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Hi there,
It seems that the new 1.5 version of Vray will be packed with cool new features. Sure - we users love cool features as much as the developers do
, but if you work with Vray on an every day basis you'll notice some glitches and missing things in the UI fast that can be really annoying. Often these are very small things but the implementation would improve the workflow significantly. So in order to make 1.5 even more complete, (I think this is your major goal right now) you could introduce some small UI enhancements that won't shine on the feature list but make life so much easier for us users.
(Thanks tom schuelke and zerofractal for their input!)
Ok, here are our wishes, let's start with the simple ones.
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- Usable small Map Slots in the Vray Material
Open the Asset Browser and drag a Bitmap on the small Map Icon in a Standard Material - it'll pop in there and you don't have to scroll down to the "Maps Rollout" - this wont work in the VrayMtl. I think this is not too hard to fix.
- VrayLights facing the right direction
I know I’m not the only one who always get's it wrong. Please make it like every other Renderer does it - just flip it 180 Degree. This is also very easy to implement. Perfect would be a target for fast and precise Placement. (Talking about backward compatibility... maybe you can include a script that turns Vray light sources very quickly or a “flip” – button that is checked on the creation of a new Light but unchecked with in the old scenes. (Than we have a “flip” Button in there forever…) Seriously - you can't leave it like this forever. Make the turn now before you go to Maya or other 3D Programs; I think most of the users want this too.
(By the Way, Brazil handles this just cool - They really had their thinking caps on: Point Light = Two clicks in the same location, Target Spot = Click + move the mouse where you want the target + Click, Area Light = Hold down mouse while dragging for the Area Light Size (like a plane) + Release + Move the Mouse where you want the Target + Click. The last way is the one that would be perfect for the Vray Light. (Hope you understand what I just said
)
- All G-Buffer Channels checked by default
An easy one. Try this one: Define a *.RPF as output for your rendering and check all or some channels in the saving options. Now render without checking the G-Buffer Channels in Vray. Max will crash. Can you imagine this can be very annoying in the morning with a looming Deadline? Simple Solution: Just check all channels by default. (I think it's not more Rendering time or am I wrong?) This way it would also solve the problem that I have to click on every single Channel when I want to activate them all. (!9 clicks although a simple click+drag would work...
)
- Working Bucket Label
'Don't know if you guys know this. You render a picture distributed and one Slave can't get the Irradiance- or certain other maps so some buckets are screwed or just black. (Maybe there is a connection problem or the network drives are not set up properly) Now you want to know which PC is the bad one so you have to watch carefully till the next wrong bucket will appear. (Which can take pretty long...) With 10 render clients this is also complicated. I even had to put my fingers on certain buckets to remember them. Pretty bad workaround if you ask me.
So please make "leave bucket label" work... make it work even if I click the button after the rendering has started. Perfect would be an option to rerender wrong buckets. (I think this is already possible with the new VrayVFB)
- Global Material Override
Just add a Map Slot and a checkmark for a global Material Override in the render globals. This way one can test just the Lightning. Brazil, finalRender and mental ray - they all have it.
- Separated Reflection/Refraction IOR's
Also very simple. Just add another IOR spinner to the reflection parameters in the VrayMtl. I know this works only with Fresnel reflections and I know you can put a falloff map in the Reflection slot to get the same effect, but - it's just faster and more elegant with another spinner. Maybe you can link the two IOR Spinners together by default and add a checkmark for separating them. (see picture @the end of the post)
- Control over color bleeding
Not that easy anymore but the users really want this for a long time. Gosh! There are even extra tools out there just to desaturate an Imap! There are several methods for a direct implementation but the most elegant one seems to be a GI Material Slot in the VrayMtlWrapper. This way you could just drag your original VrayMtl in this GI slot and desaturate it manually by adjusting the Colour in the GI Material. This way, you could even make a Red Object bleed blue. Even more control would bring separated slots for GI Send and Receive.
Another way to do it would be a Colour Bleed Spinner directly in the VrayMtl like the one in the Std. Max Lightning Override Materials. This would make the workflow even faster although you wouldn’t have that much control anymore... A hybrid solution would be perfect. Oh - and please implement these options material- AND object wise like you did with the other parts in the VrayMtlWrapper.
- Analyse Tools for Anti-Aliasing (AA) and Photons
I think these are harder to implement but I wish there would be more options to see/analyze what's actually going on under the hood. Many other Renderers have these options. Take AA for example: If Under- and Oversampling could be visualised with colours directly in your rendered picture, you could actually see why the adaptive AA becomes so slow with non interpolated glossy reflections/refractions. Or take Photons... wouldn't it be wonderful to see what density your photons actually have to set your max density value accordingly? A few colours can make your workflow faster and you really know what's going on there.
- Private Focus for Photons
Another very smart solution from Brazil. It would be very handy if you could see and control where your Photons are actually going. In Brazil you can adjust the cone of the Photons with a Hotspot and a Falloff which is visible in the Viewport. You can switch between different ways what exactly happens between the two Values - even with a custom curve. You can also adjust if- and how the Photons' energy behaves over distance. In short, you have total control.
In comparison, I have no idea or control over my photons for the VrayLight. In some scenes 90% of my Photons just disappearing in Space so I have to turn the numbers very high to get enough photons where I need them. I don't know what's happening with my photons when I play with "Ignore light normals" or other values. I have a suspicion but I really don't know - so this is definitely an area for improvements.
- Opacity/clip mapping
You guys may know it.
Let's specify our Problem first.
In the Standard Max Material, there's a Slot called Opacity. Its purpose is to clip away (or hide) certain parts of the Object to give the impression of complex geometry. (A leaf or a grate for example) Black areas mean totally hidden geometry while white Areas are fully visible. On the other hand, Refraction is the change of the rays’ direction when they move inside a Material with a different Index of Refraction. In the Refraction slot, Black means 100% Diffuse while white means 100% Refraction.
Now comes the tricky part. When we turn the IOR of an Object to 1 and invert the Black and White Map, Refraction looks exactly like Opacity- or clip mapping although it's actually a different thing.
The VrayMtl supports only the second method (IOR=1+inverted Black and White Map in Refraction Slot) which leads to a baaaaad and complicated workflow (you have to turn on affect shadows- and alpha too...) The Solution would be a separated clip map Slot or a way to switch from refraction to "clip map mode". When working in this clip map mode the IOR of the Refraction could be greyed out and the "Affect Alpha" should be checked automatically. Concerning Speed, I don't know what ways are there to speed up clip mapping for a Raytraycer - but right now when you either use a Std Max Material with Opacity Mapping or the "IOR=1" - Method, Vray get's pretty slow.
When the clip Mapping will be implemented in Vray some day, workflow could be optimized further when the VrayMtl Scene Converter automatically changes standard max opacity mapping (used from many Tree Simulation Plugins) to Vray clip papping mode. (right now they just get opaque!)
- Fake Highlights
I think Vlado & Peter don’t like faked Stuff and as you may know, the max standard highlights are totally fake.
The Solution they came up with is actually pretty elegant - fast glossy reflections (Interpolation) that pretty much represent the real world. Unfortunately there are still several limitations with this physical approach. Glossy reflections don't reflect the standard max point lights and VrayLights are far from being complete.
Fact is - we still have to use max standard point lights and that means that we need faked Highlights for them. Furthermore we users love the ease of use and control over them.
A simple Solution would be a checkmark to turn on fake Highlights and a new fake Highlights Rollout in the VrayMtl. There should be several Types like Blinn, Phong, Sheen, Anisotropic and maybe even a custom curve mode. (Like the finalRender "Zauner" Shader) Furthermore there should be the Ability to apply the Highlight normal, additive or subtractive and layer multiple Highlights over eachother. It would be cool if the Highlights would work with VrayLights too. That means they'd reflect their Shape (hopefully there will be more in the future ) too - not as a real blurred reflection but as a fake.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Ok, that's it for now Just some of these enhancements would really improve our daily workflow and would make Vray more complete and user friendly. Technically Vray is brilliant and better than every other renderer out there if you ask me. (...wonderful Ideas and Innovations)
Unfortunately the Interface is not that brilliant and seems incomplete right now. We users have to make the step and say what we want - Sure we want a smart and fast renderer - but it's not only Speed and technique that counts. It's also control and the interface cause that's the thing we're looking at every day.
If you look at other renderers, especially Brazil you'll notice that major energy was spend to make the interface "artist friendly" and intuitive. It's just fun to see that everything works like you would expect it to work. I wish Vray would go more in this direction in the future.
Finally here's a Montage what the VrayMtl could look like:
And the VrayMtlWrapper:
regards
It seems that the new 1.5 version of Vray will be packed with cool new features. Sure - we users love cool features as much as the developers do
, but if you work with Vray on an every day basis you'll notice some glitches and missing things in the UI fast that can be really annoying. Often these are very small things but the implementation would improve the workflow significantly. So in order to make 1.5 even more complete, (I think this is your major goal right now) you could introduce some small UI enhancements that won't shine on the feature list but make life so much easier for us users. (Thanks tom schuelke and zerofractal for their input!)
Ok, here are our wishes, let's start with the simple ones.
------------------------------------------------------------------
- Usable small Map Slots in the Vray Material
Open the Asset Browser and drag a Bitmap on the small Map Icon in a Standard Material - it'll pop in there and you don't have to scroll down to the "Maps Rollout" - this wont work in the VrayMtl. I think this is not too hard to fix.
- VrayLights facing the right direction
I know I’m not the only one who always get's it wrong. Please make it like every other Renderer does it - just flip it 180 Degree. This is also very easy to implement. Perfect would be a target for fast and precise Placement. (Talking about backward compatibility... maybe you can include a script that turns Vray light sources very quickly or a “flip” – button that is checked on the creation of a new Light but unchecked with in the old scenes. (Than we have a “flip” Button in there forever…) Seriously - you can't leave it like this forever. Make the turn now before you go to Maya or other 3D Programs; I think most of the users want this too.
(By the Way, Brazil handles this just cool - They really had their thinking caps on: Point Light = Two clicks in the same location, Target Spot = Click + move the mouse where you want the target + Click, Area Light = Hold down mouse while dragging for the Area Light Size (like a plane) + Release + Move the Mouse where you want the Target + Click. The last way is the one that would be perfect for the Vray Light. (Hope you understand what I just said
) - All G-Buffer Channels checked by default
An easy one. Try this one: Define a *.RPF as output for your rendering and check all or some channels in the saving options. Now render without checking the G-Buffer Channels in Vray. Max will crash. Can you imagine this can be very annoying in the morning with a looming Deadline? Simple Solution: Just check all channels by default. (I think it's not more Rendering time or am I wrong?) This way it would also solve the problem that I have to click on every single Channel when I want to activate them all. (!9 clicks although a simple click+drag would work...
) - Working Bucket Label
'Don't know if you guys know this. You render a picture distributed and one Slave can't get the Irradiance- or certain other maps so some buckets are screwed or just black. (Maybe there is a connection problem or the network drives are not set up properly) Now you want to know which PC is the bad one so you have to watch carefully till the next wrong bucket will appear. (Which can take pretty long...) With 10 render clients this is also complicated. I even had to put my fingers on certain buckets to remember them. Pretty bad workaround if you ask me.
So please make "leave bucket label" work... make it work even if I click the button after the rendering has started. Perfect would be an option to rerender wrong buckets. (I think this is already possible with the new VrayVFB)
- Global Material Override
Just add a Map Slot and a checkmark for a global Material Override in the render globals. This way one can test just the Lightning. Brazil, finalRender and mental ray - they all have it.
- Separated Reflection/Refraction IOR's
Also very simple. Just add another IOR spinner to the reflection parameters in the VrayMtl. I know this works only with Fresnel reflections and I know you can put a falloff map in the Reflection slot to get the same effect, but - it's just faster and more elegant with another spinner. Maybe you can link the two IOR Spinners together by default and add a checkmark for separating them. (see picture @the end of the post)
- Control over color bleeding
Not that easy anymore but the users really want this for a long time. Gosh! There are even extra tools out there just to desaturate an Imap! There are several methods for a direct implementation but the most elegant one seems to be a GI Material Slot in the VrayMtlWrapper. This way you could just drag your original VrayMtl in this GI slot and desaturate it manually by adjusting the Colour in the GI Material. This way, you could even make a Red Object bleed blue. Even more control would bring separated slots for GI Send and Receive.
Another way to do it would be a Colour Bleed Spinner directly in the VrayMtl like the one in the Std. Max Lightning Override Materials. This would make the workflow even faster although you wouldn’t have that much control anymore... A hybrid solution would be perfect. Oh - and please implement these options material- AND object wise like you did with the other parts in the VrayMtlWrapper.
- Analyse Tools for Anti-Aliasing (AA) and Photons
I think these are harder to implement but I wish there would be more options to see/analyze what's actually going on under the hood. Many other Renderers have these options. Take AA for example: If Under- and Oversampling could be visualised with colours directly in your rendered picture, you could actually see why the adaptive AA becomes so slow with non interpolated glossy reflections/refractions. Or take Photons... wouldn't it be wonderful to see what density your photons actually have to set your max density value accordingly? A few colours can make your workflow faster and you really know what's going on there.
- Private Focus for Photons
Another very smart solution from Brazil. It would be very handy if you could see and control where your Photons are actually going. In Brazil you can adjust the cone of the Photons with a Hotspot and a Falloff which is visible in the Viewport. You can switch between different ways what exactly happens between the two Values - even with a custom curve. You can also adjust if- and how the Photons' energy behaves over distance. In short, you have total control.
In comparison, I have no idea or control over my photons for the VrayLight. In some scenes 90% of my Photons just disappearing in Space so I have to turn the numbers very high to get enough photons where I need them. I don't know what's happening with my photons when I play with "Ignore light normals" or other values. I have a suspicion but I really don't know - so this is definitely an area for improvements.
- Opacity/clip mapping
You guys may know it.
Let's specify our Problem first. In the Standard Max Material, there's a Slot called Opacity. Its purpose is to clip away (or hide) certain parts of the Object to give the impression of complex geometry. (A leaf or a grate for example) Black areas mean totally hidden geometry while white Areas are fully visible. On the other hand, Refraction is the change of the rays’ direction when they move inside a Material with a different Index of Refraction. In the Refraction slot, Black means 100% Diffuse while white means 100% Refraction.
Now comes the tricky part. When we turn the IOR of an Object to 1 and invert the Black and White Map, Refraction looks exactly like Opacity- or clip mapping although it's actually a different thing.
The VrayMtl supports only the second method (IOR=1+inverted Black and White Map in Refraction Slot) which leads to a baaaaad and complicated workflow (you have to turn on affect shadows- and alpha too...) The Solution would be a separated clip map Slot or a way to switch from refraction to "clip map mode". When working in this clip map mode the IOR of the Refraction could be greyed out and the "Affect Alpha" should be checked automatically. Concerning Speed, I don't know what ways are there to speed up clip mapping for a Raytraycer - but right now when you either use a Std Max Material with Opacity Mapping or the "IOR=1" - Method, Vray get's pretty slow.
When the clip Mapping will be implemented in Vray some day, workflow could be optimized further when the VrayMtl Scene Converter automatically changes standard max opacity mapping (used from many Tree Simulation Plugins) to Vray clip papping mode. (right now they just get opaque!)
- Fake Highlights
I think Vlado & Peter don’t like faked Stuff and as you may know, the max standard highlights are totally fake.
The Solution they came up with is actually pretty elegant - fast glossy reflections (Interpolation) that pretty much represent the real world. Unfortunately there are still several limitations with this physical approach. Glossy reflections don't reflect the standard max point lights and VrayLights are far from being complete. Fact is - we still have to use max standard point lights and that means that we need faked Highlights for them. Furthermore we users love the ease of use and control over them.
A simple Solution would be a checkmark to turn on fake Highlights and a new fake Highlights Rollout in the VrayMtl. There should be several Types like Blinn, Phong, Sheen, Anisotropic and maybe even a custom curve mode. (Like the finalRender "Zauner" Shader) Furthermore there should be the Ability to apply the Highlight normal, additive or subtractive and layer multiple Highlights over eachother. It would be cool if the Highlights would work with VrayLights too. That means they'd reflect their Shape (hopefully there will be more in the future ) too - not as a real blurred reflection but as a fake.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Ok, that's it for now Just some of these enhancements would really improve our daily workflow and would make Vray more complete and user friendly. Technically Vray is brilliant and better than every other renderer out there if you ask me. (...wonderful Ideas and Innovations)
Unfortunately the Interface is not that brilliant and seems incomplete right now. We users have to make the step and say what we want - Sure we want a smart and fast renderer - but it's not only Speed and technique that counts. It's also control and the interface cause that's the thing we're looking at every day.
If you look at other renderers, especially Brazil you'll notice that major energy was spend to make the interface "artist friendly" and intuitive. It's just fun to see that everything works like you would expect it to work. I wish Vray would go more in this direction in the future.
Finally here's a Montage what the VrayMtl could look like:
And the VrayMtlWrapper:
regards
).
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