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Material Types

There are several types of materials in OctaneRender^® that can apply to surfaces to achieve a variety of appearances and rendering effects.

• Clipping MaterialThe representation of the surface or volume properties of an object. - Allows one object to become a clipping volume for other objects in a scene.
• Composite - Mixes several materials using masks.
• DiffuseAmount of diffusion, or the reflection of light photons at different angles from an uneven or granular surface. Used for dull, non-reflecting materials or mesh emitters. - Used for rough, non-reflecting materials, as well as light emitting meshes.
• GlossyThe measure of how well light is reflected from a surface in the specular direction, the amount and way in which the light is spread around the specular direction, and the change in specular reflection as the specular angle changes. Used for shiny materials such as plastics or metals. - Used for shiny materials such as plastics or metals.
• Hair - Designed for hair and fur objects.
• Layered - Constructs complex materials that consist of a base layer and several material layers.
• Metallic - Similar to the Glossy materialUsed for shiny materials such as plastics or metals., except by default it exhibits more metal-like characteristics.
• Mix - Mixes any two Material types.
• Null - Used for mesh objects that should be invisible but contain a medium.
• PortalA technique that assists the render kernel with exterior light sources that illuminate interiors. In interior renderings with windows, it is difficult for the path tracer to find light from the outside environment and optimally render the scene. Portals are planes that are added to the scene with the Portal material applied to them. - Designates openings in scenes to allow the render kernel to better sample light from those areas.
• Shadow CatcherThe Shadow Catcher can be used to create shadows cast by objects onto the surrounding background imagery. The shadows cast are not limited to simply a ground plane but can be cast onto other surfaces of varying shapes. - Captures shadows.
• SpecularAmount of specular reflection, or the mirror-like reflection of light photons at the same angle. Used for transparent materials such as glass and water. - Used for transparent materials such as glass and water.
• Standard Surface - A material that closely aligns with the Autodesk Standard Surface shader specification.
• Toon - Designs hand-drawn looking surfaces.
• Toon Ramp - Controls shading on the model. To use this material, you also need to use Toon lighting in the scene.
• Universal - Brings substance maps and PBRA contemporary shading and rendering process that seeks to simplify shading characteristics while providing a more accurate representation of lighting in the real world. outputs into OctaneRender.

The most used materials are Diffuse, Glossy, and Specular, however, the new Standard Surface material is designed to comply with Autodesk's material standard which makes this material the most flexible if porting a scene to another application is required. The Mix materialUsed to mix any two material types. is often used to blend any combination of these materials together to provide deeper surface characteristics. The Universal material could be used often as production workflows move more towards PBR specifications.

MaterialsA set of attributes or parameters that describe surface characteristics. are accessible by first creating a new Octane material in the Content Browser (Figure 1), then double-click on the new Material icon to open it in the Octane Material window.

Figure 1: Creating a new Octane material in the Content Browser window

The Octane Material window has a Material Out node and a Parent Material node by default (figure 2). You can add new Material nodes by dragging a Material type into the workspace from the Materials list on the right side of the window.

Figure 2: Accessing the Octane material types in the Octane Material window

After you add a Material type, it's Output pin must be connected to the Input pin on the Material Out node and the Details tab contains the parameters for editing the new Material type (figure 3).

Figure 3: Adding a Diffuse materialUsed for dull, non-reflecting materials or mesh emitters. type to the Octane Material node network

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