Decal Masking

[Ian Foster Griffith]

Hi, Roy, I need your advice when trying to get Alpha or colour masking of a decal. As you can see from the image the area around the txt is not transparent. Yes have reviewed the forum and have "double sided" ticked. I'm doing something wrong here, missing something can you have a look. Have attached mock up of project with the issue in it - dwg and png file.

[Ian Foster Griffith]

Here is the image.

[mike makki]

you may need to use photoshop..

[Ian Foster Griffith]

Do you mean use photoshop to create the Alpha channel image?

[George Ioannidis]

It's not enough just to apply a decal on a face (or other entity). As far as I can understand that, you should create also a material using the desired bitmap as texture map. Then, you just have to say nXt which colour of the texture map should be considered as a transparency mask. Simply go to masking tab, check Transparent switch and select the color you want to be transparent using colour picker (I suppose it should be the white area in your case). Apply material to object and simply adjust the orientation  of it (using for instance quick mapping tool). This is what I am doing in similar cases. Cheers.

[Ian Foster Griffith]

Yep this is the method I have used and it works in AR4 and with basic settings it also works in nxt.

But trying to understand why my settings on my project produce a frosting look on the transparency.

I have setup whole lighting scheme and buggered the decal, why? what setting stopped the decal transparency working. Have attached the dwg file and png image from Roy to look at.

[Peter Milner]

Set the decal transparency IOR to 1.0

[Roy Hirshkowitz]

Looks like the Indirect lighting is screwing it up he one on the building-- this is probably a bug.  Two other problems (1) the decal has a white border which has not been masked out. (2) The Refractive background intensity is not the same as the Visible background intensity (this creates a problem with the one in the sky.)  It is not necessary to change the IOR in decal props.  When I turn Indirect lighting off and fix the other things I get:

For the moment, if you want Indirect Lighting-- use the Path Tracer.  e4 also doesn't seem to work properly with this drawing-- I need to find out why.

[Peter Milner]

Okay, it was just a guess based on the reflections coming off the decal.

[Roy Hirshkowitz]

Not a terrible guess.  The IOR is set to 1.0 internally for transparent masking.

[Ian Foster Griffith]

OK drop indirect lighting for the time being. Have tested and it works. Indirect setting did give the model a soft look I liked, will try pathtracer. Thanks guys for your help.

I have been trying to get two standard Lighting schemes done. (One night/late afternoon and one daylight) attach are AR4 lighting I have been using. Getting two standard go-to schemes in nxt to be my start point for each project is what I working on. Which is why I have bumped into this transparent masking issue.

Have attached light setting can you please look over it and tell me if I'm on the right track for the type of day/night house images attached. I believe that I'm looking for real sky image behind but have the model lighted and reflecting a hdri or auto shy/ground setting. Need to be able to match colour schemes with image output for client colour requirements, ie lighting scheme matches the colour patch that the client gives me.

Also what is the best way to change the lighting settings to bring my model to night lighting. Have been trying but my lights seem to blow the image out. What should I turn off or down to bring the lights I put into my model. Turn sun off or down or turn down background or change hdri etc etc. Would love your input on this.....

[Ian Foster Griffith]

Also the white border around decal was me screwing around with Alpha channel in photoshop to try and solve the transparency issue . Not an issue because did the alpha channel setting in the first png image right. have tested and work fine. Thank guys for input

[Ian Foster Griffith]

Hi Roy

(indirect lighting and decal  transparency issue.)

Where are we up to on this one?