Is it possible to instance materials?

[jackarnold]

Hi all,

 

In a scene I'm working on I have 5 jpegs plugged into their own CoronaLightMtl.

 

 

I want all the CoronaLightMtl nodes to share the same parameters, emit light, intensity, visibility etc. But don't want to update it 5 times every time I tweak something.

 

Is there a way to instance the materials so they all update, but can have different bitmaps plugged into them?

 

Thanks in advance.

[Nicolai Bongard]

Not sure if instancing materials is possible, but a workaround with vray would be to use a multisubtex (instead of multisub material). I suppose all your materials are to be mapped onto backplate geometry? If so you could collapse the uvmapping, join them all into one editable poly with different material IDs and apply a material with a multisubtex.

[notamondayfan]

You can link values using the Wire Parameters

 

Basically you say "material 1 intensity = material 2 intensity"

 

You can then add maths to the parameters too, so you could material 2 always 50% intensity of material 1.

 

Dean

[James Vella]

yes but havent tried with corona lights , in theory it works

 

i do this with color correction. if i have 5 leaves and want them all desaturated by 50% then ill instance the color correction, but have non instanced bitmaps within them. works like a charm

[jackarnold]

wire parameters of course!

 

Thanks Dean!!

[jackbird]

You can do it right in the slate material editor - create a bezier float controller, show the parameters you want in the target materials, and wire up the controller to the parameters.

[jackarnold]

 

Bezier Floats where have you been all my life

[notamondayfan]

Does look like a useful technique! Might have to finally switch to the slate editor....