Random colour tiles (Poser 11 FireFly/SuperFly)

[3dcheapskate]

Main topic is over on the Renderosity Poser Technical forum - Using 3D nodes (Cellular) with 2D UV maps ?

But since I can't post the mt5 files over there...

 

[3dcheapskate]

(each plane is UV mapped to the same full square so the pattern on each is identical - this prop was just to check an axes-related problem)
The zip contains just an mt5 and png

 

[3dcheapskate]

A slight modification to that gives me my swimming pool tiling

 

[3dcheapskate]

An earlier version using the 3D Noise node - not so good because there are artefacts when it's rendered in FireFly

But the shader fitted on a single screenshot...

For the shaders in the previous two posts I basically just replaced the ColorRamp node with a User_Defined node, and the Noise node with three fBm nodes, one for each colour channel (the FireFly artefacts are from the Noise node)

 

[3dcheapskate]

Here's the material from the second post here (Blue-green fBm tiling) applied to the sides and floor of the toon pool freebie I'm working on.

I made two tweaks - the number of tiles (Value-1 of the Math_Functions node far right of the shader) changed from 10 to 40, and Mortar_Thickness of Tile node increased to 3.

Here's a Poser 11 FireFly render

and a Poser 11 SuperFly render too

 

[3dcheapskate]

I've just converted the 'Random tiling fBm' material from the first post here to a rather more user friendly Poser 11 compound node - MT5 file attached.

Here's what it looks like in the material room.
The first 4 parameters should be self-explanatory.
The 5th, 'Random_Tweak', changes the random colours - try using 1, 2, 3, etc:

Here it is applied to my toon pool with some of those parameters adjusted:

And for those who like spaghetti, here's inside the compound node (for some reason, when I expand the compound node the External Inputs node get moved way, way over to the left of everything else. That's Poser for you, eh?):

 

[3dcheapskate]

I'm working on another compound node that'll give more flexibiliity and allow the equivalent of things like the Blue-green fBm tiling.mt5...

Just a couple of little things to iron out...

 

[3dcheapskate]

...done

The attached zip contains a 'Weighted_Color_Tiles' compound node that looks like this

First 4 parameters self-explanatory as before.
5th 'Random_Tweak' changes the random values - try using 1, 2, 3, etc. Other values should be fine too.
Last three parameters are 'weights' for the R, G, B channels - values should be 0, 1, 2, or 3. I won't explain because I'm not very good at that, but just try setting various combinations and you should get the idea

 

[3dcheapskate]

And another, almost (and possibly) final I think, update. I've added a few bits to the previous compound node so that if all three weights are set to zero it'll simply produce a random colour as per the first version of the shader I posted here in post #2.

Some hints for the weights (examples below given in RGB order):
0,0,0 = totally random colour tiles
1,0,0 = shades of red; 0,1,0 = shades of green; 0,0,1 = shades of blue (should be near enough full dynamic range)
1,1,0 = shades of yellow; 1,0,1 = shades of magenta; 0,1,1,= shades of cyan (*slightly biased towards darker shades)
1,1,1 = shades of grey (*will be on the darker side)
2,1,0 = combinations of red and green with red >green for every tile; 0,1,2 = combinations of blue and green with blue > green for every tile; etc
3,2,1 = combinations of R,G and B with R > G > B; 1,2,3 = combinations of R,G and B with B > G > R; etc
Combinations like 3,2,0 or 2,2,0 aren't recommended - they'll probably work fine but I can't really say what they'll produce.

And for those who fancy opening Pandora's box, here's an annotated screenshot of the expanded node just to give you some pointers amongst the spaghetti and nodeballs...

*This is because the shader was originally created for the 3,2,1 and 2,1,0 style combinations and my brain's reached it's limit...

 

[3dcheapskate]

All-singing all-dancing "Poser 11 compond node for creating random colour tiles" freebie now in Renderosity FreeStuff.

(Yes I know, but I can't be bothered with asking them to add the missing u to the freebie title so a compond node it is then)

 

[3dcheapskate]

I've just been playing with this idea again, but using a P node's x and z values instead of the U and V coordinates. The reason is that I want to make a swimming pool that can morph from round to rectangular to peanut shaped, which of course would hideously distort the nice UV based tiling on the floor of the pool.

Here's the first shader, just a quick test to prove the concept (zipped MT5 attached to this post)

A render with the shader applied to a sphere and a plane

And a top view of that

That appears to work

 

[3dcheapskate]

Successfully made it three colour channels and added mortar between the tiles. Zipped MT5 attached to this post, screenshot of shader and a couple of renders follow.

Two obvious problems, reasons for both known.
1) Mortar is double thickness along the x and z axes. Due to the simple check I used to differentiate tile and mortar. Not too difficult to fix.
2) Random pattern is the same for each quadrant. Because I used the absolute values of the x and z positions. Shouldn't be too hard to work with negative x and z positions - just need to think carefully...

 

[3dcheapskate]

Okay, already fixed both of those. No shader screenshot as it's a bit of a mess, but the zipped MT5 is attached to this post and two renders follow.

Just a bit of tidying up needed, and maybe make it a compound node too?

 

[MEC4D]

View attachment 79019

Hi @3dcheapskate
How you changed the model preview in material room ? Is there a path to replace the sphere with your own model ?

 

[KageRyu]

Wish this could work in Poser 2014. I rarely use 11+ for a variety of reasons.

 

[3dcheapskate]

Hi @3dcheapskate
How you changed the model preview in material room ? Is there a path to replace the sphere with your own model ?

I have no idea. It changes of its own accord to G2 James' face after I set the renderer to SuperFly (which I did just for testing). When I change back to FireFly it reverts to the standard full square thingy. Can't see anything on the Edit > General Preferences, nor on the Render > Render Settings that might change it. But I do vaguely recall there being a facility somewhere to set the object that's used in the PoserSurface preview, cube and sphere being other options. However, I can't find anything about it in the manual. Maybe ask on Rendo's Poser Technical forum ?

 

[3dcheapskate]

Wish this could work in Poser 2014. I rarely use 11+ for a variety of reasons.

It should do... I think. I only have Poser 11 installed now, so I can't check.
The nodes I'm using are ones that have been around since at least Poser 9... I think... so there shouldn't be a problem there. It's just Math_Function, Blender, fBm, and P (I rename a lot of Math_Function nodes to remind me what's going on).
If you load an MT5 from a later version of Poser than the one you're using I think you get a pop-up warning that it might not work, but you just ignore that cos it should work. At least that's what I used to do when I used Poser 9 / PP2014 shaders in Poser 6... I think ;o)

 

[KageRyu]

Ok I'll give it a try. A procedural tile node like this could be very useful.