Indigo Renderer Forum

Hi guys, esp. SmartDen

I'm trying to create an exterior scene of a house with trees. After waiting quite long time every time I hit "Export", due to tree models, I learned about "sep. meshs". I then move all trees to another layer and export just the trees to trees.igs with "sep. meshs" on. Then, hand-edited the mainscene.igs later by adding all the <material>, <include> and <model> into the mainscene.igs.

So, like a spoiled kid, "I want more candy, I want more candy, ... " Here's what I like to ask ;

1. A button said something like "Export as Proxy" to export only <material>, <include> and <model> to a .igs (because others like <renderer_setting>, <camera>,... will be set by the mainscene.igs). This button will work together with "sep. meshs" though.

2. A field to browse for proxy.igs (ie. trees.igs) so rendering can be start with "Autorun" enabled.

I'm not sure if this is the right approach for the proxy rendering. If anybody has any suggestion, pls fill me in.

Sounds like an interesting idea

I don't really understand what you really want. is separate mesh not enough?

SmartDen wrote:I don't really understand what you really want. is separate mesh not enough?

Basically I think what he wants is to get all the materials & mesh data to be exported as a separate file. Say "(Name of blender file)_scene.igs" and then be able to export only the settings (camera, tonemapping, ...) that will then merge with the already exported scene, to then be rendered by indigo.

Hence making the export a lot quicker.

I've tried Blender exporters for other renderers that work like that (the Vray script comes to mind). It's pretty handy, provided that you don't touch any of your meshes between test renders. Move one vertex and you can re-export the whole thing.

Borgleader, you are way ahead of me

SmartDen, What I meant is that, let say I have a scene that contain unfinished model of a house on layer01, and finished model of trees (with lots of instancing) on layer02. While working on the house, every time I test rendering it take a long time to export because of all those huge trees in layer02.

Without wanting to export the trees every time I test rendering. So

1. I tried exporting only trees with .sep meshs (that gives me two files, let say a tree.igs and tree-meshs.xml)

2. With layer02 disabled, I can now export the scene pretty quick (let's say it's named mainscene.igs). But in order to get the tree to render also, I have to copy the <material>, <include> and <model> from tree.igs and paste into mainscene.igs

What I'm asking for is the way to somehow merge the previously exported (trees.igs) on-the-fly without having to copy/paste.

I think it's pretty much the same thing that Borgleader said. Hope I make myself clear now, SmartDen. Sorry for the confusion.

BbB, yes, I choose the word "proxy" because what I think about is pretty much like proxy rendering in V-ray. I've never use V-ray though, just know its proxy thingy exists.

yes, it's clear now. but it not so easy to make. if you want to merge some different mesh files, you need to have somethink dummy objects in you scene to link later imported meshes with this objects. or you have to export meshes, materials and objects and merge them on export time.
i have to think about it, what is the best way to do this

Knowing you're thinking about it is good enough, thank you, SmartDen

I'm now thinking about the material problem that might occur if the two files (or more) have the same material's name and such.

I think what you are asking for I did some time ago - possibly >6 months?- and no one wanted it.

My soln made a controlling .igs that was left unfinished and then had the include file names you chose at the subsequent export from the visible layers auto written to it.Then you finished it and ran the controller.igs (optionally autorun)

The controller had the render settings, camera, materials and includes named in it.

The includes only had mesh .uv and position info.

If you wanted to redo only the meshes previously named trees you would just resave that layer and the controller would still be valid.

If you wanted to change materials etc only you would have had to re-export the controller and do the incl list manually - however I also made a setting to export a user defined number of ready incl statements to edit to make that easier.

You would just have to type trees into the line in place of the incl number e.g. controller-incl-1.igs ---> controller-incl-trees.igs

Perhaps smartden will get around to something like that for you in the future HTH

EDIT: forgot to say this was originally done to handle a large number of meshes (=1000's) coming from a CAD program.

Thank you for sharing, Big Fan. Hope this idea will become true someday

palawat wrote:Borgleader, you are way ahead of me

SmartDen, What I meant is that, let say I have a scene that contain unfinished model of a house on layer01, and finished model of trees (with lots of instancing) on layer02. While working on the house, every time I test rendering it take a long time to export because of all those huge trees in layer02.

Without wanting to export the trees every time I test rendering. So

1. I tried exporting only trees with .sep meshs (that gives me two files, let say a tree.igs and tree-meshs.xml)

2. With layer02 disabled, I can now export the scene pretty quick (let's say it's named mainscene.igs). But in order to get the tree to render also, I have to copy the <material>, <include> and <model> from tree.igs and paste into mainscene.igs

What I'm asking for is the way to somehow merge the previously exported (trees.igs) on-the-fly without having to copy/paste.

I think it's pretty much the same thing that Borgleader said. Hope I make myself clear now, SmartDen. Sorry for the confusion.

why don't you want to use proxy feature in blender? i just don't understand why i should rewite something in python while it already implemented in blender.

SmartDen, if you mean the Append/Link feature in Blender, yes it works great with Indigo and Blendigo; thanks to you.

I can link a tree.blend to the file I'm working on, no sweat. But if the tree.blend is huge and it take 10 min. to export just the tree.blend, then every time I hit the export scene button on the file I'm currently working on it'd take the additional 10 min for the linked tree file. I know 10 min doesn't seem long but for 3 preview rendering, these processes add up about half an hour.

Separate meshes can solve the above issue, but it requires copy/paste which I have to say it's not that big deal unless the project gets more complicated, ie. more linked file.

But, if you didn't mean the Append/Link, please tell me what it is. There are still many things in Blender that I didn't know.

palawat wrote:SmartDen, if you mean the Append/Link feature in Blender, yes it works great with Indigo and Blendigo; thanks to you.

I can link a tree.blend to the file I'm working on, no sweat. But if the tree.blend is huge and it take 10 min. to export just the tree.blend, then every time I hit the export scene button on the file I'm currently working on it'd take the additional 10 min for the linked tree file. I know 10 min doesn't seem long but for 3 preview rendering, these processes add up about half an hour.

Separate meshes can solve the above issue, but it requires copy/paste which I have to say it's not that big deal unless the project gets more complicated, ie. more linked file.

But, if you didn't mean the Append/Link, please tell me what it is. There are still many things in Blender that I didn't know.

ok. i understand what you mean. but it's not so easy to implement. i search for solution

SmartDen maybe we can help you out - want to email me?