Custom Shader Node - Texture Editor

[overdrivediamond]

Hey,

We created a custom shader node for our pipeline and noticed yet another problem. In the Texture Editor, the textures menu shows an extra texture (shading group) that shouldn't be there? This doesn't normally happen in Maya-defined materials, but I noticed it occurs in ours. Is there a way to remove it?

Example: (texture menu)
pSphere1 | ShaderNode1SG
pSphere1 | ShaderNode1SG | fileNode_diffuse
pSphere1 | ShaderNode1SG | fileNode_normal

Another issue is that the areas in the Texture UV Editor that are not defined by uv are surrounded by a black background (rather than the texture).

Yet another issue...when switching between shader files, we noticed that that a ghost "map1" is created. Is this a Maya spec?

Thanks in advance.

[joojaa]

QUOTE(Overdrive D @ 09/20/07, 08:10 PM) [snapback]273564[/snapback]
Another issue is that the areas in the Texture UV Editor that are not defined by uv are surrounded by a black background (rather than the texture).

procedurals work that way, maya bakes to uv and outside uv theres nothing to bake, a map shows fully if your bake resolution (for the shader) is set to normal and not some other value (which again bakes)

Standard behavuiour.

QUOTE
Yet another issue...when switching between shader files, we noticed that that a ghost "map1" is created. Is this a Maya spec?

Its porbebly the uv chooser lookup

[overdrivediamond]

The black background only seems to happen in the first texture (SG) of the Texture Window. Is there a way to remove the SG texture from the custom shader node? Does this issue only happen to custom maya shader nodes?

[joojaa]

QUOTE(Overdrive D @ 09/21/07, 08:51 PM) [snapback]273624[/snapback]
Does this issue only happen to custom maya shader nodes?

No, like i said above, it happens on ALL procedural processing. This includes re interpolation of maps to different resolution than on disk.

Unless texture resolution is set to default! or image -> uv texture editor baking is on and its not 3d procedural

[overdrivediamond]

Thanks for your immediate replies. Here's the major issue that we see. It seems that the custom shader performs tiling procedural (or in a different manner) than the Maya's traditional lambert one does, thus leaving the black background. Is there a way to prevent this effect and have it follow the standard lambert style?

Maya's traditional lambert shader

Our custom shader

When I tweaked the texture hardware rendering attributes in the lambert material from default to 256x256, it had the same results as the amat shader node. It seems that when the material uses a resolution other than default, it has the strange effect (black background)

Is there a way for the custom shader node to behave as the standard maya one?

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The following information came from the docs:

Assigning a texture shader as an input to a built-in Maya material shader

When a user assigns a texture shader as an input to a built-in Maya material shader (for example, lambert) a connection is automatically made between the texture node's message attribute and the downstream materialInfo node's texture[0] attribute. This is necessary for accurate hardware rendering. This does not happen automatically with custom material shaders and procedures will have to be implemented to make the connection. Unfortunately when the scene is saved and re-opened the texture will no longer be connected to the materialInfo node's texture[0] attribute. Instead the material shader's message attribute will have this connection.

Workaround

Procedures will have to be implemented to break this connection and reconnect the texture node's message attribute with the texture[0] attribute. Possible solutions may include: the registering of a callback in the plug-in's initialize method to check for this connection and alter it if necessary, or the modification of the AE template script to make such connections when necessary.
Monitoring the desired hardware resolution of a Texture2d node

To monitor the desired hardware resolution of a Texture2d node the renderer queries its resolution attribute. This attribute is added dynamically to a texture when the user sets the Hardware Texturing >Texture Quality of a built in material shader node (e.g. lambert.). This is not the case with custom material shader plug-ins.

Workaround

A procedure must be implemented that will dynamically add the resolution attribute (type kLong) to an input texture. The resolution attribute can have the values: 32, 64, 128, or 256.