Translucency on/off toggle

[Rick Eloy]

Hi!
Couldn't find anything similar to this in the forum, so if this is an old idea please forgive me.
Here's the thing: when creating trees, I often use VRay2SidedMtl to give that extra realism (as most people do). Unfortunately, that adds up to the render times, which makes me change the leaves' materials for testing lighting and other stuff (and not losing the shadows) until I'm happy with the results and only then I'd apply the leaf material again.
My question is: would it be possible to have a toggle under Global Switches to simply turn translucency on/off? That could work for SSS and real translucency too, I guess... Just wondering, here...
Thanks!
Rick Eloy

[tashko.zashev]

Hello Rick,

Thank you for your suggestion.
I'm not sure if it's feasible to enhance the Global switches section with more options, but I will forward it to our developers team for consideration.

[piotrus3333]

you could control 2sided mat translucency with vray color map. with that in composite map it could be one click per material to turn it on/off.

[Rick Eloy]

@Tahsko: thanks for the reply. I know the Global Switches section is already crowded, but it's worth the shot.
@piotrus3333: That could be done, of course, but when you have around 10 different mats per tree species to turn of it gets a bit out of hand. Thanks for the hint, anyway.

[vlado]

Well, we added a checkbox to globally disable SSS for Maya, it should be pretty easy to do it for 3ds Max too. Not sure if this should include any form of translucency though?

Best regards,
Vlado

[Neilg]

Not sure if this should include any form of translucency though?

I think you need another checkbox for that checkbox...

[Rick Eloy]

Well, we added a checkbox to globally disable SSS for Maya, it should be pretty easy to do it for 3ds Max too. Not sure if this should include any form of translucency though?

Best regards,
Vlado

I guess it will depend on which feature people use the most. Of course, I mentioned VRay2SidedMtl because that's what I use the most, but maybe most chaps out there prefer to have that kind of control over SSS only. The way I see it, archviz scenes usually feature lots of 2Sided stuff for fabrics and leaves (much more numerous than SSS stuff), that's why I thing that would come in handy.

[piotrus3333]

+1. I think that could be handy.

[vlado]

Or, we could just make sure that translucent leaves render faster...

Best regards,
Vlado

[Rick Eloy]

Hahaha... I wouldn't mind that at all, Vlado!

[piotrus3333]

actually since I'm using foliage that don't receive gi or real reflections/refractions my 2sidedMat leaves render pretty fast.