default shader: issues

Started by Valentina, June 04, 2017, 11:59:15 AM

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Valentina

Hi everyone, I'm trying and playing with objects in terragen 3. My intention is to import obj in Tg from Maya, the software which now I use mostly. I've encountered many issues: the objs I import in Tg keep only their colour and colour image, but nothing at all of other settings (reflectivity, bump, roughness, eccentricity ecc). Not a great deal, I can plug my spec/displacement textures by myself and I can even re do my shading work playing with reflection settings and other settings in the default shader.
But with this default shader I'm having troubles..
I hope image isn't too big, referring to it:

Sphere 1: I used a constant shader and a reflective shader in order to give color and specular information. result: color is correct and specular too, the sphere can, infact, reflect environment around it as I expected it to do since reflectivity is 1.

Sphere 2: I used the default shader with the same settings of the reflective one. result: color and specular point are correct, but the sphere doesn't reflect anything.
___________

Sphere 3: I used a glass shader in order to give to my sphere color, transparency settings and speculare ones. Result: all is correct.

Sphere 4: with the default shader I can't achieve any transparency. with values from 0 to 0.49 i see no sphere, with values from 0.5 to 1 i see a fully solid sphere.

What am I doing wrong? I would like to use the default shader because it gives me the opportunity to plug different maps, such as colour image, roughness, specular, displacement and so on, while I can't plug a map in the constant shader. Also, the default shader is only one node which, by theory, can perform anything. But probably I miss something.
thank yoy for your help and, as always, forgive my English.

(I still have problems understanding if I have to post something in the Tg discussion or in image sharing, if I've started this thread in the wrong section, please forgive me :/ )

Valentina

Oshyan

The Default Shader has specular-only reflection, the reflection is not Ray Traced. That's why you don't see true reflections on Sphere 2, only specular.

Similarly, the Default Shader does not have Ray Traced transparency and refraction. That's what the Glass and Reflective Shaders are good for (same with reflections, as above).

Currently Ray Traced effects (refractive transparency, reflections) are treated as somewhat special cases in the Terragen render engine. They require more demanding rendering calculations and are hence generally limited to specific shaders. In the future this will hopefully be better integrated as Terragen moves more towards a fully ray/path traced approach.

If you want to add Ray Traced Reflective or Refractive properties after using the Default Shader for basic shading, you can just add a Glass or Reflective Shader after the Default Shader, before it goes into the Surface Shader input.

And, for clarification, the Image Sharing section is to be used when you are sharing an image as the primary goal of your post, i.e. a work-in-progress or final image that you have made for presentation. If you have a question or support issue it should be posted in a different section, even if you are using one or more images or other attachments to illustrate the issue (because the primary purpose of the post is the question or issue you have, not the image/attachments).

- Oshyan

Valentina

thank you, can be a solution. I think I'll begin with far objects, so I can sacrifice some level of details.
thank you again,
Valentina