though I didn't have plans for a curvature texture in the first place. Suggestions for improvements are welcome and we'll do them; there's no need to whine about it.

Best regards,
Vlado

[cheerioboy]

Interesting. I'd be interested to see how this compares with VrayDirt

[Vizioen]

Poor Vlado. Rome wasn't built in a day either. Besides Vray is still a renderengine, not an all-in-one solution (although it would be nice ofcourse).

[Jiri.Matys]

I did not mean any harm. I love VRay, this is why I use it and teach it. Iam just saying Bloomer plugin is great for what people maybe want from curvature map I think. So anyone know there is something else to suite their needs, thats all.

VRay is great with or without curvature map.

[soulburn3d]

<shrug> We were asked to port a specific mental ray shader, which is what we did, even though I didn't have plans for a curvature texture in the first place. Suggestions for improvements are welcome and we'll do them

See my list of features in the first post. While I like Boomer's plugin, at $60, a lot of people won't be interested in buying it, so a shader in vray that's more full featured would be a huge help. Please contact me for any more details.

- Neil

[soulburn3d]

For the people in the thread asking about this and AO, Ambient Occlusion will capture only the concave surfaces on an object. Curvature will capture the concave and convex surfaces. Frequently one uses Ambient Occlusion in shading to place dirt and rust in areas that are sheltered, which is frequently where dirt and rust would appear in real life. And then you use a curvature shader to capture the convex edges on a surface, to place stuff like scratches and paint breaking off to reveal metal, since the sharp convex edges are frequently where people rub up against the surfaces, causing this sort of wear. Here's a little more info...

http://www.neilblevins.com/cg_educat...x_map_wear.htm

http://www.neilblevins.com/cg_educat...usion_rust.htm

Glad to see Vlado is open to improving the map, as it'll need more parameters to capture this look properly.

- Neil

[lllab]

great examples.
i do think at least some parts of the above shown things are possible already now with vray dirt, if you mix/blend 2 dirt shaders in a mix shader (i used "product" mode). one dirt with invert normals and double sided option on. i often use this setup to make things like shown above. normaly with texture s in the radius slots to add some grunge.

here a rough small test.one could texture the radius to make nice scratches/damages to the surface parts as in Neils nice examples above,
i made it simple here, just one dirt red, the other green to separate convex/concave and neutral(white)



this was made in c4d version, sorry, but same possible in max or any vray i guess.

that said i think it would probably be quite useful to have some of the boomers features/easy of use, i also like the tension map p.e, or also texture input for the curvature shader values

cheers
Stefan

[lllab]

p.s.: the curvature shader would help where dirt fails due its nature, also in the above combination use, which happens when the thickness of an object is less than double the dirt radius.
so actually i think it is important to have a curvature shader having similar features as vray dirt (or add a "curvature mode" to dirt mabye?)

cheers
Stefan

[soulburn3d]

I did a test running dirt for curvature like you describe a year ago and ran into a number of problems and limitations. See this thread:


http://forums.chaosgroup.com/showthread.php?78797-Curvature-map-for-max-and-any-word-on-the-raw-light-selects&p=626095#post626095

So while its a good workaround to know, I'd hesitate using it to replace an actual curvature shader.

- Neil

[soulburn3d]

p.s.: the curvature shader would help where dirt fails due its nature, also in the above combination use, which happens when the thickness of an object is less than double the dirt radius. so actually i think it is important to have a curvature shader having similar features as vray dirt (or add a "curvature mode" to dirt mabye?)

Looks like you found the issues I was just posting about

- Neil

[lllab]

yep
seems both ways are needed