The first tweaks to Visualization are in:
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Smoother edges on your screenshots
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Added area selection
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Fixes and improvements
Just like last time, please let us know what you think in the thread and share your latest visualizations with us.
4 Likes
I am thrilled with the new options you are working on. Will textures be included in USDZ format and other export formats in the future?
Hi - yes, in the future. We don’t have it in our imminent timeline, but we understand how important a feature it is
5 Likes
Indeed, edges are way more smooth and almost eye-candy, but for some reason, even though I’m using latest generation iPad Pro and Mac Pro (with 3 RTX cards in!), once in ten times, there’s a pesky difference between my refined model and the screenshots, especially with wood (I know how difficult it is to get a flawless wood material, trust me. So far, I’ve been creating my own materials. Thanks to the Shapr3D team, I can at least get a sweet result without delay)!
It’s no biggie, but since feedback is welcome…
All other features are nearly perfect. I ran into sync issues (duplicates instead of a modified single file) but it may be due to my devices being exhausted 
Area selection is a blessing. No more zooming in and out or toggling on and off endlessly to avoid selecting unwanted parts, especially when there are hundreds of!
Regarding the materials UI, there’s a little thing missing: changing and editing super fast is a time-saver (almost a life-saver), but a “remove” or “X” to get quickly rid of a material, or maybe all materials at once is missing.
Awesome job so far. There will always be something to improve, but no need to rush it.
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@Loki Did you make custom materials that work in Shapr? I’d be very interested in that if you are willing to share how it’s done.
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Gladly! Always there to help if I can.
I fear that such things “from scratch” are only possible using dedicated software like gaming engines and/or NVIDIA vMaterials (requiring advanced prior knowledge of C++)… if you want lifelike realism, that is! Using existing materials and tweaking them doesn’t cut it, and there’s a risk of being sued for copyright infringement and such. Better stay away from it.
Honestly, if I haven’t been part of a team (truly amazing experience), I’ll be absolutely clueless.
You may know that back in the 80’s, it was all bitmap-based, right? I remember my father (architect) banging his head on the wall because of this. It didn’t change much. UIs and core resources access plus CCs helped a lot. Hardware and software improvements too.
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not easy to do, but not impossible. If I can, you can definitely!
I’ve got my own techniques and other people have theirs… and though we agreed to never start fighting over trivial yet niche matters like that on forums, it’s not always the case.
Just as a quick recap: you’ll need 3 things to get started:
- A precise, detailed roadmap defining exactly what you want and how you plan to achieve that (including how much time and energy you can put in it),
- A powerful and reliable graphical engine (no need to get lost in code, there are always other ways),
- A powerful and reliable workstation with solid GPU-powered computing. I’m not using CPUs for such things anymore since built-in graphical cards GPUs do far better, faster, without overheat and crashes.
Methinks I need a little refresher (I feel a bit rusty) and some testing, but yes, if there’s anything I can do to help, I’ll do! I’m not 100% sure “home-made” materials brought from sources like gaming engines and fully code-based cores will work with Shapr3D, but if it does even at 5-10%, it’d still be nice!
If you’ve got a LiDAR scan, using meshes from real-life objects can help a lot as well.
Actually, the only nightmarish part is the whole back and forth file conversion, loss and warp that goes with it, but there must be a way around.
Take this as my own humble opinion and a honest (objective as can be) overview of the state of such things right now. It’s nothing more. What about working together on such things? Would you be interested and up for it? Better two brains than one, right?
I still think dedicated software is the best way to go, but it has to be combined with GPU-powered computing. That also means investing a lot. Dough, time, energy …
If you/I/we can find a solid way, bypassing that, then it’s a game changer, and I love challenges!
Edit: here are some (copyrighted) screenshots to illustrate what I had the privilege to be a (really) tiny part of. Here we go. It’s either from scratch or based on scanned real-life materials. You’ll quickly notice that lighting and materials can’t be separated. Their parameters differ, but they’re a whole. One can’t exist without the other.
Thunderstorm-fog shrouded islands:
©HoYoVerse 2020-21
Mech Golem buried in river-moved rocks and trees:
©HoYoVerse 2022
Mech Golem steering cabin, elevator and power supply system:
©HoYoVerse 2022
Those were made using Unity, Unreal Engine 5 and another unreleased specific-game-bound engine. As you will notice, characters are in 2D (mainly using ProCreate, which is a superb tool regarding materials creation, BTW) and everything else in 3D. It’s on purpose. The whole was done in 12K and 18K, and I had to bring them down to 4K. It was much too heavy for display on the forum!
Now, NVIDIA vMaterials. Copyrighted as well:
Layers of materials on a solid spherical object:
Overview of basic materials (everything can be combined and tweaked endlessly. No limits as far as combined layers are concerned. Burnout ahead, I’m warning everyone here):
Dear R&D team, I’d like to ask you about possible use of such materials within Shapr3D. They don’t work with usually supported formats. I’m still working on an universal lossless hybrid-format converter, but it has burnt me out. The only thing I can do know to recover is to come back on the forums and chat. I hope you don’t mind!