Hi all,

Q1:  I am experimenting with short renders using GI.  Somewhere along the line GI
stopped providing “light” to the scene.  Only the phong light was providing light.
I exported the fact as a “parked object” and started a new file, and GI worked again.
So the problem was I had to reconstruct the camera movement (can this be exported too?)
When GI stopped lighting the the scene, I tried turning it off-on, quit-reboot, zap p-ram,
everything I could think of.  Any tricks here?

Q2:  I tried to apply a stock EIAS “material” (.mtl) but EIAS said it couldn’t be done.  Re: Material folder
stock metals, etc. 

Many thanks!!!

Richard

Richard,
Can you post the project?  A lot of things could be going on, and it would be hard to know with out seeing the project.

Also (Q2), did you mean .mtr?  .mtl is a file that gives .obj it’s texturing info, and I don’t think EIAS can read.  If the material is EIAS stock, you should be able to get to it from Material > Material Palette.  Even if it is not stock placing it in the stock materials folder (perhaps within a new folder of your choosing) will make it available as well.

Take care,
Yon

Hey Yon,

Thanks for responding…

Q2:  The stock metals are, in fact, .mtr.  I try to drag them into the diffuse “add” window and EIAS tells me
it cannot be used as a shader… Shaders can be dragged in from the shader palette.

Q1:  Here is the file with the buggy GI.  I have since re-constructed in a new file and GI seems to be fine.
It’s located:  ftp://chenarch.com user: test_files pw:  testing123 folder:  yon

Many Thanks!!

Rich

PS:  Yon, Are you in U.S. or elsewhere?

Rich,
I am in fact in the US… Denver.

Materials can be dragged from the Material Palette onto the material info ‘preview ball’.  It should change all of the settings, including any shaders as it will replace all of the materials settings.  I’m not sure what the problem is there for you.

I’ll download the file in a bit and get back to you.

Yon

I didn’t know that about Materials palette… Thank You… Should have figured that one out.  It’s a whole “Material”

Rich,
can you do a collect files on the project and repost?  A fact and the hdr are missing.

Yon

Thanks Yon.  It’s up there.  Damn… I never used “collect files”.  That’s fabulous.

Getting Less Ignorant Every Day

Richard

Richard,

I like the TV, pretty cool.

A found a few things, the first is that your HDRI Sky Map was being used, but it was toggled off in the Maps (see picture where I’ve turned it on).  Either turn the map on, or switch to GI color maps.

Also you may want to turn off GI secondary rays.  These rays are only used to illuminate reflections and refractions.  They really have a high price on the rendering time, and you can get a similar effect using a light that cast GI secondary (which fakes the effect, but keeps the reflections from being black.)

I’m rendering out a test to see if that was it.

Yon

Richard,
The rendering went through fine with the HDR image turned back on.

You might try these things as well,

Bump the GI intensity up to 1 or 2.

Set clamp rays for minimum distribution in the sky maps (click on image name) special> HDRI tab.

Set the secondary rays to 10, you don’t need too many for reflections.  You don’t need any with out reflections.

Set the material ‘screen_1’ luminance to 100 and set to shade, then the screen will be ‘light’ by the movie.

Place a 8bit (LDR) version of your HDR in the World info> Raytrace >Reflection tab, so the chrome has something to reflect. In the chrome material tab turn on raytraced reflections and turn off use environment.  Or skip what I just said, but add a environment to the chromes reflection tab, and increase the reflectivity of the chrome.  Otherwise the chrome will just be gray paint.

Post it when you’re done.  It looks like fun,
Yon

Wow, Yon,

Thank you for all the help…

I will post it… and link to a short vid of it.

Thanks again,

Richard

Hi Yon, how do you do to get the GI not to affect so much the skyMap Reflections? I have found that if you decrease the intensity you get more reflections but loose the GI effect. Thanks ,
Edgard

Hi Yon,

I posted two short vid here of the TV set: 

1) http://www.chenarch.com/tv_winky_landscape_320_h264.mov

This started out as a “demonstration” to my kids of how crumby TV was when I was a kid (I’m 50).
The Winky Dink animation was a still image I chopped up and animated using PS and AE, making
it look like old, squashed video from the 50s.  When EIAS piece was in AE, I shoved the landscape video
around in the bg to try to “match” the camera movement.  Is this the caveman way of doing things?

2) http://www.chenarch.com/nano_trailer_final_320_h264.mov

Turned it into a little trailer segment of sorts… Two effects I can’t figure out: It would be cool to have a sun shadow
pass across the TV set (first second or two a big shadow passes over) and when the “shrinking dot” comes
on, it would be nice to have the blackish screen “reflect” the landscape and moving clouds… in EIAS I had a raytrace world .img for global reflectance, as you suggested, that matched the HDRI sky map.

Again, Many thanks for your help, Yon!!

Richard

Hi Richard,
To get the reflection of the world on the TV screen while it is black - how about creating a flat plane in front of the screen, map it with the intended reflection image, then define the plane as a reflection only object (object info window, shading tab).

Aziz.