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GLBDaz Studio Shader Mixer / Brickyard creating an RGB Mask
104
Hi All,
This may be a long shot... Has anyone had any luck creating an Iray Shader with an RGB mask?
Specifically I'm trying to create a shader that takes an RGB texture map as an input and have that drive 3 sperate materials within the shader. In the past I've been able to do this with separate Black and White masks as inputs for each of the materials (so 3 separate image files) but I'm hoping to consolidate this down to a single map using each channel as its own mask.
I'm coming unstuck because I can't seem to find a Get Component or Split RGB brick in the brickyard.
As an aside, this may be user error but is there anyway to search for bricks by name rather than scrolling through
Thanks
LZY
This may be a long shot... Has anyone had any luck creating an Iray Shader with an RGB mask?
Specifically I'm trying to create a shader that takes an RGB texture map as an input and have that drive 3 sperate materials within the shader. In the past I've been able to do this with separate Black and White masks as inputs for each of the materials (so 3 separate image files) but I'm hoping to consolidate this down to a single map using each channel as its own mask.
I'm coming unstuck because I can't seem to find a Get Component or Split RGB brick in the brickyard.
As an aside, this may be user error but is there anyway to search for bricks by name rather than scrolling through
Thanks
LZY
! REPORT
Hi LZY,
I am not using the Shader Mixer much, but in the Brickyard under Utility -> Color is a Color Components brick that splits the input color into its three components. There is also a Color Transform Brick to combine them into one color. This could be used for the final color outputs of the three masks by using three of these bricks and connecting for each of the three splitter outputs all three inputs together. I am not sure if this is needed; maybe the splitter outputs can be used directly for the image map inputs.
As far as I know, there is no option to search for bricks by name.
I am not using the Shader Mixer much, but in the Brickyard under Utility -> Color is a Color Components brick that splits the input color into its three components. There is also a Color Transform Brick to combine them into one color. This could be used for the final color outputs of the three masks by using three of these bricks and connecting for each of the three splitter outputs all three inputs together. I am not sure if this is needed; maybe the splitter outputs can be used directly for the image map inputs.
As far as I know, there is no option to search for bricks by name.
REPLY
! REPORT
LZY
Karma: 5,237
Sat, Aug 08Hi Petege, thanks for the response. The only Color Component I can find is RSL only and this would need to be MDL to be compatible with iray.
The search continues...
The search continues...
You have to scroll through them...
I once stumbled across an RGB brick by chance on there; normally, there should be one present.
I once stumbled across an RGB brick by chance on there; normally, there should be one present.
REPLY
! REPORT
LZY
Karma: 5,237
Sat, Aug 08If you find it again let me know 
My solution, which is somewhat working, is using the bricks Float 3 Get X, Float 3 Get Y, Float 3 Get Z. These seem to equate to Red, Green and Blue.
My solution, which is somewhat working, is using the bricks Float 3 Get X, Float 3 Get Y, Float 3 Get Z. These seem to equate to Red, Green and Blue.And here is the result. The only issue I'm having at the moment is with texture compression in daz studio. The RGB map becomes heavily pixelated. This is resolved by changing the Texture Compression Thresholds in the Optimization tab. This does not happen with black and white masks, I wonder if there's a way to resolve this in the shader itself. Anyway, I now have material zones without needing geometry to define the material zones.
REPLY
! REPORT
Pushee-Ri
Karma: 51,950
Sat, Aug 08Congratulations!!!!
I’ve tried several times to wrap my head around this pile of spaghetti with Kandinsky topping ... but I’ve failed every time. What I had in mind were procedural textures.... but as I said: nope, nada, niente
That’s why I find your achievement particularly amazing and admirable. Seriously - absolutely top-notch!
I’ve tried several times to wrap my head around this pile of spaghetti with Kandinsky topping ... but I’ve failed every time. What I had in mind were procedural textures.... but as I said: nope, nada, niente
That’s why I find your achievement particularly amazing and admirable. Seriously - absolutely top-notch!
LZY
Karma: 5,237
Sat, Aug 08Thanks! I always finish a session in the shader mixer with a massive headache and minimum viable product vibes. I wish daz would put more effort into it. Blender invested heavily in their node graph a few years ago and it really shows.
Pushee-Ri
Karma: 51,950
Sat, Aug 08DAZ and invest in something that hardly anyone uses? You must be kidding 
But now that I've seen from your example that it's possible to create something useful, I'm starting to get a little itchy to give it another try
Do you know of any good DAZ-based tutorials? I know there are plenty from Nvidia and Blender, too—but I'm so new to this that I wouldn't know where to start with them.
But now that I've seen from your example that it's possible to create something useful, I'm starting to get a little itchy to give it another try
Do you know of any good DAZ-based tutorials? I know there are plenty from Nvidia and Blender, too—but I'm so new to this that I wouldn't know where to start with them.
LZY
Karma: 5,237
Sun, Aug 09There's a chicken and egg argument in there somewhere along the line that more users would be generated by more usability but I guess the real reason is you can't make money from it. I don't think you can encrypt shaders like you can scripts, could be wrong but that's my guess.
As to your question, not really. There are some threads in the daz forums that give glances of what might be possible and the language is mdl which is the same as substance designer and very well documented outside daz studio. Also the principles are the same as blender node graphs, with similar logic working for both.
This unfortunately brings us full circle; because its such a pain to navigate the brickyard and the name etc of the bricks are obscure and some features simply don't exist its painful to translate.
As to your question, not really. There are some threads in the daz forums that give glances of what might be possible and the language is mdl which is the same as substance designer and very well documented outside daz studio. Also the principles are the same as blender node graphs, with similar logic working for both.
This unfortunately brings us full circle; because its such a pain to navigate the brickyard and the name etc of the bricks are obscure and some features simply don't exist its painful to translate.