There are 2 separate mechanisms for handling materials:
Automatic conversion of native ArchiCAD materials to Maxwell materials
- Emitter materials are converted to emitters
- Materials with transparency are converted to transparent materials
- Materials with shininess are converted to plastic materials
- Other materials are converted to diffuse materials
- Textures are supported – note that texture files are stored in sub-folder of the project folder with the name derived from the project name (project_Textures). Do not delete these files – otherwise the Maxwell rendering engine won't render the project.
Maxwell MXM materials as special parameters of native ArchiCAD materials
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It is possible (and advisable) to use Maxwell MXM materials (stored as separate files) with ArchiCAD projects. There is an extensive library of MXM materials distributed with the Maxwell rendering engine or you can easily create your own materials. |
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Maxwell MXM material parameters are accessible from the Material dialog of ArchiCAD when the Maxwell Rendering Engine is selected as the active rendering engine for material preview. Note that the interactive preview of the Maxwell material is shown in the preview control of the material panel.
Preview
Starts Maxwell material editor (MXED) in wizard mode to create your own material. You are presented with save file dialog which will allow you to specify the name/location of the MXM file you are about to create – after that MXED is started in wizard mode to guide you through the process of creating a Maxwell material – you may consult Maxwell manual for details on MXED and Maxwell MXM materials.
MXM Material
Load
Opens material browser to select a MXM material to load. Once the file is selected its name is shown in the name control, path for the file is shown in path control and preview (if available) is updated in the preview control for easy preview of the loaded material.
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Removes MXM material attribute from ArchiCAD material.
Creating materials within ArchiCad
In addition to Maxwell materials stored as MXM files it is possible to create simple Maxwell materials directly from ArchiCAD's material panel. This is especially useful when working with light emitting materials - it is no longer needed to go to the Maxwell material editor (MXED) to create MXM files as the required material can be created in the ArchiCAD dialog directly. Choose one of the 5 material types available:
Diffuse
Diffuse Maxwell material - color/texture of the material is taken from ArchiCAD material specification.
Plastic
Plastic Maxwell material with 2 BSDF layers - - color/texture of the material is taken from ArchiCAD material specification. The roughness parameter controls how shiny/dull the material is - the same as in MXED.
Metal
Metallic material based on the presets for Aluminum, Cobalt, Copper, Gold, Silver. The roughness parameter controls how shiny/dull the material is - the same as in MXED.
Dielectric
Dielectric material - typically any transparent material such as water, glass etc. Please see the Transmissive Properties properties page in the Maxwell documentation for more details.
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- Distance: attenuation distance in millimeters - half of the light is being absorbed when it passes through the given distance of the material. Smaller attenuation distance means the material will turn opaque faster.
Emitter
Light emitting material (must be applied to an object which will act as the light source). Please see the Lighting with Emitters page in the Maxwell documentation for more details.
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- Presets: presets for typical emitters from real world
Preview Material
Pushing the button will generate a material preview for the specified Maxwell material settings and display it in the material preview control for easy verification.
Material browser
The material browser is used for loading Maxwell MXM materials into the material dialog of ArchiCAD. The Browser allows for quick and easy location of desired materials even you have many MXM files on disk. The Browser view contains individual previews of MXM materials and sub-folders of specified location. You can enter sub-folder by double-clicking on it.
Maxwell Grass
