dragging inside texture/shader editor?

Mistara

i cant see exactly - watching this tutorial   'Creating lights From Textures Using Anything Glows

says texture is multiplying itself by 1.5, but is uneeded.

he's dragging lines inside shader, where is he dropping the thing?  
looks like lot of stuff highlighted

thanks!

MarkIsSleepy

MistyMist said:

i cant see exactly - watching this tutorial   'Creating lights From Textures Using Anything Glows

says texture is multiplying itself by 1.5, but is uneeded.

he's dragging lines inside shader, where is he dropping the thing?  
looks like lot of stuff highlighted

thanks!

At 2:39 he drags the color from "Source 1" within the multiply that is in the color channel up to the color channel to overwrite the multiply - when Carrara converted the shader it probably added that mutiply, and you don't usually need it..

 

Dartanbeck

Right. The texture room is really cool like that.

Drag any channel to another, and you're moving the channel's attributes to another. This will leave the original channel blank, with a result of "None", unless you Ctrl + Drag (Cmd + Drag), which results in copying from one to the other.

Note that some channels will say that the action is not allowed. You may actually override that via the dialog box. For example, try dragging a value 1-100 slider onto Reflection and you'll get that warning. Override the dialog and you'll still have a 1-100 slider on Reflection, and it does work, though Carrara didn't want you to do it.

Dartanbeck

You can drag this way too

Mistara

thanks.  appreciating all the advice on workflow techniques!
 

is there a chart for 'index of refraction'?  for settings of diamonds, fishtank walls, magnify eyes through eyeglasses lenses.

thanks :)

Dartanbeck

Yup. It's in the Index of Refraction field drop-down ;) LOL

Dartanbeck

Big thing to know about refraction is that it often requires two layers of mesh to get the correct effect.

Like glass, for example. If you apply a glass refraction to a single plane, refraction will continue to whack out whatever is behind that plane unless you place another plane with refraction in front of or behind at the appropriate thickness desired for the glass. So if we use the clear glass shader from the Carrara examples, set up either a box or two planes at the correct thickness for glass and apply the shader to all involved and you'll see refraction behaving properly. The same shader on a single plane will act much differently.

 

 

MarkIsSleepy

MistyMist said:

thanks.  appreciating all the advice on workflow techniques!
 

is there a chart for 'index of refraction'?  for settings of diamonds, fishtank walls, magnify eyes through eyeglasses lenses.

thanks :)

Like Dartanbeck said, most of the common things you might need are already in there as presets, but if that doesn't suffice, here's the most complete list I've seen: http://www.pixelandpoly.com/ior.html

Of particular interest to many Carrara users: Beer has an IOR of 1.345. 

Dartanbeck

Thanks for that! Just so happens to be time for a nice glass of IOR 1.345 

Mistara

cheers!  

IOR 1.345  - would be kewl name for a robot  lol

happy gobbl gobbl day. 

evilproducer

MistyMist said:

cheers!  

IOR 1.345  - would be kewl name for a robot  lol

happy gobbl gobbl day. 

Maybe that's Bender's numeric designation?

Dartanbeck

MistyMist said:

cheers!  

IOR 1.345  - would be kewl name for a robot  lol

happy gobbl gobbl day. 

Thanx! You Too! 

...and now for some IOR 1.345! :)

Mistara

am in shader room.  i tried dragging a shader preset from browser tray, dropped it in the lil preview render window, seems to work!

now the trick is, want to create a preset to set glow and shinieness only, not change any other attribute

Dartanbeck

I don't think that we can do that. Have you tried saving an individual channel to the browser?

Fenric's Advanced Shader Tweaker is really useful for that, if you wish to change All shaders selected.

I must be strange... but it doesn't bother me to go in an individually manage each channel of each shader in my scenes.

Mistara

i changed color to the brick pattern, but is only black & white?

is silly question, doh, but how do i color the bricks?

was hoping to make like a pockmarked deep red

thanks!

3DAGE

MistyMist said:

i changed color to the brick pattern, but is only black & white?

is silly question, doh, but how do i color the bricks?

was hoping to make like a pockmarked deep red

thanks!

Make a Mixer,. (Operators / Mixer) which gives you two "Source" options and a "Blender",. the Sources can be other Mixers, or simple colours.or texture maps

For a Brick shader,. you'd use the Brick Pattern in the Blender,

Source 1 is the Mortar colour,. Source 2 is the Brick colour.

Mistara

Thanks.

(Mixer option was under Operators.)

source 1 and 2 are both set to mixer as well.

Mistara

well, looks more like buttons than bricks, so far

mebbe can make a plane of greebles next

3DAGE

Instead of just red and blue,. try changing Source1 and Source2 to Colour gradients, then add a Fractal noise to each of the "shaders"nodes for those gradients.

Edit the colour range in each Colour Gradient.

Make source 1 , different greys, like mortar,. maybe some greens and yellows for mossy vegy stuff

Make Source2's gradient reds and browns,. maybe some lighter or darker colours

Play around with the type of fractal noise and the Scale and Contrast of the noise.

Play with the colours in the Colour gradients, move them around and see how the shader changes.

You can go even deeper by making Source1 and Source2 "Mixers" which gives you two options and a blend,.

Now source1 and source2 could have two different colour gradients blended together with different shaders or patterns

edited to add pic

3DAGE

Working with shaders can be confusing, and mixers can get confusing quickly since a mixer creates two "Source" options, and a "Blender" to mix the two sources.

The blender mixes the two sources together based on black and white (greyscale) values.  

Blenders can be anything you like, Patterns, Fractal noise, or any other shader function, or greyscale image.

In your shader screen shot,. you've got the Bricks as Source 2, of the Red "Source2"  instead of putting the bricks pattern in the blender.

take your time,. play and learn,. then save your shader to your browser :)

 

evilproducer

Holly Wetcircuit was a big advocate of using empty shader channels to build components of your complex shader, then using drag and drop to put them where they really needed to go. Her Photo real sun tutorial (in comic form) at the Carrara Cafe discusses the strategy a bit. Definitely worth a read!

3DAGE

Yes,. using a new master shader as the "sketchboard" to create mixers or other components is a very useful method,. You can see what you''re working on in the diffuse channel,. then copy / paste into your shader when your happy.

Not being able to see the initial effect of sub level shaders is one of the big drawbacks of making interesting shaders ..but it's a bit like tying a shoelace,. complex and confusing when you're learning the basics,. and gradually becomes something you don't really think about

Sometimes I wish carrara had a Greeble function, but there's actually a couple of ways to do the same thing in Carrara.

You can use a shader, in the displacement channel,. if you create something which is a mixer of "Squares" and a value, or none  blended with a Tiles

You could also model some simple low polygon buildings, and use the replicators or surface replicators to apply them to almost anything.