Material node editor

[nachetz_dominguezadamerocandio]

Are there any plans of implementing something like material node editor in 3d s Max or Keyshot?

Or maybe develop further vray for grasshopper materials and the possibilty of baking them into the project?

Thanks!

[Peter.Chaushev]

Although I have no detailed info to share, it is worth mentioning that a node-based material UI is something that has been for a long time present in our internal roadmap and the dev team wishes to implement at some point.
An announcement will be made as soon as we have a working version worth sharing.

[robbie_bruins]

I really really really want this.The current asset editor is just tedious to work with when creating complex materials

[konstantin_chaos]

Hi guys,

We have plans to work on a Node Material Editor for the next major V-Ray update.
However I can not guarantee that we'll succeed in this endeavour.

The main challenge is not the Editor itself, it's our current backend asset management infrastructure.
It needs to be refactored in a major way, something we've already started doing - little by white with each update.
It needs more work though.

There is one interesting question I want to post here (indirectly related to the material editor initiative):
Would you give up the material layers for a Node Editor in exchange?


This is one of the legacy V-Ray features that we really want to part with.
Of course material layering will remain possible, using the Blend material.

Regards,
Konstantin

[Micha]

Hi Konstantin,

it sounds great to get a node editor, so the artistic freedom will grow.

I ask me, what will be with my hundred of project files where I used layered materials? Often I need to open old project and to render scenes for clients again or the project will be continued.

General I don't like the Blend material, never I used it. I don't like to fill the asset editor with sub materials. My asset editor material list are full enough. I would like it more if the sub materials could be hidden from the asset editor and only accessible by the blend material (could be nice if the current edited material could automatic expand the structure at the left asset editor window (like at the screenshot) and automatic collapse if the user jump to an other material). Hiding submaterials is no probleme to code or?



I like the good old layer materials a lot. They are easy and quick to setup, easy to understand for beginners. I wished they could be kept.

For example if I need an emitter with glossy layer (for a TFT screen (some times I need a lot of different screens in a scene)), it's very easy now, but per blend material it would be cumbersome.

From my daily work my experience is that I don't miss a node editor. For product design, train/airplane interiors and exteriors the simple layer structure is good enough. The node editor could be nice for seldom needed special materials only. I suppose so 99% of my materials are quick created per layers.

General I ask me - who need a node editor and for what? Are it some hobbyist only or pro user with daily load? Maybe it's needed for architecture rendering. But why are layers not enough? I have no idea and I'm curious to understand the need.

[Grigio18]

Hi Konstantin,

it sounds great to get a node editor, so the artistic freedom will grow.

I ask me, what will be with my hundred of project files where I used layered materials? Often I need to open old project and to render scenes for clients again or the project will be continued.

General I don't like the Blend material, never I used it. I don't like to fill the asset editor with sub materials. My asset editor material list are full enough. I would like it more if the sub materials could be hidden from the asset editor and only accessible by the blend material (could be nice if the current edited material could automatic expand the structure at the left asset editor window (like at the screenshot) and automatic collapse if the user jump to an other material). Hiding submaterials is no probleme to code or?



I like the good old layer materials a lot. They are easy and quick to setup, easy to understand for beginners. I wished they could be kept.

For example if I need an emitter with glossy layer (for a TFT screen (some times I need a lot of different screens in a scene)), it's very easy now, but per blend material it would be cumbersome.

From my daily work my experience is that I don't miss a node editor. For product design, train/airplane interiors and exteriors the simple layer structure is good enough. The node editor could be nice for seldom needed special materials only. I suppose so 99% of my materials are quick created per layers.

General I ask me - who need a node editor and for what? Are it some hobbyist only or pro user with daily load? Maybe it's needed for architecture rendering. But why are layers not enough? I have no idea and I'm curious to understand the need.

I cannot disagree more
99% of materials are now feasible without any layering other than the standard v-ray material (just using coat, sheen ,thin film, self illumination)
A node-based material representation is much more intuitive and logical and allows you to have everything under control, you get used to it in a day even if you come from years of layered/compact material editor.

For backwards compatibility, the only suggestion I would make to Chaos is to make sure that you can install different versions of vray on different versions of rhino, without any special tricks...

Vray 5 on rhino 6, and vray 6 on rhino 7/8.
Simple and painless for pro users...

[robert_dobrowolski]

Node editor would be greatly useful with some more complex materials in archviz, where you'd want to do the blending on texture/shader level rather than on material level. Especially if different textures are mapped differently to break repetition, this gets cumbersome quickly with current solution.
I'm wondering if node editor would speed up the workflow with simpler materials and most of the work is hooking up textures to correct slots. This is something I keep on doing frequently and feel like there could be a faster way about it.
Personally layers is something I could very well live without.
Anything that makes work with material editor more streamlined would be greatly helpful. Especially a way to manage multiple materials at the same time. A frequent use case would be a series of materials which are identical but for one property. It depends on how the node editor would work (per material or per scene) but potentially it could help in such cases,

[robbie_bruins]

Hi guys,

We have plans to work on a Node Material Editor for the next major V-Ray update.
However I can not guarantee that we'll succeed in this endeavour.

The main challenge is not the Editor itself, it's our current backend asset management infrastructure.
It needs to be refactored in a major way, something we've already started doing - little by white with each update.
It needs more work though.

There is one interesting question I want to post here (indirectly related to the material editor initiative):
Would you give up the material layers for a Node Editor in exchange?


This is one of the legacy V-Ray features that we really want to part with.
Of course material layering will remain possible, using the Blend material.

Regards,
Konstantin

I would not mind giving up the material layers tab workflow and replace this with a blend material as long as old .Vraymt files are still compatible with later updates. I've got a large library of materials that need to be compatible for rendering old scenes for clients.
Getting a node editor would make using blend materials and other more complex material editing so much more effective and intuitive. As long as loading and using old materials is not compromised I would welcome every step moving forward in this direction.

[wu_xiaolong]

Hi guys,

We have plans to work on a Node Material Editor for the next major V-Ray update.
However I can not guarantee that we'll succeed in this endeavour.

The main challenge is not the Editor itself, it's our current backend asset management infrastructure.
It needs to be refactored in a major way, something we've already started doing - little by white with each update.
It needs more work though.

There is one interesting question I want to post here (indirectly related to the material editor initiative):
Would you give up the material layers for a Node Editor in exchange?


This is one of the legacy V-Ray features that we really want to part with.
Of course material layering will remain possible, using the Blend material.

Regards,
Konstantin

Can't give up the material layer because it's too cool and effective. Adults shouldn't have to make choices, I'll take both the material layer and the node editor