Uniformly Scaled Tiling Textures based on World Space Coordinates

Rashad Carter

Hiya! Just a quick question for pretty much anyone. The newest Octane beta allows for Texture Baking, a feature I have long craved for as I think it can go along way toward human skin texturing by allowing a person to bake noise procedurals onto models without having to resort to painting with brushes. But for it to work as I intend the scaling has to be 100% consistent with no distortions.

People who don't use Bryce aren't aware of some of the features that make it so awesome, but some of the amazing things about it are its mapping options. There is a mapping option called "World Cubic" that will literally take any image or procedural and it will apply it to the surface in a uniform manner, projected evenly on all sides of the model. This is extremely useful for things like bricks on buildings, no matter how irregular the form of the building.

This mode is in contrast to Object Cubic mapping, which while similar to World Space, Object Space mapping can distort a pattern if the model itself is different sizes along certain axis. So to be clear, World Space and Object Space look the same if the model itself happens to be the same scale along the X, Y, and Z axis. However, if the model is taller than it is wide, then to maintain consistent scaling in Object Cubic mode one would need to increase the number of repeats along the Y axis to match. IF a model is animated and moves around lifing arms and so forth causing its apprent scaling to vary from shot to shot, the patterns on the surface will appear to stretch and shrink between frames. That result is very odd and unwanted.

Bryce doesnt have a baking camera and wont ever get one so....

If possible, I want to avoid the Object Cubic type of mapping in favor of the World Cubic, so that I am certain scaling will remain consistent along all three axis for the baking. How is type of mapping accomplished in Carrara? Is there a way to do it in the Octane Mterials options?

Thanks in advance any help you can offer is appreciated.

evilproducer

Quite a few of Carrara's procedural functions have the Global, Local, and UV options to map the procedural shader to the object. Additionally, how you set the projection method will effect the appearance.

My suggestion would be to experiment with the settings. Many times Carrara has a function that is the same or very similar to other programs but has a different name.

I have noticed that when using a Global setting for procedural shaders you can get what is called texture slide, where the model moves but the procedural function does not, so it appears to glide or slide across the surface. Local or UV options generally take care of this.

With the texture baking you mention, I would think the texture sliding shouldn't be an issue as it should be baked to a map that Octane would use and map to the object. Am I understanding that correctly?

If I am understanding correctly, wouldn't that also negate the effect you are worried about in Octane? If the procedural shader appears as you wish in Carrara prior to baking it, then shouldn't it be correct when baked for Octane?

Are you wanting to bake procedural textures onto animated objects that change shape over time, such as a cube stretching to become more rectangular? Or are these just irregular shapes that stay in a static state?

I did just test the brick procedural function in Carrara and it does not have the Global, Local, UV option. It will map to the object depending on the projection method you use.

WendyLuvsCatz

Inagoni baker is very useful for baking Carrara procedurals for Octane, I use it a lot to create texture maps that use world space terrain functions, layers etc that Octane cannot see.

Handy to know with 3 you can go the other way now with Octane shaders too.

I will definately be buying/upgrading to 3 with all the exciting features it has.