DS 4.6 Shader Builder/Mixer
zenbuddhist_64fc3fad32
Posts: 0
I have made a conscious decision to move fron Poser 2010 to DS 4.6 PB. I have had DS on my computer for years but coud never make sense of the libraries and content management. I am slowly beginning to understand how it works bnow, and I am satisfied with the results. I really like the way DS renders and how figures can be posed easily and clothes fit easily and well.
This past year I have been concentrating on modeling and I use DS3 for setting up textures and other aspects of the whole modeling practice. I took the Master Modeling course by Dreamlight which was a lot of help in moving me forward. Since this time, I have moved into the newer releases of DS, and currently I am using DS 4.6 PB. I became especially interested on the shader mixer/builder capabilities of this app. Therein lies my problems.
Being a fairy intelligent guy and fully capable of following directions, I studied some of the basic tutorials on the shader mixer. I am quite certain I am inputting the data correctly, doublechecking and comparing my work against the tutorial. My problem is this - I can build the simple shaders correctly, but when I apply the shader to the object in the scene (for now a simple cube or sphere) nothing happens, although the color often changes. None of the textures I input show up on the scene object. In preview, they render as the should. Clicking "apply" does nothing to the object in the scene. (Yes, I am making sure the object is selected!) I am beginning to have doubts about my system, and whether it is capable of showing these shaders. I am running Win XP 32 bit with an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU @ 2.80Ghz. My video card is a NVDIA GeForce 8600 GT. The system is running 4096 MB of RAM.
I've read as much documentation as I can find, although I find it quite sketchy, with many of the documentation pages claiming to be a WIP. Searching the internet does not return me any more information that can move me forward. I read through the thread in the forum on shader/mixers and attempted to do carnite's simple tutorial with no results. I have spent a week hassling with this, and this old man is getting a bit frustrated. Can anyone steer me in the right direction, possibly to tutorials or documentation that will help me figure this out?
TIA
C~
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Comments
Render once you have applied the shader. You will see the difference.
To get a texture preview you must conform to DS Standard naming of the textures. Didn't see it in any document but found it by myself
For example for the diffuse, your node name should be something like "Diffuse Color"
The viewport previews materials based on the names of properties that belong to that material. To display a texture on the surface it will look for a property called by a particular name. In shader mixer you can set the property's name in the "Properties" tab next to the "Brickyard" tab. Just click the desired property's gear and click "Parameter Settings...". Then set the name. If you pres the down arrow next to the name you will see the common used names. "Diffuse Color" will preview the main texture. As shader mixer is very open ended in what it can do, the viewport is only able to show an approximation of what the render will look like.
Rendering made no difference. The image rendered fine in preview in the shader pane, but as I said, would not apply to the actual object in the scene. Would be grateful if you could show me to documentation on DS Standard naming. One thing I have seen, although it may not be relevant - when I work on the shader and then check surface parameters, the image map does not appear in the dropdown, as it would if you input the image directly into surface parameters. This is making me crazy! Thanks for your help.
C~
I have attempted to follow your instructions but seem a bit confused. I get what you are saying - the names are obviously case sensitive in order to get the texture to transfer.to the object. I checked the name in properties as you said in the brick repository and then checked them against the name in surface parameters. They are the same in all cases. One thing not clear to me is the labels for "path" and "type" and I am wondering if this isn't part of the issue. In all cases, it lists "type" as none, and in the case of "path" it lists, for example using the "checker" shader, such parameters as "Checker (2) in "Diffuse Color." I am at a loss here, and appreciate your input. Gettin' a bit too old for this kind of frustration - I'll be 70 tomorrow!
C~
I have attempted to follow your instructions but seem a bit confused. I get what you are saying - the names are obviously case sensitive in order to get the texture to transfer.to the object. I checked the name in properties as you said in the brick repository and then checked them against the name in surface parameters. They are the same in all cases. One thing not clear to me is the labels for "path" and "type" and I am wondering if this isn't part of the issue. In all cases, it lists "type" as none, and in the case of "path" it lists, for example using the "checker" shader, such parameters as "Checker (2) in "Diffuse Color." I am at a loss here, and appreciate your input. Gettin' a bit too old for this kind of frustration - I'll be 70 tomorrow!
C~
Sorry, procedural textures cannot be previewed in the viewport. The documentation is still in development at this time. The properties it looks for are:
Diffuse Color
Diffuse Strength
Glossiness
Specular Color
Specular Strength
Ambient Color
Ambient Strength
Opacity Strength
Horizontal Tiles
Horizontal Offset
Vertical Tiles
Vertical Offset
They are case sensitive. If a property is set to one of these names that property will preview in the viewport as if the default material had the matching property set to that value.
The better tutorial in shader mixer: http://www.daz3d.com/shader-mixer-tutorial-i. Very complete.
Be patient. Frustation is common. Each time I obtained progress it has been preceded by one or two weeks of frustation, not a bit, much much frustation. Just yesterday I solve a problem with a shader which made me waste a complete week.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY! And we are never tooo old for frustration, when we stop being frustrated we are already dead %-P
Charlie, do you still need help? If so, I think we might be getting you off track by talking about Parameter Settings because primarily they affect what you see on the main stage which presents only an OpenGL, non-rendered preview. If I understand you correctly, your biggest concern is that your shader is not getting applied to the object and not rendering correctly. So please look at the steps in my two image attachments (click the image to see the bigger one) and see if that helps. Personally I always do better with a "show me". If my image doesn't solve your problem, and if you know how to post a screenshot of your Shader Mixer tab, that might help us discover what's wrong together.
Oh but while I'm thinking of it, Path refers to the grouping of Parameters, so choosing Diffuse would put your parameter in the Diffuse Group. I don't think Type is being used at this time. It might be something the developers plan to implement later.
Charlie, do you still need help? If so, I think we might be getting you off track by talking about Parameter Settings because primarily they affect what you see on the main stage which presents only an OpenGL, non-rendered preview. If I understand you correctly, your biggest concern is that your shader is not getting applied to the object and not rendering correctly. So please look at the steps in my two image attachments (click the image to see the bigger one) and see if that helps. Personally I always do better with a "show me". If my image doesn't solve your problem, and if you know how to post a screenshot of your Shader Mixer tab, that might help us discover what's wrong together.
Oh but while I'm thinking of it, Path refers to the grouping of Parameters, so choosing Diffuse would put your parameter in the Diffuse Group. I don't think Type is being used at this time. It might be something the developers plan to implement later.
Hi, Parris~
I've been struggling away with this all week and all of the great feedback I have received has been helpful. However, it has not solved my issue and I have been feeling particularly stupid because of it, thinking that maybe I am just too old and senile to be able to wrap my head around this whole shader business. I was at the point of giving up and was thinking I just couldn't "get it." However, today I rechecked this thread and found your images and I immediately had success in applying the correct shader to the scene object. I am eternally grateful to you for this excellent help. Being a very visual person, it was extremely helpful for me to actually "see" what is going on through your excellent images and annotations. I think the problem I was having was not selecting the object correctly, as you pointed out in your instructions. I applied the Cararra Marble texture using your images as a guide and crossed my fingers and did a render. Success! It applied as it should do. What was really confusing me is that I know I was building the shader correctly, and rendering the preview image in the shader mixer pane always produced the right results. However, when I clicked "apply" and attempted to render my scene, the texture was just not there. Now I can move forward. Many thanks for your knowledge and help, and thanks to all who have tried to help me with this problem. I am a bit discouraged over the lack of documentation for this feature, and wish things were more than just a "WIP" most of the time.
C~
Great! Good Job. I thought maybe I had guessed what was going wrong for you. I'm so glad you have succeeded. And I agree, the state of documentation is a huge problem for all levels of users. Though it seems to be slow go, I am confident that at some point documentation will get the attention it deserves.
For now though, at least we have this forum and each other.
It's amazing how one such small thing can cause so much frustration, and we end up spending hours and hours searching for the answers. Now and then I get lucky, as in this case. Although I was selecting the obj in the "scene" tab, I failed to select in the "surfaces" tab, and it was the cause of all my problems. Such a simple thing, but a step that is required.
I am thankful for people like yourself and all the others that have helped me with this problem. I find it refreshing to be able to access such a fine group of individuals who can show me the right way of doing things. It really is the best path to learning...
C~