Maya Domemaster3D Shelf

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Domemaster3D Shelf Tools
• Domemaster3D Menu

Introduction

The Maya version of the Domemaster3D shader includes a custom shelf with 46 tools that help automate the fulldome and VR production process, and features a matching Domemaster3D Menu system.

Domemaster3D Shelf Tools

AutoMagic Button

The AutoMagic tool creates a "domeAFL_FOV_Stereo" based fulldome stereo camera rig and adds a hemispherical reference grid to the scene.

AutoMagic LatLong 3D Button

The AutoMagic LatLong tool creates a "LatLong_Stereo" based stereo camera rig and adds a spherical reference grid to the scene.

Domemaster3D Button

The Domemaster3D tool creates a stereo fulldome camera rig with the "domeAFL_FOV_Stereo" lens shader applied.

Dome Texture Button

The Dome Texture tool creates a screen space file texture. This is useful for loading file textures as control maps for the "domeAFL_FOV_Stereo" shader.

Dome Ramp Button

The Dome Ramp tool creates a screen space ramp texture. This is useful for creating editable gradients that can be used to drive the control maps on the "domeAFL_FOV_Stereo".

DomeAFL_FOV Button

The DomeAFL_FOV tool creates a standard 2D fulldome camera with the "domeAFL_FOV" lens shader applied.

DomeAFL_WxH Button

The DomeAFL_WxH tool creates a 2D fulldome camera with the "domeAFL_WxH" lens shader applied. This shader uses a diameter and height setting instead of a field of view control.

LatLong Button

The LatLong tool creates a LatLong / Equirectangular / Spherical camera with the "latlong_lens" shader applied.

LatLong Stereo Button

The LatLong Stereo tool creates a stereoscopic LatLong / Equirectangular / Spherical camera with the "LatLong_Stereo" shader applied.

Color Material Button

The Color Material tool creates a "mia_material_x_passes" based mental ray shading network with support for color file textures.

Color + Bump Material Button

The Color + Bump Material tool creates a "mia_material_x_passes" based mental ray shading network with support for color and bump file textures.

Color Image Sequence Material Button

The Color Image Sequence Material tool creates a "mia_material_x_passes" based mental ray shading network with support for color file textures. The mentalrayTexture node has extra attributes applied that allow you to create image sequences.

Note: The image sequence mode requires your batch rendering software to distribute the rendering job using 1 frame per packet / render slice so a new image is loaded for each frame of the sequence.

Hybrid MR + Maya Color Material Button

The new Hybrid mentalrayTexture + Maya Color Material tool creates a shading network that combines the render time improvements of a mental ray texture based surface material for reducing blurry streak artifacts when rendering with lens shaders, and a real-time high resolution preview benefit of a stock Maya file texture node. The shading group uses the "Suppress all Maya Shaders" setting to make sure the mentalrayTexture is used at render time in a similar fashion to how the Starglobe surface material works. A place2dTexture node is used to drive the placement of both the mentalrayTexture and the Maya file texture nodes. Note: The place2dTexture WrapU and WrapV attributes are not supported by the mentalrayTexture node so it is a good idea to keep the rotate frame setting to 0/90/180/270, and the RepeatUV values in the range of 0-1 so the texture map doesn't expose the blank area outside the image area when transformed.

Starglobe Button

The Starglobe tool creates a "mia_material_x_passes" based starry background for your fulldome scenes.

FulldomeIBL Button

The FulldomeIBL tool creates a custom mentalrayTexture based shading network that lets you feed fulldome 180 degree images and image sequences into mentalray's IBL node angular texture input.

Note: The FulldomeIBL image sequence mode requires your render farm software to distribute the rendering job using 1 frame per packet / render slice so a new image is loaded for each frame of the sequence. The FulldomeIBL tool works with Maya 2015's newly improved "emit light" IBL lighting system.

HemirectIBL Button

The HemirectIBL tool creates a custom mentalrayTexture based shading network that lets you feed in an image with the top half of an equirectangular panorama into mentalray's IBL node spherical texture input. The word Hemirect is short for hemi-equirectangular which is a new panoramic format based upon using the top 90 degree field of view zone of an equirectangular image which gives a 360° horizontal by 90° vertical part of the "all sky" region that matches the coverage area of a regular fulldome image.

Note: The HemirectIBL image sequence mode requires your render farm software to distribute the rendering job using 1 frame per packet / render slice so a new image is loaded for each frame of the sequence. The HemirectIBL tool works with Maya's improved "emit light" IBL lighting system.

IPR Viewport

The IPR Viewport tool creates a new torn off "persp" viewport window using your active camera view. This window has the mental ray 3.14 based interactive viewport rendering mode active which provides an efficient way to preview the camera framing in a 360 degree panoramic scene with a mental ray lens shader active.

The IPR Viewport window is set to use the same aspect ratio as your final rendered imagery and the viewport is created at 50% of the size of your current Maya "Test Resolution" setting in the Maya Render View window.

Note: For a stereo camera make sure to be looking through the right or left camera view in the stereo camera rig before you activate the IPR Viewport mode.

DomeGrid Button

The DomeGrid tool creates a hemispherical yellow wireframe reference grid.

Galaxy Creator button

The Galaxy Creator tool creates dynamic particle based galaxies.

DomeText Button

The DomeText tool creates raster titles and scrolling credits that can be used in a fulldome 2D or fulldome stereo production setting. This tool uses ImageMagick to render the title graphics using fonts installed in your system.

CrossBounce Button

Simulate the effect of "crossbounce" light pollution that happens when imagery is projected across a hemispherical fulldome theatre screen.

DomeViewer Button

The DomeViewer tool provides an immersive fulldome and panoramic image / movie viewer.

Histogram Button

The Histogram tool uses ImageMagick to calculate a histogram analysis for the current image in the render view. Clicking the "Refresh the Histogram" button updates the plot.

Render Rez Buttons

• The 0.5k button sets the render resolution to 512x512 pixels.
• The 1k button sets the render resolution to 1024x1024 pixels.
• The 2k button sets the render resolution to 2048x2048 pixels.
• The 4k button sets the render resolution to 4096x4096 pixels.
• The 8k button sets the render resolution to 8192x8192 pixels.

Wide Aspect Ratio Render Rez Buttons

The 2:1 aspect ratio resolution buttons are optimized for the "LatLong" and "LatLong_Stereo" shaders.

• The 2x1k button sets the render resolution to 2048x1024 pixels.
• The 4x2k button sets the render resolution to 4096x2048 pixels.
• The 8x4k button sets the render resolution to 8192x4096 pixels.

Open Maya Project Folder Button

The PRO button opens the current Maya project folder in a new window on your desktop. This is the same as if you manually browsed to the folder using Finder (macOS), Windows Explorer, or Nautilus (Linux).

Open Scenes Folder Button

The SCN button opens the "scenes" folder for the current project in a new window on your desktop. This is the same as if you manually browsed to the folder using Finder (macOS), Windows Explorer, or Nautilus (Linux).

Open Sourceimages Folder Button

The SRC button opens the "sourceimages" folder for the current project in a new window on your desktop. This is the same as if you manually browsed to the folder using Finder (macOS), Windows Explorer, or Nautilus (Linux).

Open Images Folder Button

The IMG button opens the "images" folder for the current project in a new window on your desktop. This is the same as if you manually browsed to the folder using Finder (macOS), Windows Explorer, or Nautilus (Linux).

Open Temporary Folder Button

The TMP button opens the operating systems "%TEMP%" temporary folder. This can be useful if you want to check out the log files from the DomeText tool, or inspect the contents of the folder to see about freeing up disk space.

Display Render Log Button

The rLog button opens the current "MayaRenderLog.txt" file in a text editor to show the render statistics.

Diagnostics Button

The Diag button generates a Maya Diagnostics Report and saves it to your desktop. This is helpful for detecting issues with Maya and the Domemaster3D shader.

The diagnostics output is formatted in plain text format using the "markdown" syntax and can be opened in Markdown Pad / StackEdit / Notepad++ / TextWrangler / BBedit or any other plain text editor.

Task Manager Button

This button will open the macOS Activity Monitor, the Gnome System Monitor, or the Windows Task Manager. This is useful to check the efficiency of the renderer by inspecting the memory usage and the processor utilization.

Upgrade Domemaster Node IDs Button

The Upgr / "Upgrade Domemaster Node IDs" button will look in your .mb Maya Binary scenes for any legacy "latlong_lens", "domeAFL_FOV", "domeAFL_FOV_Stereo", or "domeAFL_WxH "nodes and replace them with newly created nodes using the current Node ID information from the current domeFL_FOV_Stereo.mi and "latlong_lens.mi" mental ray include files. The domeAFL node Extra Attributes settings will be refreshed too, along with the expressions linked dome preview shape.

Lens shader nodes that need to be updated will have their icons replaced in the Hypershade with the red text that reads "NodeID Upgrade Required."

Add Pre/Post Render Mel Button

Add the Domemaster3D shader Pre/Post render mel scripts to the Maya Render Settings window.

Remove Pre/Post Render Mel Button

Remove the Domemaster3D shader Pre/Post render mel scripts from the Maya Render Settings window.

Launch Another Maya Instance Button

This tool will launch an additional copy of Maya that will run independently. This is handy if you want to work in two separate Maya sessions at the same time.

Load Mental Ray Plugin Button

The Load MentalRay Plugin tool forces mental ray to reload. This button can fix issues if Maya didn't startup correctly or the mental ray plugin isn't set to autoload.

Wiki Button

The Wiki Help tool loads the Domemaster Stereo Shader Wiki page in your web browser.

Version Button

The Version Info tool shows the current version number for the Domemaster Stereo Shader and provides links to the download page, and the NING group.

Domemaster3D Menu

The same tools that are in the Domemaster3D shelf are also accessible as menu items. To access the Domemaster3D Menu you need to be in the Rendering Menu Set.

If you want to add the Domemaster3D menu items to your own custom shelves, it is possible to use the "Control + Shift + menu item click" technique. The selected menu item will then appear in the current shelf tab and have the correct icon applied for the specific tool.

Maya 2016 and 2017 users will notice the new menu icons next to each menu item.

Note: There are two new items added to the Domemaster3D for Maya shelf named "Elliptical Filtering on Maya File Nodes" and "List Elliptical Filtering Details on Maya File Nodes". These two features are used to allow you to make full use of mental ray 3.14 for Maya's new ray differential base texture sampling modes.

When this new elliptical filtering and ray differential based texture sampling modes are used, the previous blurry streak artifacts that were quite a nuisance will be removed from your panoramic renderings automatically when using a stock Maya file node based texturing workflow. You will find the Maya file node's new elliptical filtering options in the mental ray Extra Attributes section.