Texture Blending in 3DSMAX - FX Shaders
polycounter lvl 7
Hey guys, I'm looking to blend a rock texture with a dirt texture within 3DSMAX and I'm having trouble finding the right FX shader that will work. (blending diffuse, spec, normal)
Alot of what I've found dictates that I use UDK or Cryengine and I'm just wanting to do this all within max.
That being said is there any good FX shaders out there that can do this easily and can be rendered out properly? Much thanks if any of you can help out!
Alot of what I've found dictates that I use UDK or Cryengine and I'm just wanting to do this all within max.
That being said is there any good FX shaders out there that can do this easily and can be rendered out properly? Much thanks if any of you can help out!
Replies
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?t=100187
There has to be a way without limiting what you can do in Max to just blend two textures... what do people do in the movie industry?
A lot of people put "vertex color" in the mask channel and then apply vertex paint modifer to the object and paint the blend. It won't show up in the viewport but it will show up when you render.
This seems like such a simple thing to have a solution to - why can't max do texture blends without issues? Hah.
I'm just going to blend the textures in UDK, it obviously can't be done the way I want it. (I want to have my cake and eat it too)
They're different things handled in different ways, written in different languages.
3dsmax procedural/parametric materials like Blend will only show up in the viewport with a rough approximation as far as Autodesk have been bothered to implement them - so, for example, some materials will not ever show up correctly in the viewport because they have only been implemented in the software renderer.
Similarly, FX shaders for real-time display (like those you'd get in UDK or other game engines) are written specifically for that purpose. They are not supported in Max's software renderer because Autodesk have never implemented a feature that could convert those shaders to be renderable.
In the long run, this sort of tech will converge and cross over, but for now it's very much a case of "one or the other" except in specific circumstances where necessity or user pressure has required Autodesk implement real-time viewport functionality (which are, importantly, approximations, rarely ever exactly the same result!) for their "offline renderer" materials.
Hope that helps clarify the situation since you seem to be getting your wires crossed slightly about what will work in different rendering methods, and why.
This does work in a way since, DX mats have a software render mat for rendering (when you hit render). So you can have the real time shader in the viewport and the other mat when you render.