Tiles map + randomization

[Anonymous]

I am primarily a Revit user, exporting my files via FBX for 3DS rendering with iray.

I am using Tiles Map for laying ceramic floor tile, and have run into one limitation I need help with.

When laying ceramic tile in the real world, the tile manufacturer typically makes 6 different actual tile patterns, and the person laying the tile mixes these up by selection and rotation as he lays the tile. The result is a floor that appears fairly random since there are 6 * 4 possible tile placements.

Is there a map or a tool that can do this for me? I want to provide 6 bitmaps, each of a single tile, and then have them layed out randomly in various rotations. I do not need the hue and color shift adjustments as these are more appropriate for natural tile.

I have looked at BerconMaps which would work, except does not support Mental Ray, and hence does not support iRay.

I have looked at Brick'n'Tile which works, but creates a really large bitmap of the combined layed out tiles, just as if I had done it manually in Photoshop. The image file is very large, and we have tight memory limits in iRay running on CUDA GPUs. But maybe all the solutions will end up this way anyway?

I looked at Texture Shaker plugin, but at $205, it was a bit much for me to invest and not be sure it would do what I need. I could not find a demo version.

I looked at Wood Workshop, but it seems limited to (1) wood only, and (2) its own wood texture generator. If it accepted my bitmaps, it would have been perfect.

Masonry Designer at brick(dot)com is really neat, and even lets you mix tiles from different tiles made by that manufacturer. It also lets you incorporate patterns, etc. But it is limited to that vendor's bricks.

I know of course I could do this all manually with Photoshop, but it would be vere difficult for me to show new tile options to customers if I had to go to Photoshop everytime. I really need to be able to just take pictures of the individual tiles and have them randomly assembled. This would also result in a very large bitmap - which may be unavoidable by any of these solutions. One advantage of course is that I could incorporate desired patterns in the floor, like accent borders, medallions, etc.

If the bottom line is that I need a bitmap creation tool, then I will expand my search to 2D tile makers. So far I have been searching for 3DS specific tile makers.

Any other ideas?

[Anonymous]

You could subdivide your floor plane into tiles sized polys and the give them random material ID's using a script or even assign them yourself if you want a certain order to them.

Then make your Arch & Design and throw in a multi / sub MAP in the diffuse slot (found under maps > mental ray > multi/sub map in the slate material editor).

This way you can use the (random) material ID's you gave to your plane's poly's for the different bitmaps. It's also got a random option you can take a look at

The only limitation I can think of is that the multi/sub map only supports up 20 different maps, but that could be helped by splitting your plane into 2 pieces, and assigning a different arch & design to each piece, allowing you 20* piece combinations.

Hope this proved to be helpful!

M.

[Anonymous]

Following the Ryiu idea, you could also add to each tile sized poly a UVW Map Xform modifier and set randomly (among 0°, 90°, 180° or 270° - using maxScript for example) the rotation parameter. Then you would need only 6 sub-maps in you material instead of 6x4..

-amarhys

[3wood]

You can do it in AutoCAD with TILEPATTERN.vlx, 

Then export it as an image.

Here is an excerpt of Example 6 of Tilepattern.

[madsd]

With 2020 and OSL, this is very easy to generate procedurally.

You simply hook up the tile ID as Array controller on a 1-10 map and inject the data streams you want.
You can control number of random colors, shuffle, as well as offsets, rotations and anything you can think of.

No plugins required, and it works in the viewport as well as render time.

[emilio_toncovich]

Hello how are you?
I thought the approach you made was excellent. It helped me a lot.
Thank you!