Prefs - Preview: Maxwell Options

Owned by thomas (Unlicensed)
Last updated: 27 Jul, 2015
3 min read

 

This dialogue is part of the → “Preview” preferences and opened when you click on “Maxwell Options”.

Illumination (A)

Global Intensity

Here, the global light intensity is controlled. The parameter acts like a multiplier and accepts all positive values. Settings smaller than 1.0 create a darker impression, values greater than 1.0 add more light to the scene.

Physical Sky

This option adds a physically accurate model of a sky depending on the adjusted time:

  • It is possible to simulate conditions like sunrise, dawn or sunny summer days.
  • When inactive a conventional sky dome model will be used instead.
Light

This slider controls the current time of the day and is used to determine the colour of the physical sky.

Hour

Here, the current time is shown when you drag the “Light” slider.

Use IBL

Instead of a physical sky or a sky dome, you can use HDR images to illuminate the scene.

Background | Illumination | Reflection | Refraction Buttons (B)

These buttons reveal identical sets of parameters, but for different image channels:

  • “Background” is the image you will see in the background of the rendered image.
  • “Illumination” acts as the scene's global light source.
  • “Reflection” is what you will see in an object's reflective areas.
  • “Refraction” is what you will see in an object's transparent areas.
Same as Background

If you want to use the already loaded image from the “Background” channel enable the checkbox. For obvious reasons, this option is not available for the “Background” channel itself.

HDR File

Load a HDR file to illuminate the scene with the associated “...” button.

Intensity

This is the HDR map's brightness. Higher values create more light.

Tile U | V

These parameters create repetitions of the HDR image in horizontal and vertical directions.

Offset U | V

These parameters rotate the HDR image around the horizontal and vertical axes.

Globals (C)

Quality

This parameter ranges from 20 to 100 and determines the render's size in pixels – it acts like a multiplier. An example:

  • Adjusted render size: 800 x 600
  • Quality = 80%
  • Actual render resolution: (800 * 0.8) x (600 * 0.8) = 640 x 480
  • As a result, the image appears blurred. Change “Quality” to 100 to get a crisp render.
Number of threads

Determines how many computer cores will be used for the render.

Global Scale

Adjust Maxwell Render's scale with RealFlow's scale. If the objects in the rendered images appear like miniatures you consider a higher scale. Transparent and SSS materials also react on scale changes.

Playback (D)

Max Frame Time

Here you can enter a render time limit in seconds. When the limit is reached the render will be aborted even if the given “Max Sampling Level” is not yet reached.

Max Sampling Level

The higher the sampling level, the less noise the final image will have. The default value of 7 is suitable for most previews. Higher settings result in longer render times.

Engine

Maxwell Render comes in two flavours:

Motion Blur

The value acts like a multiplier to stretch the motion blur streaks.

Channels (E)

Alpha | Motion | Normals

These images contain information for post processing jobs.