slate material editor question

[grue1970]

hello. i never thought of this before, but it's actually becoming more important for me now.

i have a material setup with a diffuse bitmap.  i happen to have 8 variations of that bitmap, each a different color, that i need to render.  so in my slate material editor i have 1 standard materail and 1 connected diffuse bitmap.  under that diffuse bitmap, but not connected, are the other 7 bitmaps that are each a little different.  when i need to render another one, i just wire it up to the diffuse slot.  so  it's a nice little "list" of the 8 bitmaps and i just wire-connect them depending on what i need to render.

OK - so my slate material editor view1 is getting pretty over-run with bitmaps and materials.

typically in my workflow, i will zoom out, select all in the view and delete, this helps my workspace stay clean ha!  when i need a material, i just use the eyedropper to get it back from the scene.

so my question is - i do not want to do that now because all those bitmaps will disappear and they are not on any other objects in the scene, so when i delete them from the slate material editor workspace aka View1, i'll have to reload them all!

is there a way for me to SAVE a slate material editor view so that say View 1 has all those bitmaps and the material i wire them to, then another view to have other mateirals i create or pick from the scene?

also, is there a way to move materials between different saved views and are the saved views automatically updated if they change?  so i can close max and re-open and still have them all available even if they are not currently in the scene?

hope this is clear 🙂

thanks!

[Anonymous]

So you just want to switch between multiple bitmaps? You might try this setup using the OSL node '1 to 10 (color)' You can then use the 'Input Index to use' parameter for switching between bitmaps.

[RobH2 · Accepted solution]

You can't save the views but you and open new ones. You can put all the bitmaps in one new 'View' and have them available. Save your material to a set in the Slate Browser and when you need it, drag it to the new 'View' with all the bitmaps and wire the one you want, or just use the OSL comment above. BTW, the correct parameter for OSL is hard to find. You'll find it in 'Maps/OSL/Switchers'. 

[grue1970]

Yep, and as long as i keep that view open i should be good - or i should say as long as i don't delete that view.

Anyway, the OSL too - i am currently using 3dsmax 2018.  not sure of the release anymore or whether there are any updates because my autodesk desktop app keeps crashing while checking for updates. nice.

otherwise it seems like OSL should be available for 2018, but i don't see any of the map options or a group called OSL in slate material editor. hm.

anyway, thanks both.

[RobH2]

I've actually uninstalled Max 2018 so I can't check about its support for OSL.

In that case, use my comment for a workaround. It should be ok for you.

Plus, if you want to create a material that conserves all of your bitmaps, just make a material and wire all of the 8 bitmaps to any available slot. Then, save that material. You can then later disconnect all of the bogus connections by dragging across them. Connecting them bogusly just ensures that they save temporarily. 

[grue1970]

thanks. yeah like save it in it's own material lib.  anyway for now i'm using the VIEW2 approach. that's pretty nice actually, the multiple views.  i can make all the materials i know are going to change on one view and clean up the other one ha.

[RobH2]

Great, yea that's a good workflow. That group or set of assets will just stay available in that new View in that file as long as you don't delete it. It is a great and helpful feature. I like the OSL suggestion too. That saves the whole rig if you drop it into a Library so you can drag it out into a new file.