Devin Johnston Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 Is anyone using this program, I'm having some major problems with it and since the company is based in Moscow and their forum is in Russian with no English support I'm not getting any help. I'm having several problems, first it seems that the proxies that it scatters are stripped of their multi/sub object materials and a generic material is substituted. There is a vray scatter texture available but it is only a random color generator and there seems to be no way to attach materials. I can't figure out why there would be no material support and if this is the case the program is virtually useless. My second problem is that I can't use DR with it, others say that they can but I've been unable to get it to work so far. I'd appreciate any help at this point. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnvid Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 Long thread on Chaos but even though the demo looked great, it did look like there was trouble, perhps too good to be true? Is it version 2? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devin Johnston Posted January 20, 2009 Author Share Posted January 20, 2009 Yes I got V2 this morning and this is the first time I've used it so it's entirely possible I'm missing something. However it's not that complex of a program and from the way it was presented it seemed to be the perfect answer to the problem I'm facing now. The fact that there based in Russia the time difference and their subtle lack of understanding of the English language is making it very difficult to communicate. Questions seem to take at least 12-24 hours to be answered. I'm also in the Vray forum discussion but I'm not getting any help their, this is my last chance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trick Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 The procedure is as follows. Let's say you want to make trees. You assign a multisubobject material to it (for trunk, branches, leaves, etc) and you can put a RGB multiply material in the diffuse slot for the leaves with a leaf texture and the VRayScatterTexure to get the color variations later. After that you export the mesh to a VRay Proxy, but make sure that the material stays in the material editor. Then make a plane, assign VRayScatter to the plane, choose the saved VRay Proxy for the tree, and assign the mentioned material to the VRayScatter object. Then adjust all parameters and ....viola !! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Thomas Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 Apologies if I'm being too simplistic here but doesn't this come down to the same thing as proxies in general not retaining their materials? It's not unique to vray scatter. I find it generally good practise to save my proxies as a max scene file containing the material and then merge them in rather than using the vray proxy insert on the command panel. I understand this isn't really an option with vray scatter, but perhaps in this case you should save a .mat file along with each proxy and give it the same name as your proxy. Then you can simply apply it to all instances and you have the option of adding in a mix map with the vray scatter material if you wish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ihabkal Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 I bypassed all these problems and am using GroundWiz instead. And it is a PLEASURE. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devin Johnston Posted January 20, 2009 Author Share Posted January 20, 2009 Amazingly that seems to have worked, it's a little inconvenient having to have the proxy material in the editor but I guess it's a bug they haven't fixed yet. I get the feeling that I'm entering another Maxwell situation here where I'm trying to use a software program that's still full of bugs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trick Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 I bypassed all these problems and am using GroundWiz instead. And it is a PLEASURE. Yes, GroundWiz is far easier and a lot more fun to use. You can spray in proxies exactly where you want them and you can put different proxies in the container for spraying. The only big thing why I sometimes need VRayScatter is that GroundWiz stops being comfortable in use, when going over 80000 instances. The setup time before rendering starts is taking way too long. VRayScatter on the other hand does millions of instances in almost NO time. This does not mean that it is much easier on memory. With some millions of instances you still need a big (meaning 8GB+ RAM) machine, but at least then you will be able to use so many instances. In general for 95% of my work GroundWiz does a perfect job. But when you have to do animations over a massive landscape with millions of trees VRayScatter (and a room with fully packed machines) is the only way to go. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trick Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 Amazingly that seems to have worked, it's a little inconvenient having to have the proxy material in the editor but I guess it's a bug they haven't fixed yet. I get the feeling that I'm entering another Maxwell situation here where I'm trying to use a software program that's still full of bugs. Once you assigned the material to the VRayScatter object you don't need it in the material editor anymore...if that is what you meant. It's indeed a good idea to have a material library that caries the same name as your proxies. But there are worse situations where this is required. I have large libraries with VRay materials carrying the same name as the trees I make with NatFX and SpeedTree, because on generation they will have standard materials. This workflow has somehow improved with the latest versions of the plugins, but there is always some work to do, to get things comfortable into your workflow... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devin Johnston Posted January 20, 2009 Author Share Posted January 20, 2009 Well I don’t' have Groundwiz so it's kind of pointless to bring it up, anyway the whole reason I got vrascatter is it is supposed to work specifically with vray and can handle many millions more proxies than anything else can. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Thomas Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 Like I said, this is a common issue with vray proxies and is not a specific bug with the Vray Scatter plugin. Proxies don't store materials. Check here for more info on this: http://www.cgarchitect.com/upclose/VI/Week25/week25.htm Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devin Johnston Posted January 20, 2009 Author Share Posted January 20, 2009 Like I said, this is a common issue with vray proxies and is not a specific bug with the Vray Scatter plugin. Proxies don't store materials. Check here for more info on this: http://www.cgarchitect.com/upclose/VI/Week25/week25.htm Honestly I've been using Vray for over 2 years and I've never had a problem with them holding onto their textures. When I create a proxy I save it into a Max file and then just merge them into what ever scene I'm working on. It's one of the most reliable and useful features of Vray in my experience. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stephen Thomas Posted January 20, 2009 Share Posted January 20, 2009 Right, I get you. So you're merging the proxy in first then scattering it? In that case it does sound like a bug then. You'll find though that it is the max file that is holding the material info rather than the proxy itself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devin Johnston Posted January 20, 2009 Author Share Posted January 20, 2009 Well I don’t' have Groundwiz so it's kind of pointless to bring it up, anyway the whole reason I got vrascatter is it is supposed to work specifically with vray and can handle many millions more proxies than anything else can. Sorry about that Trick that was rude, I know you were just trying to help. I'm a little frustrated by this whole mess, thanks for your help without it I'd still be in the dark. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ihabkal Posted January 21, 2009 Share Posted January 21, 2009 Oh that is ok, I say stupid stuff all the time. I only mentioned GroundWiz because I believe that we all should be aware of all plugins that do a specific task if we don't use them...I tried GroundWiz, VrayScatter demo, and Forest pro 3, the first one works for me. But I understand it has limits, they all do, as was mentioned earlier in this thredead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RnDGroup Posted January 22, 2009 Share Posted January 22, 2009 Sorry for some support problems with our product. We just relise new version and have a lot of questions from our customers. And also we have 8-12 hours time differens with USA and our English is not so good. Please read manuals on rendering dot com. Also you can get support by email (mail at icube dot ru) or whrite direct to me (mobilep800 at mail dot ru) - i will try to help as soon as possible. Alex Duk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trick Posted January 22, 2009 Share Posted January 22, 2009 ...i will try to help as soon as possible... To prevent people asking unneccessary questions, it would be wise to make some tutorials/demos that show the workflow to get the most out of this plugin regarding render speed, memory requirements, number of instances, best GI methods, etc. You seem to have been using this plugin a lot so this should not be any problem. Also some examples regarding masking in combination with GradientEdge would show the endless possibilities !! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devin Johnston Posted January 22, 2009 Author Share Posted January 22, 2009 I agree the Manual is extremely vague in some of the most important areas like masks and materials. It would also be of great benefit to have an English forum as I'd be willing to bet most of your clients don't speak Russian. One thing I have noticed is that scaling seems to be unreliable; objects that start out at 100% are sometimes either extremely large or small. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manta Posted January 22, 2009 Share Posted January 22, 2009 By the way how much does it cost...can't seem to find that anywhere... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Devin Johnston Posted January 22, 2009 Author Share Posted January 22, 2009 $270 per workstation and render nodes are now unlimited. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ihabkal Posted January 23, 2009 Share Posted January 23, 2009 One thing I have noticed is that scaling seems to be unreliable; objects that start out at 100% are sometimes either extremely large or small. THe same problem happens with GroundWiz and Forest Pro 3, so if you specify scaling from 80% to 100%, you end up with some trees at 20%! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RnDGroup Posted January 23, 2009 Share Posted January 23, 2009 Forum for English speakers will be open at next week. Tutorials and demos also will be available soon. Thank you for your critics. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trick Posted January 23, 2009 Share Posted January 23, 2009 Forum for English speakers will be open at next week. Tutorials and demos also will be available soon. Thank you for your critics. Thanks. That's comforting to know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ihabkal Posted January 23, 2009 Share Posted January 23, 2009 your flags are same colour, but in different location Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trick Posted January 23, 2009 Share Posted January 23, 2009 Our blue is darker :p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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