Render
Material Editor
Panels
Materials
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Render Material Editor Panels Materials |
Materials |
The Materials command opens the Materials panel which specifies the color, finish, transparency, texture, and bump for use by the built-in Rhino renderer.
Materials can be dragged and dropped onto any Material, Texture, and Environment control.
Colors can be dragged from a color swatch and dropped onto a different color swatch.
Drag a texture from a texture field and drop it onto a different texture field to move. Hold the Ctrl key to copy.
Material Editor displays materials used by objects in linked 3dm files. The materials can be used in the current model, but they are not editable. Double-click a linked block to edit the materials in a new Rhino window.
Material preview thumbnails are rendered by the selected render device in Options > Cycles.
When assigning a material to a block instance, you will be prompted a question. The material will be assigned differently depending on how you answer the question.
Yes assigns the material to all objects in the block instance.
No assigns the material to the block instance. Objects in the block instance need to set Use Object Parent to inherit the block instance's material.
Render contents (materials, environment, and textures) can be hidden by plug-ins or scripts. More information...
Materials panel
The Materials panel has additional browsing tools.
BackSelects the previous item in the list.
ForwardSelects the next item in the list.
Current itemDisplays the current item icon and name.
Search
Search NamesLimits the search to names.
Search NotesLimits the search to notes.
Search TagsLimits the search to tags.
Displays how 'name:', 'note:', 'tag:', '?', '#' and '^' are used for searching items.
MenuDisplays the Tools menu.
Help
Create New Material Click to select an action to create a new material.
Import from material libraryImports a material (.rmtl) from the Render Content library folder.
Create Physically Based material from texture filesCreates a physically based material from image files, or a PBR texture set (.zip).
Select one or more image files, or a PBR texture set (.zip).
Free or paid PBR texture sets can be downloaded from the Internet.
In the Texture Selection dialog, set the material name, texture assignment, texture mapping, and units.
CustomCreates a new custom material.
Custom materials have all possible settings available in the editor.
Double SidedCreates a new double sided material.
EmissionCreates a new emission material.
GlassCreates a new glass material.
MetalCreates a new metal material.
PaintCreates a new paint material.
Physically BasedCreates a new physically based material.
PictureCreates a new picture material.
PlasterCreates a new plaster material.
PlasticCreates a new plastic material.
GemCreates a new gem material.
More types...Creates a new material from the Material Type Browser dialog.
The name of the material.
The type of the current material.
If you change a material from a type to another, the settings compatible between the current and the new material types will migrate.
CustomThe default material is white and matte, with no reflectivity or transparency.
Custom Settings
Sets the material's base (also called diffuse) color.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
The Gloss finish control adjusts the highlight from matte to glossy and sets the color of the glossy area.
You can see Gloss finish in the Rendered display mode, but it makes no difference to Rhino Render. Some third-party renderers may use it.
Move the slider to change the value.
Double-click the slider to enter a number.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
The Reflectivity setting sets the material's reflectivity amount and sets the reflective color.
Move the slider to change the value.
Double-click the slider to enter a number.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
Adjusts the transparency of an object in the rendered image.
Move the slider to change the value.
Double-click the slider to enter a number.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
This value defines the bending of a ray of light when it travels from a transparent material into another.
Click 
to bring up a list of predefined values for different materials.
Example IOR values are shown in the following table:
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Material |
IOR |
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| Vacuum | 1.0 |
| Air | 1.00029 |
| Ice | 1.309 |
| Water | 1.33 |
| Glass | 1.52 to 1.8 |
| Emerald | 1.57 |
| Ruby/Sapphire | 1.77 |
| Diamond | 2.417 |
Textures (images or procedural textures) can be used for color, transparency, bump, and environment.
Rhino supports the following file formats:
Transparency is not supported in these formats:
Transparency is supported in these formats:
Click (click to assign texture) to assign a texture.
When a texture has been assigned to a setting:
Specifies a texture to use as the material's color.
Uses a texture to control the material's transparency.
Uses a texture to control the material's bump depth or object's normal direction.
Bump and Normal maps add details to surfaces in rendering without modifying the shape of the surface.
Uses grayscale values of a texture to make a surface appear bumpy.
Uses RGB values of a bitmap image to alter surface normal directions.
Uses a texture as the material's environment reflection.
The image should be an angular map or light probe projection (spherical) image. Other image projections will produce the reflection effect, but it will be distorted and not produce the realistic environment reflection.
Advanced Settings
Allows the material to render the diffuse color with shadowing and shading by enabling diffuse lighting.
If this setting is on, the object renders with shadowing and shading.
If this setting is off, the object will render the diffuse color all over with no shadowing or shading. Turning this setting off ensures that the color the texture of picture frames remains constant over the surface.
Causes objects to reflect fully at glancing angles and only slightly reflect when the object is seen head on.
This effect simulates many transparent or semi-transparent materials, such as glass, plastic, and materials that have a thin transparent glaze, such as laminated paper, polished woods, and paint.
Allows images with an alpha channel for transparency to make the object transparent in the areas of the image where the alpha channel is applied.
Makes the surface reflections fuzzy. For surfaces that are perfectly reflective, such as mirrors and chrome, use 100% polish. Lower values model materials like certain plastics and the sanded surface of frosted glass.
Changing this setting can increase rendering time.
Controls the clarity of the material.
Creates translucent materials like tracing paper or hand-made glass.
Changing this setting can increase rendering time.
Creates clear materials such as water, float glass, and diamonds.
Adds a color to the shaded result. It does not take into account the lighting, so if the emission color is white, the object will always appear white. If the emission color is gray, all parts of the object will appear brighter than they would otherwise.
Double SidedThe Double Sided material allows to display different materials on the front and back sides of a "thin" object that does not have a physical thickness, such as a single surface or mesh.
Double Sided Material
The material displays on the front side of an object.
The material displays on the back side of the same object.
EmissionThe Emission material can be assigned to an object to make the object into a lighting source.
Emission
The illuminating color.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
The brightness of the light.
Move the slider to change the value.
Double-click the slider to enter a number.
The Emission material will be rendered black when Intensity is set to 0.
GemsThe preset Gem materials offer a choice of preset gems. Other settings are pre-determined by the gem type.
Gems
Amber |
Amethyst |
Aquamarine |
Diamond |
Emerald |
Ruby |
Sapphire |
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GlassThe preset Glass material type allows the Color, Frost, and index of refraction settings to be modified. Other settings are pre-determined.
Glass
Sets the glass color.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
Sets the transparent clearness.
Move the slider to change the value.
Double-click the slider to enter a number.
Sets the index of refraction. Details...
MetalThe preset Metal material allows the Color and Polish to be modified.
Other settings are pre-determined by the metal type.
Brass |
Bronze |
Chrome |
Copper |
Gold |
Gold (Yellow) |
Platinum |
Silver |
Stainless steel |
Steel |
Titanium |
Metal
Sets the metal color.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
Some common metal colors are listed in the Select Color dialog.
Sets the reflection sharpness.
Reflection polish (left) low to high (right).
Sets the texture style for the bump from a limited list.
Sets the size of the bump pattern from XXXS to XXXL. You have to select an appropriate size for your model. The bump effect will not be visible in the rendering when the size is too large or too small.
PaintThe preset Paint material allows the Color and Glossiness to be modified.
Sets the diffuse color.
Sets the Fresnel reflectivity and Reflection polish.
Physically BasedPhysically Based Rendering (PBR) simulates interaction between lights and surfaces in the real world to create photorealistic renderings. Different material types usually use different shading methods. The physically based material type integrates several shading methods into a single material.
Physically Based Material
The diffuse color of the material that displays when no texture is assigned.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
Controls the smoothness of object surface. Rough surfaces reflect light rays in a wider range of angles that make reflection blurry.
Move the slider to change the value.
Double-click the slider to enter a number.
Enable to give the material a metal appearance.
Controls transparency of the object.
Move the slider to change the value.
Double-click the slider to enter a number.
Move the slider towards left to increase transparency. Transparent materials increase the rendering time.
Sets the index of refraction. Details...
Click this button to enable or disable shading methods.
Add textures to current Physically Based MaterialSelect more image files to add to the current PBR material. The Texture Selection dialog will open for you to assign the image files to PBR material settings.
Detailed settings
Click Details settings to enable/disable shading methods.
When any setting has (click to assign texture), the setting can be controlled by the assigned texture.
Base Color / Metallic / Roughness
The diffuse color of the material that displays when no texture is assigned.
Click the color swatch to select a color from the Select Color dialog.
Controls transparency of the object with the bitmap texture's alpha channel.
Gives the material a metal appearance. Details...
Controls the smoothness of the material. Details...
The bitmap image for metallic texture can be used as the roughness texture, but the colors have to be inverted to add roughness to the rusted portion instead of the non-rusted portion.
Subsurface parameters control how light rays penetrate the surface of a translucent object and scatter inside the object.
Scattering Radius is based on model units.
The specularity parameters scale the reflection highlight on non-metal objects.
Scales the brightness of reflection highlight.
The amount that the specularity is tinted by the base color.
Anisotropy parameters control the aspect ratio and orientation of the specular highlight to simulate directional brushed metal materials.
Changes the aspect ratio of the specular highlight.
Changes the angle of the specular highlight. The value can be 0 (0°) to 1.0 (360°).
Sheen parameters mimic the rim specular effect usually seen on some fabrics like silk.
Increasing Roughness blurs the rim specular.
Controls the width of the rim specular.
The amount that the rim specular is tinted by the base color.
Clearcoat parameters simulates the highly reflective layer on top of the base paint of a car.
Controls the reflection intensity of the clear coat.
Bump uses grayscale values of a texture to make a surface appear bumpy. Normal uses RGB values of a texture to alter surface normals.
Controls the roughness of the clear coat.
The roughness of the base paint is controlled by the base roughness setting.
Opacity parameters control the transparency of the material.
Changes the transparent level of the object.
Sets the index of refraction.
Controls the roughness of refraction.
Changes visibility of the object. Reducing the alpha value also reduces refraction effect.
When the value is set to 0, the object will be completely invisible.
Emission parameters turns an object into a light source.
The lighting color.
Increases or decreases the lighting intensity.
The material will be rendered with the base color when Multiplier is set to 0.
Bump / Normal and displacement
Bump / Normal and displacement parameters use textures to add details to the surface of an object.
A bump map uses grayscale values of a texture to make a surface appear bumpy.
A normal map uses RGB values of a bitmap image to alter surface normal directions.
Two flat cylinders (right) using a metallic material with/without the normal map (left).
Displacement uses grayscale values of a texture to move an object's render mesh vertices.
Displacement is based on model units.
Ambient Occlusion parameters use a bitmap image to add fake shadows of ambient light to the object.
An ambient occlusion map is a bitmap image baked from a 3D model in a rendering to store the indirect lighting information of ambient light when the model is rendered.
PictureThe name of the material.
The Picture contains a simple bitmap image.
The path and name of the bitmap file.
See also Bitmap Texture.
The Self-Illuminated option causes the image to always display at full intensity and is not affected by light or shadow.
The Grayscale option sets the image color to 256-grey
Specifies transparency settings for the image. Specify a transparent color to be used as an alpha channel in the case that no alpha channel is specified in the image.
Transparency is not supported when using JPEG (.jpg; .jpeg), PCX (.pcx), or Windows Bitmap (.bmp)
Specifies that the image alpha channel be used to determine transparency.
Specifies that a color in the image be used to determine transparency.
The tolerance to be used to determine if the texture's color matches the transparency color.
Sets the amount of transparency for the entire object.
Extra text information stored in the material that appears in the tooltip when you mouse-over the thumbnail.
PlasterThe preset Plaster material is the default matte, non-reflective, untextured material. Only the Color can be changed.
Sets the diffuse color.
PlasticThe preset Plastic material allows the Color, Reflectivity, Polish, Transparency, and Clarity to be changed.
Sets the diffuse Color.
Sets the Reflectivity.
Sets the Transparency.
Sets the Transparency clarity.
Sets the texture style for the bump from a limited list.
Sets the size of the bump pattern from XXXS to XXXL. You have to select an appropriate size for your model. The bump effect will not be visible in the rendering when the size is too large or too small.
Render content (materials, environments, and textures) are stored in models. They can also be saved to files and shared across models. The Libraries panel displays the default content folder. Content can be dragged and dropped between Rhino sessions or between a Rhino window and a disk folder.
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ShowPanel=Yes / No / Toggle |
Displays the Materials panel. |
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Options |
Displays command-line options. AddDeleteRenameChangeDuplicateLoadFromFileSaveToFileAssignToObjects |
The Snapshots command saves and restores Named Views, Named Positions, Layer States, as well as rendering settings, object settings including locked/hidden state, display mode, material, position, light settings, curve piping, displacement, edge softening, shutlining, and thickness.
Rhino detects material, environment and texture name conflicts in the following file operations:
When a render content item name already exists in the current model, but the content settings are different, the conflicted items will be resolved based on the related advanced settings.
Search for PasteConflictOption (for paste) and ImportRenameConflictingEx (for import and insert) in Advanced settings and change the value as described below.
0 = Do not import incoming conflicted render contents.
1 = Import and rename incoming conflicted render contents with [imported] post-fix.
2 = Import incoming conflicted render contents and overwrite existing ones.
3 = Pop up the Render Content Name Conflict dialog and let you decide how to resolve the conflicts.
Materials and texture mapping in Rhino for Windows
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The RenderAssignMaterialToObjects command assigns a material to the selected objects from the command-line.
Select one or more objects.
Select a material by entering its name or ID.
Command-line options
When the selected object has materials assigned to sub-faces:
Keep assigns the material to the object and keeps existing per-face materials.
Remove assigns the material to the object and removes per-face materials.
Ask shows a dialog box to let you decide what to do.
When a block instance is selected:
Yes assigns the material to the objects in the block instance.
No assigns the material to the block instance.
Ask shows a dialog box to let you decide what to do.
Assigns a material to a layer from the command-line.
Assigns a material to the selected object's layer from the command-line.
Rhinoceros 7 © 2010-2023 Robert McNeel & Associates. 13-Oct-2023
