Maxwell Render

Ok, now I understand why all the silence.
Just as the silent minutes in the 2001 space Odysee intro scene, it prepared us for intensity of what was to come ahead !
This is just perfect.
Exactly what was needed.
Simple, straightforward, and apparently indeed working.

I was just wondering what the "Quality" setting was doing exactly.
Isn't it more or less redundent with SL ?
Is it some kind of biased trick ? (Gniarf-gniaf-gniarf !)

Thanks a LOT guys !

About the other big enhancement, I hope the improvements with SSS include the Single-Sided version...
Not too much time to test at the moment...

Oh, just a little problem with the toolbars :
File "C:\Users\osuire\AppData\Roaming\MaxwellDotNET\Plugins\Rhino\Toolbar\MaxwellToolbar.tb" was previously converted to C:\Users\osuire\AppData\Roaming\McNeel\Rhinoceros\5.0\UI\MaxwellToolbar_tb.rui and left open.
Maxwell: The Maxwell toolbar file (C:\Users\osuire\AppData\Roaming\MaxwellDotNET\Plugins\Rhino\Toolbar\MaxwellToolbar.tb) appears to be damaged.
Maxwell: Please copy [Program Files]\MaxwellDotNET\Plugins\Rhino\4.0\Toolbar\MaxwellToolbar.tb to a convenient place and load it using the Rhino toolbar manager.

The problem is that there is no "Plugins" folder in \MaxwellDotNET\ ...
Can't find a trace of the MaxwellToolbar.tb file on my computer

Cheers,

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Olivier

Hey NL!
Hey JD!

respect, this is simply great.. even running it of my little laptop (2.0ghz) works amazingly well.
also the rhino implementation is very well done... but i never doubted that anyway

@olivier

i think quality gives us control over the subsampling wich is usually fixed in MW render.

btw. i also have the problem with the toolbar file missing from the install directory..

strangely i anyway found a working copy in this path:

C:\Users\YOUR USER\AppData\Roaming\MaxwellDotNET\Plugins\Rhino\Toolbar


daniel

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workstation: EVGA SR-2 / dual x5650@3.5Ghz / quadro 4000

What I think you need to do is to open the Toolbar manager, 'Close' the Maxwell toolbar, close the Toolbar manager, and then run Maxwell_ToolbarReset.

The Quality parameter determines the actual resolution rendered by the engine -- the rendered image is then stretched to fit whatever size you have made the Fire window. So no, there are no biased methods to be found here.

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Next Limit Team

yep.. closing it did the job.
thnx.



i see.. saw jagged edges at low quality so i thought it has something to do with AA. .. sorry i skipped reading the manual

btw.. a command or button to make a (autonamed) screenshot from the fire window would be great..

daniel

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workstation: EVGA SR-2 / dual x5650@3.5Ghz / quadro 4000

The Toolbar trick works, thanks Jeremy.

I have a little issue : If I lock the Fire window on a camera, and continue working in another perspective view with another camera name, the calculation sometimes restarts as I hide or unhide objects.
I thought that once the meshes were exported, only changes to Maxwell settings or camera movements could trigger a re-calculation.

Cheers,

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Olivier

Well, that is how it works in theory, but in fact, I have to listen for viewports being repainted to know when cameras have changed. Repainting, however, happens alot, so I have to filter on a bunch of different criteria to try to determine if anything interesting has actually happened or not. Various things you might do can indeed result in false positives. I can obviously improve that, but it is not easy to predict every possible scenario, so if you notice a very specific set of conditions I can watch for, I should be able to use that information to filter out more extraneous restarts.

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Next Limit Team

hello guys
I like to new Fire a lot, but I can't find the settings to change the quality of the Fire Rendering in the Rhino plugin...
In studio it's there... but in the Rhino Plugin, I can't find the settings to make the Fire preview a bit nicer...
where are thouse settings?
Thanks, Oliver

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Maxwell Render 2.7 / Cinema 4D R13 Studio / ZBrush 4R3 / Rhino / Adobe Production Suite CS5
Win7 Pro 64bit

Hi Oliver,

If you right click on the Fire preview image, the settings appear.

great feature!
and thanks a lot for the great implementation jd! I also had the toolbar-problem, but the workaround works fine.
however, it is not possible to dock the fire window to use it like a viewport or can't i find it?
cheers, kami

haha, ah so easy
Thanks a lot!

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Maxwell Render 2.7 / Cinema 4D R13 Studio / ZBrush 4R3 / Rhino / Adobe Production Suite CS5
Win7 Pro 64bit

Big problem here with Single-Sided SSS.
Remember the PVC membrane fabric material Jeremy ?
Well now it has become some kind of Ghost !



As you can see, the material appears to be seen "trough" the structure and also looks transparent when it was only translucent.

Me not happy

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Olivier

@Kami: there is a Dockable Fire Window switch in Scene Manager > Options > User Interface which will cause the Fire Window to become a Rhino docking window when enabled.

@Olivier: is this a plugin-related issue -- does it only occur in the Fire window -- or is it a more general render engine issue? Also, as usual, we would need you to send an actual (Rhino) scene before it is possible to diagnose the issue.

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Next Limit Team

Jeremy, this was not rendered in the FIRE window.
I probably should have created another thread...
I suppose you could whip up a very simple scene with a SS-SSS and would probably see what I see.

A translucent material showing through opage materials... How biased !
At last, some special effects are possible in Maxwell !



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Olivier

It is not an efficient use of time for me to go poking the engine to see how it responds to various things. If you have a scene which readily reproduces the issue, I'm happy to take a look, make sure it's not somehow plugin-related, and if not, forward it on to the proper people. Otherwise, please feel free to post about it in the engine bugs forum.

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Next Limit Team

Hi Jeremy,

I understand this is certainly not a plug-in issue.
Yet, it does also take quite a bit of time on my side to report such bugs :
Zip the model, uploading it on a file sharing site, writing a thread, copy/pasting the link, following the thread.
Generally, the core developers are far from being as prompt as you to reply, which can be a bit frustrating.
For example, I still don't have an answer about whether objects with thin SSS are allowed to intersect or if it will generate noise.

Anyway, given that the second main claim about 2.5 was improvements in SSS, I am surprised that something so enormous could find it's way passed the testing rounds..


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Olivier