Deleting Parts Shader

gregsandor · October 30, 2009, 08:31:30 AM

Why can't I just use the delete key to remove parts shaders? I'm still connecting shaders to multishaders so I can see them as I work on them, and to have to go individually and right-click, select from menu, select, delete each shader is a pain in the neck.

Henry Blewer · October 30, 2009, 11:27:20 AM

There is a icon to the right of the parts shader. This will open the nodes for materials of the object. The red bars are the various materials. Open each one to assign the various attributes.
I did not learn about this until recently. It works better than a multishader. For some reason I can't just add nodes and plug them in, but they can be added from within the attribute window.

gregsandor · October 30, 2009, 03:33:48 PM

Let me rephrase my question:

Why can't I just use the delete key to remove parts shaders? I'm still connecting shaders to multishaders so I can see them as I work on them, and to have to go individually and right-click, select from menu, select, delete each shader is a pain in the neck.

Henry Blewer · October 30, 2009, 06:53:28 PM

You can box select all the different parts in the parts shader by left click dragging the mouse around them. I use the delete from the menu at the top. I don't know or use the keyboard shortcuts. (There has been too many other things to learn)

Klas · October 31, 2009, 04:16:30 AM

njeneb:
load an object, go into the surface shader and you see the object parts and default shader. Now mark the shader and press [DEL], the default shaders are deleted but the object parts not.

jo · October 31, 2009, 06:05:21 AM

Hi,

I believe you aren't supposed to be able to delete object parts. Once they're deleted there is no way to recreate them. If they can be deleted by any means it's probably a bug. I will check it out next week.

Regards,

Jo

Klas · October 31, 2009, 07:09:49 AM

Quote from: jo on October 31, 2009, 06:05:21 AM
Hi,

I believe you aren't supposed to be able to delete object parts. Once they're deleted there is no way to recreate them. If they can be deleted by any means it's probably a bug. I will check it out next week.

Regards,

Jo

Henry Blewer · October 31, 2009, 08:22:59 AM

When I began trying to use my own objects, I used a default shader. This worked ok for an object with one material. The multishader did not know which part/material to shade. I was flummoxed. Then, somewhere I learned about the icon to the right of the inputs. After opening that, things made sense. I do not know of any other way to work with multiple materials in an object.

Anyway, Jo knows this program better than most of us. He'll have the right answer. I do think he is right about the objects parts. Where would the program know what they were without them? $:-\$

gregsandor · October 31, 2009, 10:02:14 AM

Quote from: jo on October 31, 2009, 06:05:21 AM
Hi,

I believe you aren't supposed to be able to delete object parts. Once they're deleted there is no way to recreate them. If they can be deleted by any means it's probably a bug. I will check it out next week.

Regards,

Jo

I don't want to recreate them. I like setting up the .mtl file and using the multishader for models. I usually build large sets of related-theme models and UV map and organize them to share materials in a particular way ahead of importing them. Rather than duplicating shaders I build the shaders and assign them to the entire group of objects. Please don't remove that ability.

Henry Blewer · October 31, 2009, 11:03:53 AM

That is available. The key is to link the parts which share materials. This can be done using the input for each 'channel'.
I tend to use procedurals for just about everything. It would be great if Blender materials/textures were supported. I would model the objects and then bring them into Terragen 2. The materials would be assigned, but left unfinished. Then I would start adding Surface Layers to each material.
If image mapping is to be used, get PoseRay. It makes everything 'fit' so the image maps map correctly. It exports Wavefront obj format, which seems to be the external object format standard. Here is the link to the beginning thread which has a link to the program. There is also an explaination of how it was used.

http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=3036.0

gregsandor · October 31, 2009, 11:43:12 AM

I build my own .obj models and UV map them myself with UVMapper, so I don't need PoseRay, though I've heard a lot of people find it really useful.

Henry Blewer · October 31, 2009, 05:41:14 PM

There is a scale issue. For instance, Blender does not know about real world measurements. There is only Blender units. When something is imported into Terragen 2, it seems that the actual size data is lost.
Poseray somehow gets around this, so that the scale is preserved for image mapping.

Oshyan · October 31, 2009, 11:14:07 PM

The Parts Shader was introduced as part of a replacement for the Multishader to allow for an arbitrary (i.e. more than 16) number of textures. When an object is loaded, the Parts Shader is created with individual texture shaders inside it corresponding to each UV mapped texture specified in the object. This allows full control over complex objects, which was a very desired feature for a long time. We don't yet have the ability to manually create textures mapped to individual UV areas inside TG2 *after* the initial object load however, so that's why you need to rely on what TG2 creates automatically from the beginning. If you want to adjust the UV mapped areas, you should do so in your 3rd party modeling or texturing application.

- Oshyan

gregsandor · November 01, 2009, 12:17:45 AM

I asked how to delete the parts shader nodes quickly, without having to go through a lot of separate operations to get rid of them in order to set up my scenes for rendering. I don't want to have to go into each of 70 models and connect the same Brick shader over and over again. I want to create my shader set, delete the default shaders, and tell every model to use Architecture_Shader_Set.

I know the origin and the raison-d'etre of the parts shader. I understand how to build, UV map and assign materials for my models. I don't need Blender or Pose Ray; though I appreciate the suggestions they have nothing to do with my question.

Henry Blewer · November 01, 2009, 09:15:40 AM

For now there is not anyway to use objects other than the way we have been describing. 3D Studio Max has a Terragen 2 plug in now. I do not know very much about it. But more plug-ins for other software, including Lightwave may be written.