New Beta Test Version

We released a new Beta Test version to try some new features and fixes.

If you have any problems with it let us know. (There are some relatively large changes in this Beta test version which may cause some problems until we iron the out.)

Autosave - occasionally the rendering hangs during Autosave. If you have this problem, then set Autosave to 0 to turn it off.

Download:

Download this version from: JL08 Beta

(We are not placing this Beta Test version on our downloads page until a few users have tried it out)

JL08 Beta - Dec 8, 2010

Added Material Channels to change the colors of materials after rendering
Added Planar HDRi Backgrounds
Added Contrast to the Tone Operator
Fixed bug when creating Arroway and other texture Set materials
Fix bug where lamp colors were displaying as black on lamp wizard.

Material channels:

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Render Plus on December 8, 2010 at 8:06pm

Let us know if anything does (or does not) work with this Beta test version.

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Permalink Reply by Boothy on December 9, 2010 at 7:38am

Thanks Al
I will download and try later
Boothy

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Permalink Reply by STORIUS on December 9, 2010 at 9:56am

Al

I tried several tests and the problem seems solved with armaterial Arroway.

Thanks Al

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Permalink Reply by Render Plus on December 9, 2010 at 9:59am

STORIUS said:

Al

I tried several tests and the problem seems solved with armaterial Arroway.

Thanks Al

great. Try out the material channels feature and see if it will be useful for altering the color of artisan materials after rendering.

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Permalink Reply by Boothy on December 9, 2010 at 10:54am

Hi Al

Many thanks I think this option as took NXT yet another leap forward.In hindsight - This would have saved a load of time with presentation previously mentioned last week. I think I am probably more excited about the HSL control and tone control - both being yet one more step away from having to use photoshop (not that I have a problem with this).

In terms of limitations - first impressions (I have only being playing with for 5 mins) are more relevant to shadow colour than reflection\indirect lighting as the material is changed on a pixel colour basis the shadow colour changes at an equal rate and therefore starts to look less realistic - I am not looking for a solution here - just stating that to be used well it may have to be used selectively - the second image is more relevant to me where I can for example change door colours to give the client an alternatively colour scheme.

Its a shame that we cannot save the final image to re open in render window as we do in image editor so a rendered image could be closed and reopened another time.In the example regarding door colours - having given the client several options , he or she will inevitably come back the next week with new a scheme - in this situation I would have to render the model again. Can I have multiple render windows open at once in a multiple batch render situation? - so I could still make multiple overnight batch renders ( I produced 9 visuals in one continuous run last week) and still edit colour before closing render window.

Please do not take any of these observations negatively or consider that I am not grateful - this is really good stuff!

I have also noticed in beta that the hdri background channel is not greyed out any more - do this mean its now active? I am only just back from a long couple days in London so have not had much time to play - I will spend some more time later or Friday and get back to you

Thanks again for your support and effort

Boothy

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Permalink Reply by Boothy on December 9, 2010 at 11:31am

Hi Again

I also noticed that in the`set light channels`option in set up dialog - 2 of the channels are listed as self glow - is this a typo or can we now allocate more than 1 self glow channel ?

Thanks again

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Permalink Reply by Boothy on December 9, 2010 at 12:54pm

If there are situations where simple pixel colour change is not enough - the material channel does give you the option of creating your own `blue or green masks` to allow very quick easy creation of complicated selections\masks in an image editor - this is really cool stuff !

Boothy

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Permalink Reply by Render Plus on December 9, 2010 at 2:12pm

Boothy said:

Hi Again

I also noticed that in the`set light channels`option in set up dialog - 2 of the channels are listed as self glow - is this a typo or can we now allocate more than 1 self glow channel ?

typo - sorry.

have you tried using the material channels for intensity of self glow signs yet?

Thanks again

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Permalink Reply by Render Plus on December 9, 2010 at 2:17pm

to open multiple render windows, you can run Irenderbatch.exe manually, and select the default file.

or you can start the second rendering from a new instance of SketchUp.

If you want to rerender a window, the windows will hace to have different batch file locations.

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Permalink Reply by Boothy on December 9, 2010 at 2:20pm

have you tried using the material channels for intensity of self glow signs yet?

Do you mean by changing luminosity in HSL settings ?

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Permalink Reply by Render Plus on December 9, 2010 at 2:25pm

Boothy said:

have you tried using the material channels for intensity of self glow signs yet?

Do you mean by changing luminosity in HSL settings ?

yes

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Permalink Reply by Boothy on December 9, 2010 at 2:31pm

One of the things I thought it might be good for was to tweak backgrounds - unfortunately because it only affects visible rendered pixel colour of rendered image (unlike the tonal basis of light channels) it does not allow change of colour behind other materials in the same way a self glow channel does - in the image below I was using my test model originally to change self glow of background but keep relections on glass windows - with material channels this cannot work.