pixels : PIU : Tutorial Title

Introduction

This tutorial will concentrate briefly on another form of faking caustics and do a little animation.

This tutorial requires:

ShaderMakerPro
Pixels3D | studio | v3.6 only
Photoshop

Create the Glass Shader

We'll use SMP to get a good look at our Glass Shader. First, create a Raytracer node and change its input colour to black. Plug the Raytracer node into the Reflection and Refraction Inputs of the main shader. Set the remaining inputs to match the image on the right.

Create the Shadow Map

Using Photoshop, we can create the shadow's Alpha map to control the lighting inside any shadows our objects will cast.

Create a white circle about half the size of the width and height of the image. Then use Filters>Blur>Gaussian Blur and soften the circle to something like the image on the right, and save the image as a PICT file.

Setting Up the Shadow Shader Light

Open up Pixels3D 3.6, select the light, and move it flush with the z axis. Open the Shader Manager ( cmd-w ) and click on an empty slot in SM. This will bring up the shader for our light. Uncheck Sample Once, set the float value of the Shadow input to Image Map, and load in the PICT file we just created. Set the values to match the image on the right. Click OK.

Enable Shadows for the Light

Back to Pixels, open the Object Info window ( cmd-i ) and check Shadows then Raytraced and set the values as shown. A higher Area value will soften the edges of the shadows.

Group the Glass Spheres

Now lets create our scene by creating a default sphere (shape>sphere). Duplicate it twice and arrange the duplicates to match the image on the right.. Create a null ( shape>null ).

Select the spheres, followed by the null and link them ( control>link ). The null can rotate the group well for our animation, as well as move the spheres as one. Select all the spheres, open the Shader Manager, click an empty swatch, and load our SMP glass shader.

Create a default mesh (shape>mesh), and scale (control>scale) it large enough to cover the ground of the spheres and their shadows. Use a tile diffuse colour node for its shader.

Timeline

Select only the null in the centre. Open the Timeline ( cmd-t ) and make sure we are at frame 00:00:00. Select Animation>Add Keys to set a keyframe for the null at its current state. Set the current frame to 00:02:00 or 60 in the timeline.

In Object Info set the Null's Y Rotation to 360.00 and choose Animation>Add Keys to save our rotation to the timeline.

Render Setup

Let's setup the renderer for animation ( cmd-u ).

Click the Range of Frames radio button, and set the time values as shown. This will save out a series of PICTs that we can later import into Quicktime™ Pro and make a short film. You can also choose not to render an animation and do only one frame for a snap shot. Be sure Raytracing is checked.

Final Render