Possible or not ? if not its a suggetion for improovements

[tom schuelke]

Hi everyone,

I am a long year youser of vray for 3ds max, and so to say, i am not very firm with revit as a modelling programm. Nevertheless, i now have to take a first look into it, becaus my very big architectural company has switched over to revit as a host for "building integrated modelling" bim. And i have to find ways to make vray work together well with revit, as far as it allready is possible.

So now here are a few problems i had in the last days..

1.
Using Bim, Revit has to deal with huge amounts of geometry, and by linking even much mor geometry from external specialists, as for example Specialists for heating and cooling. In Germany, bim integreates all these crafts into on compound revit modell, to simulate the whole building process in all its complexity , before anything gets done in real world. So as you can imagine, you can get very very big Geomeric files. Never the less we need to render them especial to show our customers, the whole complexity, to prove what we are doing.

When searching for linked files from external Specialists, it is terrible difficult to find materials associated to them. you just cant do it as shown in the vray tutorial videos. because often after importing them as ifc files, they even dont have any real materials.

So what i am searching for is anything like an eyedropper, to just pick the used material of an object or just all corresponding objects with the same material, to open it in the material editor of vray, or to jump directly to this material without having to search for it by jumping to any button to see the name of the material and than having to remember it ant than going back to the vray material list and searching the name.. This is just horrible.. slow and uggly..

so is there any faster way to do so ? if not pleas please make something like the materialpicker in max. it would speed up workflow so much.

2.
i would also like to see something like a Chart of all materials used in the scene, and having the possibilty to just switch all materials over to the selectd new vray materials in one cklick.. understand me.. if my company would integrate rules, which revit materials to use for which revit elements , i just could maybe switch over to corresponding vray mats with one mouse klick and also save this tables for another scene..

3.
I was searching for something like a vray clipper, to maybe cut back only the walls of my building and show inside all of the unbeleavable complex structures. But untill now i only can use the Revit clipping Box, which limits these options very much.

4.
Sure everyone wants this one... Why cant i just open the material Editor of vray directly and have to open it using the windows explorer..

5.
for sure... vray proxys for trees and some standart grass would be appreciated..

thats it at the moment.

thanks

[tom schuelke]

Hi i thought about another thing ...

so my 6. Question was for an improvement of the swarm features.. I would like to send my renderjobs to some sort of backburner rendermanager, to just be able to go on working, and dont have to wait some times for hours untill my last rendering is finished... with big projects it still takes much time..

[Ana Lyubenova]

Hello Tom,

On behalf of the entire V-Ray for Revit team, I would like to thank you for your highly detailed feedback. In general, I would say that we are currently working on all issues that you pointed out.

I understand that it is very difficult for an experienced 3Ds max user to transfer to Revit and during this process, one might not like V-Ray for Revit (especially if comparing it to V-Ray for 3Ds Max). Believe it or not, once you get used with Revit itself, you will understand V-Ray for Revit better.
Here are some remarks as well as some workaround suggestions based on your feedback:

1. "When searching for linked files from external Specialists, it is terrible difficult to find materials associated to them." -> you can find the linked model materials in Revit's Object Styles dialog (Manage tab -> Object Styles -> Imported objects); you can easily rename those materials in order not to "get lost" in your Revit project later on.

2. "Chart of all materials used in the scene" -> use the filters in the V-Ray Material Browser. Thus, you can see the Project materials, Current view materials, Revit materials that are already mapped or still unmapped with V-Ray ones.
"The possibility to just switch all materials over" -> we are already working on improving the material browser in general.
"Save this tables for another scene" -> currently you can export the V-Ray settings (which include materials mapping) and import them in any other project. Thus, you can set the V-Ray material mappings just once and then share them across different projects. (here is a link to Sharing settings description: https://docs.chaosgroup.com/display/VRAYREVIT/Sharing)

3. V-Ray clipper -> I know it gives a higher dose of design "freedom" compared to Revit's Section box; however, since Section box is an option, we prefer to give priority to features that will drastically enhance V-Ray for Revit renderings (like proxies and fur)

4. Why don't you just pin the vrmat editor to your Windows taskbar? As soon as you replace a Revit material with a vrmat, an Edit V-Ray material icon will appear that can launch the vrmat editor (you can see it in the V-Ray material section of the following page: https://docs.chaosgroup.com/display/...p-VRayMaterial)

5. I think I already responded to this one : )

We are happy to receive as much feedback as possible from you, our users. But please, don't judge us too hard, as Revit is challenging not only as a software product but as a codebase as well. Of course, we want to put as many useful V-Ray features as possible but in many cases, this cannot happen straightforward, neither straight away.

Once again, your feedback is greatly appreciated and in case you experience any further issues, we remain at your disposal.

Regards,
Ana

P.S. We follow the forum threads on a daily basis, therefore spamming a few of them with the same feedback is not recommended.

[tom schuelke]

Thanks Ana,

Well theese are allready some good news. nevertheless the usability of the "manage Tab, Object Style" Aproach realy cant be more but a workaround. You have to select in Big Projects between hundred of objects, and you have to know what you search for , if you dont, each and every material you search for takes minuts..

i would wish... just cklicking an object and instantaniously see all Objects, that have this material.. I would wish to load it in a special material loader window or jump in my material list to the corresponding material.. but, when you are allready on the way of improving your materialeditor, than this should only be a question of time..

i also aprecciate, vray proxys, fur and grass, but my wish for the improved clipper remains..

thanks until then..

Tom

[Winniman]

Hi I want to see what's your number 5 question answer. I can't find it in this forum. Thanks,

[Ana Lyubenova]

Hi Winniman,
It's in point 3 of my answer to Tom.

[Winniman]

Is it possible to access the nightly build by any chance?
kai.chang@perkinswill.com
thanks

[Ana Lyubenova]

Unfortunately, it is not possible at this moment, as we are still working on proxies implementation.

[Ana Lyubenova]

Hi guys,

Please, upgrade to V-Ray 3.60.01 for Revit where most of the points from tom schuelke's feedback are covered.
You can download the new version from our website: https://download.chaosgroup.com/?product=47&platform=55

Best,
Ana