Maxwell Render

Minor request. Maybe it's just me, but I'd like for the intensity parameter to match between Studio and the Plugin. Right now the plugin's 100 corresponds to 1 in studio. Slightly confusing when trying to match values.

-Brodie

Thanks -- let me know if you notice any others. Various parameters have had different semantics in Maxwell over its different versions; sometimes I don't notice when they change.

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Next Limit Team

Lately, I've been using the option to hide the rest of the model when you're within a component. It would be nice if this would translate over to Maxwell upon export. For example, you're working on a light fixture or door and you want to see how it looks without having to export the whole scene. Currently, if you're in the component, exporting the scene will unhide everything before rendering.

-brodie

Are you aware of the Export Selection function? (i.e. right-click entity > Maxwell > Export Selection... > to Maxwell/Studio/MXS) I think that should do what you want.

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Next Limit Team

Good idea, I can def. use that for what I'm wanting to do. Thanks

-brodie

OK, so something odd is happening. I have a building component and within it is a door component. If I select the overall building component and render selection, it works fine. If I go inside that component, select the door component, and render that selection I don't see anything. Upon looking at the .mxs file I found out that the door is being moved way off camera. Any ideas what's going on?

Also, I'm noticing (and maybe it's always been like this) that the scale in studio shows 0.025. Is that weird? Judging by my focal distances and the grid, the scale seems to be right, but I'm not sure why the scale on all my objects would be .025 rather than 1.0

-brodie

On the first question, it's because you're editing a component -- to SketchUp, you may as well be working in another document from the one you're really in. At any rate, the plugin is exporting the door wherever SketchUp says it is located, and that will be wherever it resides with respect to the origin of the definition of the component you're editing.

On the second, it is because the MXS is in meters and the SketchUp geometry (whatever unit specifier you may be using in its UI) is in inches.

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Next Limit Team

Gotha, that all makes sense. So, as I understand it then, everything will pretty much be in the right spot, so long as you aren't within a component when you click render. is there any hope of a fix for that on your end (ie. always positioning geometry relative to a single 0,0,0 origin axis, rather than geometry using it's component axis)?

So I guess then, at least for now, I'd have to make my selection a component, copy it, exit out of all components, pasted it, select it, and render selection?

-Brodie

No, you should not expect any change here; when you are within the context of a component, world zero is the component's origin. So yes, to make Export Selected work how you want it to, you'd need to do as you said -- pull a copy up into the document context and export it from there.

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Next Limit Team

Brodes- Mate what have you been doing NOT using that shortcut, it's one of SU's most useful!

Mate as JD suggests bring into scene context by copy > exit component edit > "paste in place" - even put it on a new layer so you can turn the lower component off - then if you make any changes etc just reverse the process: cut > open component delete old door > "paste in place" new!

FEET and INCHES! Grrrr! Oh man this grates on me! In aust at the moment anolgue TV is slowly being dropped and all gone by 2013. Why cant this be done by the rest of the world against the USA? Just say sorry guys the rest aren't supporting imperial from 2013!

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Move your arse and your mind will follow!

Richard, it was you who spoiled me. I'd long since forgotten about the 'hide rest of model' toggle. Usually, it's not useful for me but I'd altogether forgotten about it until opening up one of your models...the grass models I think.

JD, gotcha. That's unfortunate that it won't work out within a component. It sort of takes away some of the WYSIWYG. It would have been especially nice if/when you ever get FIRE to work in SU. I've gotten into the habit of working on individual pieces of geometry in a studio environment. I find if I get the pieces to all look good the whole will look good. I guess pasting into a separate document won't slow that process down too much.

btw, I really like that you can save lighting setups in the plugin. but I think it's saved within the file. would there be a way for them to transfer between sessions? I guess the alternative would be to save a sort of template which would probably be fine too, but a bit less flexible.

-brodie

This one may be out there. I'm seeing Modo is now handling subd surfaces where basically at render time it's adding polygons to the edges and beveling them. Is that something that could be written into the plugin or does there have to be some inherent modeler support for that sort of thing?

-brodie

Mate whaat's indigo plug does a subdivide on displacement materials, though not on bevels.

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Move your arse and your mind will follow!

Wow, that's pretty cool! I don't use much displacement but the subdivision has always been an issue when I do.

-Brodie

Since he is also the author of the Subdivide and Smooth plugin I'm sure it was easy for him to port that bit of code... he is one of the best Ruby authors.

Best,
Jason.

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My Tutorial Video Series: Maxwell Render 2 - SketchUp to Maxwell Workflow - ZBrush 4 - Corel Painter 12 Advanced - Substance Designer 2.1