Material Matters

[deanmaytrap]

hi there, im currently working my way through some basic materials tutorials for 3DS Max 2017 + Vray, and i cant seem to find the Blend Material.

Obviously, the VrayblendMtl is there, but the standard 3DS Max blend (which is what the tutorial pertains to) is not. This also runs counter to what Autodesk has to say on the matter, as they're help guide for Max 2017 says simply "select Blend material from the Material Browser", and its just not there.

 

What is there is:

Physical Material

Double SIded

Ink 'n Paint

Matte/Shadow

Morpher

Multi-Sub-Object

Shell Material

Top/Bottom

XRef Material

 

has it been renamed? Am i looking in the wrong place?

[deanmaytrap]

...nevermind, just learned that it only appears if the active render supports it - which is strange, because when i open a tutorial file with a blend material in it, vray rendered it just fine, even though it apparently "doesnt support it"

 

as an aisde, the work around here was to:

 

1) disable vray as the active render (set to scanline or whatever...)

2) create the material. seleting Blend from the general list

3) reactivate vray and then apply the VRayMtls to material 1 and 2 and set up the mask

4) render, without issue

 

that makes for a rather terrible workflow.....

Edited June 6, 2017 by deanmaytrap

[Nicolai Bongard]

If you are using vray there is no need for the standard blend material, as you have vray blend material available that does exactly the same - blend between two (or in vray blend materials case; more) materials using masks.

[deanmaytrap]

certainly, i came on to that after working through this particular tutorial.

It just struck me as odd that this was a workable solution for a blend using the standard 3DS blend. It is a rather dated tute, vray has simply jsut moved on from there it would seem