AV Works 2.1 transparency limits.

[Richard Swann]

While trying out the AV works 2.1 demo on AC8.1R2 (mac OS10.3) I have been attempting to photorender a building view involving lots of glazing at different angles. AV works seems to have a self imposed limit on the transparency of a material- I just get green sludge rather than clear glass for example, or indeed anything that looks like glass unless I return to ArchiCADs own renderer.
Does anybody have any tips on how to get shiny, transparent glass using AV works 2.1?

[Djordje]

Richard wrote:
While trying out the AV works 2.1 demo on AC8.1R2 (mac OS10.3) I have been attempting to photorender a building view involving lots of glazing at different angles. AV works seems to have a self imposed limit on the transparency of a material- I just get green sludge rather than clear glass for example, or indeed anything that looks like glass unless I return to ArchiCADs own renderer.
Does anybody have any tips on how to get shiny, transparent glass using AV works 2.1?

Did you tweak the material?

[Richard Swann]

Yes Djordje,
Despite hours of tweaking of all the material parameters and rerendering I still had no joy. The transparency settings seem to be overidden by AV Works own material definition which does not appear to allow for 'transparent' materials only transluscent. This is pretty fundamental stuff isn't it? When Abvent claim that :'With AV-works, all of Art•lantis features are now built into ArchiCAD's rendering options"
I would have to say they are not being totally honest, unless anyone out there knows different?

[Anonymous]

AV works is a wonderful program. Their tutorials and manual are junk. What is happening is that you are getting too much sun from AC. Here is a quote from Alain Picard of Abvent

"The ArchiCAD Sun and Light Ambient contribution are a nightmare for AV-works it is necessary to reduce them."

Try this; Go to:---- Image/3D Projection settings…/ click on the button More Sun… Set sunlight Intensity to 100, Set Ambient light to 5 and lastly set sunlight contribution to ambient to 4. Turn fog off.

Here is a place to start with the glass settings:
1- In Reflection thumbnail set the Ambient and Diffuse cursors to 0,
Specular to 100 and Shininess 95
2- In Transparency Thumbnail set Transmittance to 88 and Attenuation to 0
3- In Emission Thumbnail set Attenuation to 0 and Emission color to totally
black color
4- AC/Material/AV-works Photorealist thumbnail set Mirror Reflection set to
15

Note: In the Material window the Preview material is good for ArchiCAD
rendering engine but not for AV-works rendering engine, so don't focus on it
only a rendering will give you the result.

I am not very good at this rendering thing. We don't have the time it takes to generate nice renderings. This is why we jumped at the chance to get AV works. A program that can produce decent work in a short time.

I am including my first Rendering. It is not done yet, and if I don't get back to work on other projects, it will never get done.

[Anonymous]

Well, I don't know why the rendereing didn't get attached. I will try that again.

[Richard Swann]

Thanks thats really useful, I'll try it out when I have a moment. I worked out that the preview window does not reflect the AV settings,not surprising, but I would never have worked out the problem was the sun!