Chaos Corona Forum

Chaos Corona for Cinema 4D => [C4D] General Discussion => Topic started by: caspian on 2021-04-10, 06:26:45

Title: Help explaining the distance shader please
Post by: caspian on 2021-04-10, 06:26:45

I've clicked on the [help] button and read the document for the distance shader but I still can't quite work out how to use it. I have a sand material that I'd like to fade out towards the horizon revealing a rock material on a duplicate object. But I can't make that happen. I also get some text overlaying the sand too which is very odd. Here's a screenshot of my material setup, which I tried to base off the sea foam example.
Can anyone help out?

Title: Re: Help explaining the distance shader please
Post by: Cinemike on 2021-04-10, 15:19:50

The text on top of the preview is telling you to assign an object to the "Distance from" area (bottom of the shader settings).
Without that assignment, the shader cannot know from which other object it should measure the distance.

CU
Michael

PS

I am also not sure why you need a distance shader here at all. Would not overlaying a second material with a gradient in opacity do the same?

Title: Re: Help explaining the distance shader please
Post by: caspian on 2021-04-10, 22:19:29

Thanks for your help – The reason for using the distance shader was just to learn how to use it.
I've got it working now. Sort of. But the output from the interactive renderer is different than the picture viewer. Is this expected?

Title: Re: Help explaining the distance shader please
Post by: Cinemike on 2021-04-11, 05:35:19

Are you using v6 and multi-instances?
V7 fixed a couple of issues with them, but it's still not working perfectly - if you don't already, give it a try, it's quite a lot better, though!
Besides, IR has problems with updating fields, it needs a lot of manaul updating.

CU
Michael

Title: Re: Help explaining the distance shader please
Post by: caspian on 2021-04-11, 06:49:41

V6 yes. but I'm not using any instances in this scene. Probably should come to think of it.
Maybe it's the displacements and not the distance shader that is causing the differences between the IR and PV.
I'll download v7 and give it a go. I'm assuming its easy to revert back to v6 if I need more stability?
cheers

Title: Re: Help explaining the distance shader please
Post by: Cinemike on 2021-04-11, 15:54:17

Quote from: caspian on 2021-04-11, 06:49:41

V6 yes. but I'm not using any instances in this scene. Probably should come to think of it.
Maybe it's the displacements and not the distance shader that is causing the differences between the IR and PV.
I'll download v7 and give it a go. I'm assuming its easy to revert back to v6 if I need more stability?
cheers

I drag and drop the old Corona directory from within plugins to somewhere else and install the new one.
Exchanging the versions is as easy as simply swapping the directories later.

Good luck.

Displacement in IR got an update. too.