Nodes Re-Organization/ Nodes CleanUp for better VrayBlender

[gimu]

hello andrei, I have some wish for better VrayBlender based on my experience so far using this awesome combination, and this is the first part
about node cleanup and some re-organization (Please take a look at all images for viewing my proposals as well as what i mean)

1. New nodes organization by split them into 2 categories


2. Make few nodes more simple by moving Color Mult, Color Offset and so on into a new node


3. Blend and Mix node is similar, Join them would be good


4. Fuse Layered Map Node and Composite Map Node into a better node


5. Invert and Output node should be merge

[gimu]

6. Drop down menu for Float Operation


7. Color to Float output should be grey


8. New Vector Curves Default settings

[logan683]

6. Drop down menu for Float Operation
[ATTACH=CONFIG]30126[/ATTACH]

7. Color to Float output should be grey
[ATTACH=CONFIG]30127[/ATTACH]

8. New Vector Curves Default settings
[ATTACH=CONFIG]30128[/ATTACH]

+1 for sure to the graphs for everything that needs it pretty please?

[logan683]

Graphs for Fresnel, Falloff, etc. like Max.

[Cillu]

I'd first and foremost love to have some good, up-to-date documentation. Usually finding a node for the effect I'm looking for requires a lot of trial-and-error or searching on this forum.

...yes, even with documentation it would be like that but at least I could look up certain things and find out how they are supposed to work instead of guessing.

[vlado]

We have a problem that a lot of these nodes are not really meant to be directly visible by users; many of them are utility nodes used by V-Ray for Maya, V-Ray for Modo, V-Ray for Max etc. and have sometimes duplicate functionality. F.e. the Blend mode is used for translating the Maya Blend shading node, whereas the Mix one is designed to replicate the Mix texture in 3ds Max. They are similar, but at the same time have minor differences. We are not really at liberty to change how these nodes work or to merge them as we want.

We have a similar issue in V-Ray for Katana; I haven't figured out what to do about it yet.

Best regards,
Vlado

[logan683]

I'd first and foremost love to have some good, up-to-date documentation. Usually finding a node for the effect I'm looking for requires a lot of trial-and-error or searching on this forum.

...yes, even with documentation it would be like that but at least I could look up certain things and find out how they are supposed to work instead of guessing.

I completely agree. I was asking for curve graphs, basically, but gimu's post really helped. I found the Vector Curve, but I had to do it through Shift-A, Search (obviously in the node editor). >. <

I know Blender/Cycles and 3DS Max/VRay, but a lot of getting lost in translation when it comes to Blender/VRay.

The thing I wonder, though, is whether it's actually worth it for Chaos Group,and that is by no means a slam or me being ungrateful. It's awesome those who use Blender have access to a real engine with support now, but let's about it, we're in the vast minority. Personally, I would pay for another Multiscatter or GrowFX license (and the others I have for Max), but those guys keep telling me it's not worth it. Having said all that, my point is, it may not be worth the time/investment for Chaos. Peter and Vado are great, but they gotta eat and make sure they're people do, too. It may be up to us as users. A middle ground could be that those who want to participate in putting together supported documentation can, but it has to be approved by Chaos since it's going in their docs. But that would take a lot of work since things in Blender VRay seem to move around at a decent pace, which isn't a slam against bdancer since he's constantly working on implementing VRAY within Blender better all the time.

Point is, I think if we all wanted to work together, or could be fixed just fine.

[Cillu]

Vlado, thank you for your input, that indeed explains the HUGE number of nodes in Vray/Blender. As you say, some of them seem duplicated or have the same functionality, but in reality some of them work / don't work / don't seem to work (can't tell sometimes, because maybe I'm using them incorrectly) / work differently than you'd expect. That's what makes it so confusing and that's why I meant "good docs are necessary". At the same time, as logan says, Vray / Blender does really seem to change at a fast pace sometimes and for me it is quite hard to keep up (I'm no professional and therefore have very limited time to work on cg as a hobby). All of this should not be read as a rant, but simply a statement of the troubles I often run into - but I knew that, when I purchased Vray. I still like to use it as my default rendering engine in blender!

I'd be willing to give some input but in reality i think I can't really help all that much...but at least I'm glad you devs are aware of the situation and can hopefully do something about it some day.

[bdancer]

This seems like quite a useful proposal, I'll think on it.

[bardo]

I understand what Vlado means and it's ok...so could be useful to organize nodes in "software" groups so everyone that comes from the other 3d software can immediately recognize what he needs.

I'm just supposing that most of the Vray4Blender users are also 3dsmax/Maya users...obviously you have the sales data so you have a more objective image of the situation.

In any case I think that also for pure Blender users could be good a grouping so they can avoid nodes they're not interested.