Using OBJ objects and textures

[ArchPrime]

Hi, I have just bought a bunch of Xfrog and ArchModel trees and plants for use with Octane plugin for ArchiCAD 17:

I am having a few challenges getting these to work.

I can set up the OBJs as proxies ok, and see the grey objects in render viewport, but I cannot seem to get associated textures to map automatically to surfaces in the model, even when associated texture mtl files and jpg/tiff/png files are all in same directory as the obj.

Having the obj textures included in ArchiCAD loaded libraries doesn't help. If I attempt to reconvert all materials from archicad, this makes no difference.

I can apply textures from LiveDB ok, but the textures available there are few, and are all fairly generic and don't correspond to the species of tree

I really don't fancy trying to manually create and map materials to tens of species of plants

How do experienced users quickly and efficiently use obj objects, complete with original source textures all correctly mapped in their scenes?

[ArchPrime]

Hi again - I forgot to also ask - why do some Xfrog obj trees appear buried in the ground, when the host object is sitting on the surface? The tree has correct orientation, but seems to have its origin mapped to some arbitrary point near the top of the tree. Is this a known bug? How can I work around this without lots of trial and error raising and lowering the host object?

Also, since this is ArchiCAD, the purpose of any given scene geometry is not just for rendered visualization, and so I typically need the host object to be correctly positioned in non rendered ArchiCAD views (eg typicallly use a simple ArchiCAD library object tree for 2D plan and elevation views, with a much more detailed proxy tree in rendered views)

[face_off]

Hi

Xfrog MTL files use a non-standard specification or the trans map - which might be causing your issue. Pls see http://render.otoy.com/manuals/ArchiCAD/?page_id=222 for details.

why do some Xfrog obj trees appear buried in the ground, when the host object is sitting on the surface?

If you have an example of this, pls send it to me and I will take a look. Email is paul at physicalc-software dot com.

Paul

[rappet]

Hi again - I forgot to also ask - why do some Xfrog obj trees appear buried in the ground, when the host object is sitting on the surface? The tree has correct orientation, but seems to have its origin mapped to some arbitrary point near the top of the tree. Is this a known bug? How can I work around this without lots of trial and error raising and lowering the host object?

Also, since this is ArchiCAD, the purpose of any given scene geometry is not just for rendered visualization, and so I typically need the host object to be correctly positioned in non rendered ArchiCAD views (eg typicallly use a simple ArchiCAD library object tree for 2D plan and elevation views, with a much more detailed proxy tree in rendered views)

Hi ArchPrime,
What tree object has origin in top of your tree?
I have never had that before... I like to check it.
What I do have sometimes is that I need to set x-orientation to 270 to a correct vertical orientated object.
And sometimes I do have to elevate it a bit to be on ground instead of buried a bit, but not that much.
Sometimes it is a bit of a hazzle, but I still think it is worth using them because of the good quality.
If I need to correct the Archicad objct too much for the proxy, that it is not good enough to use in non rendered Archicad views...I use seperate layer for proxies only and then use Archicad for showing non rendered graphics.
That was my five cents...
Greetz,

[ArchPrime]

Hi guys, an example of strange tree origin I can no longer seem to replicate after installing latest plugin - might just be coincidence


I tried editing the MTL files for some of these XFrog trees (eg XfrogPlants Australian Cabbage Palm\OC37_Livistona_australis_Australian_C), with no change in output resulting:(change any lines with “map_Kd to “map_d”). I see a number of other entries with a K prefix - should these change too, eg 'Map_Ks', 'Map_Ka'?

e.g. this doesn't work/leaves this material gray in Octane, even when texture files in same directory

newmtl TRUNK1
Ka 0.1 0.1 0.1
Kd 1 1 1
Ks 0 0 0
illum 2
Ns 2
map_d OC08brk1.tif
map_bump
bump
map_opacity
map_d
refl
map_kS
map_kA
map_Ns



Oddly, one XFrog tree (XrogPlants Palmetto) does work without editing, and yet I see the MTL file has 'map_Kd' rather than 'map_d' entries throughout.

eg this MTL script works for me (auto applies correct materials) just fine, materials files in same directory:


newmtl Bark1
Ka 0.0980392 0.0980392 0.0980392
Kd 0.494118 0.486275 0.466667
Ks 0 0 0
illum 2
Ns 2048
map_Kd EA16brk1.tif


Is the MTL file looking for textures in wrong place in first example perhaps?


Cheers
Paul

[przemn]

Hey,

I had similar problems with object that had both a long name and a long texture names. The path to this file was also quite long ( as it was also burried deep down on my desktop in folder in another folder etc. - with a long path to it ).

I made both *.obj name and texture names short, copied it directly to c:\folder ... and it fixed my problem

Przem

[ArchPrime]

Hi My current understanding, after speaking with face_off (please correct me if I am wrong!) is that any texture image name length is not important, and the path length is not important, but the obj name length is important, and the material name length (which may or may not make use of texture images) is important as these last two are what contribute to the max 41 char limitation.

[rappet]

take a look at this thread (page 4 and 5)
http://render.otoy.com/forum/viewtopic. ... 0&start=30
greetz,

[przemn]

Any luck with this? I can't get xfrog trees to look right. When I export from xfrog 3.5 as *.obj any tree I tried - it either has a proper color of leafs ( but is not transparent ) or after changing "Map_Kd" to "Map_d" it has a proper transparency ( but doesn't have a color ).

when I am using *.xfr models all textures like leafs come as single *.tif files with alpha, there are no special maps for transparency, so it seems like there is a problem after exporting from xfrog 3.5 to *.obj

Przem

[rappet]

Any luck with this? I can't get xfrog trees to look right. When I export from xfrog 3.5 as *.obj any tree I tried - it either has a proper color of leafs ( but is not transparent ) or after changing "Map_Kd" to "Map_d" it has a proper transparency ( but doesn't have a color ).
...
Przem

Hi Przem,
I have very little problem using the OBj form Xfrog. I use as proxy in the Archicad plugin... when imported it does not have the right material,
but it is very easily to adjust.... I select the materials and apply the image (that comes with xfrog) to it (also transparany node).
greetz,