Available in TurboCAD Pro, Platinum and Deluxe only
Each material has five categories of parameters you can set: Pattern, Reflectance, Transparency, Texture and Wrapping. Not all categories are used for each material, only those that are relevant.
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Warning: If the selection arrow is the specified option for the preview object, and no object is selected, you will get a warning that a preview cannot be generated. This will also happen if the selection arrow is the default and you open the Render Manager with no object selected.
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Options
The first set of parameters are the Options. This includes the RED file path.
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Refractive Caustics: Will Refractive Caustics be calculated and displayed for this material.
Pattern
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Note: TurboCAD has several defined patterns, but if you want to apply your own image as a pattern, see Creating a New Material.
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If set to color, that color will be the diffusion color of the material.
If a texture map is selected, the mapped image will be used to color the material.
Image/texture Maps
texture maps are images used in pattern, reflection, transmission and bump to establish the pattern of the effect. All texture maps are assumed to be square. If the image used is not square it will be stretched/compacted into a square texture map, possibly deforming the texture.
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This Rotates the texture map by the number of degrees specified.
Rotated by 30 degrees
Reflectance
Reflections can be anisotropic, Fresnel-style and glossy. All those effects need dedicated parameters to be modeled.
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Example of an applied texture map for reflection with anisotropy
Anisotropy
The anisotropy parameter varies in [0, 1] and describes how the reflection is oriented regarding to the surface orientation. Some real-life materials are well-known anisotropic ones: CD-ROM surface or hairs and fur for example. By default, a value of 0.5 makes the material isotropic (i.e. reflections do not vary with the orientation of the surface). Make the value smaller or greater to slightly modify the way the light is reflected at the material surface.
Click and drag in the control box slider to change the orientation of the anisotropy.
The Samples value Count changes the refinement of the anisotropy significantly.
Glossiness
The glossiness parameter controls how much the reflections are blurry. The samples parameter controls the noise level of the glossy reflections. Differences in the Glossiness setting can be seen below.
Glossiness at 0.01
Glossiness at 0.05
Glossiness at 0.99
Fresnel Reflection
Fresnel support is essential as it is the way real surfaces interact with the light. The strength of the reflection generally depends on the viewing angle (the angle between the observer and the surface normal).
Fresnel reflection OFF
Fresnel reflection ON
Specular Highlights
Note: This feature has been deprecated as redundant and will be excised from future versions of the RedSDK editor.
Transparency
This category is relevant for transparent glass and plastic materials. For example, "Eroded" transparency simulates a bumpy or uneven glass surface.
Not all glass or plastic materials have Transparency defined. For example, "Tinted Glass" is smooth, and its transparency is actually defined as part of the "Glass" reflectance.
This is a good example of how complex, and powerful, the TurboCAD materials engine is. You can get similar results by defining parameters in different categories.
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In other words it controls how light moves through a material.
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Note: If Fresnel is not checked reflection may overpower transmission effects.
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If set to color, that color will be the degree of transmission of the material.
If a texture map is selected the mapped image will be used to control the transmission of the material.
Both the color and any texture map rely on classical RGB format coding for the reflection. White (RGB 0, 0, 0) equals total transmission, and Black (RGB 256, 256, 256) equals zero transmission.
Color also affects the color of light transmitted through the material.
Transmission color set to grey, and the Diffusion color is set to white.
Transmission color set to red, and the Diffusion color is set to white.
Transmission color set to grey, and the Diffusion color is set to red
Transmission color set to red, and the Diffusion color is set to red.
As for the reflections, transmission can be glossy or not. Therefore, the same glossiness controlling parameters that are available for reflections are available for transmission.
IOR (Index of Refraction)
What makes the transmission effect acting like a magnifying/minifying glass is the Index of Refraction (IOR) of the material. Users can enter the value they need in the IOR field of choose one in the drop-down list (amongst various real-life material IORs).
IOR set to 1.00
IOR set to 2.00
See how in the previous image, the Total Internal Reflection (TIR) increases with the increasing IOR. In jewelry, where materials have strong IORs, the TIR effect is responsible for most of the final appearance of the object and must be carefully handled.
Example of an applied texture map for transmission
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Note: IOR has zero affect when transmission uses a texture map.
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Bump Map
This category enables you to make a surface appear rough or bumpy. The rendering engine simulates shadows along the surface to create the textured effect. For example, you can define a Leather texture.
"Ice" is defined with a rough texture.
Wrapping
This category defines how a pattern or image wraps around surfaces of a 3D object.For materials, such as Granite, the wrapping is defined as "None," which pastes the pattern without distortion onto faces along the three major planes.
The "UV" wrapping is similar to "None" except that you can specify how the pattern is scaled.
With "Auto Axis" the pattern is oriented according to the WCS, regardless of where the faces of the 3D object are located and oriented.
You can also specify the axis along which the pattern will be projected.This allows you to give more details to surfaces without paying the cost of detailed modeling, users can setup their materials to use bump mapping.
The supplied texture map is automatically converted to a normal map and therefore must be given in a classical RGB format to encode the elevation. The amount of bump can be tuned through the scale factor. White (RGB 0, 0, 0) equals the highest points in the map, and while Black (RGB 256, 256, 256) equals lowest points in the map.
Displacement
This category enables you to make a surface rough or bumpy. Unlike bump maps, Displacement actually alter the geometry used to render the object.
This allows you to give more details to surfaces without paying the cost of detailed modeling, users can setup their materials to use displacement mapping, however displacement will create a greater rendering time than bump maps
displacement The supplied texture map is automatically converted to a normal map and therefore must be given in a classical RGB format to encode the elevation. The amount of bump can be tuned through the scale factor. White (RGB 0, 0, 0) equals the highest points in the map, and while Black (RGB 256, 256, 256) equals lowest points in the map.
