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When assigning instance attributes in Maya, they can be named like Primvars, where controls are found on the shape node. Or as attributes found on the transform node and variable per instance.

 

Example commands:

rfm2.ui.user_attrs.user_attrs_add(data_attr, nodelist, pdict) -> add to one or more nodes

rfm2.ui.user_attrs.user_attrs_del(data_attr, nodelist, attrlist) -> delete from one or more nodes

rfm2.ui.user_attrs.user_attrs(node) -> list all user attributes

 

Common

Name
Type
Default
Description
bake:activeudimsstringemptyActive udims for Integrator baking of texture atlases. Lists and ranges of udims can be provided in the string, for example: Attribute "bake" "string activeudims" "1001,1003,1005-1006". The default is "" which means all udims get baked.
bake:udimresolutionsstringemptyUdim texure resolutions for Integrator baking of texture atlases. Lists and ranges of udims can be provided in the string, for example: Attribute "bake" "string udimresolutions" "1001 512 512 1002,1003 64 32 1005-1006 16 16" If the string is empty (the default) then the Display Format resolution will be used.
grouping:idint0Grouping id used for raytrace disambiguation purposes. Value range: 0 to 15.
grouping:membershipstringemptyGrouping membership used for linking.
identifier:idint0Lower 32 bits of 64 bit object id.
identifier:id2int0Upper 32 bits of 64 bit object id.
identifier:lpegroupstringemptyGrouping membership used for light path expressions.
identifier:namestringemptyObject instance name.
stats:identifierstringemptyIdentifier string used by the stats system when referring to this instance.

Shading

Name
Type
Default
Description
curves:widthaffectscurvatureint1Indicates whether curve width should be used when computing curve curvature. If turned off, only the curvature along the curve spline will be calculated.
lightfilter:subsetstringemptyActive light filter groups in lighting.
lighting:excludesubsetstringemptyExclude light groups from lighting.
lighting:muteint0Mutes light emission.
lighting:subsetstringemptyLight groups active in lighting.
Ri:Matteint0Indicates matte object.
Ri:ReverseOrientationint0Flip shading normals.
Ri:Sidesint2Geometry can be one or two sided.
shade:indexofrefractionfloat-1Override material IOR for nested dielectrics.
shade:minsamplesint1Min Pixel Samples. For fine-tuning adaptive sampling.
shade:relativepixelvariancefloat1PixelVariance multiplier for camera visible objects. For fine-tuning adaptive sampling.
trace:holdoutint0Indicates holdout object.
trace:intersectpriorityint0Raytrace intersection priority for nested dielectrics. Value range: 0 to 31.
trace:maxdiffusedepthint1Maximum diffuse light bounces.
trace:maxspeculardepthint2Maximum specular light bounces.
trace:reflectexcludesubsetstringemptyExclude object groups from reflections.
trace:reflectsubsetstringemptyObject groups visible to reflections.
trace:shadowexcludesubsetstringemptyExclude object groups from casting shadows.
trace:shadowsubsetstringemptyObject groups active in shadows.
trace:transmitexcludesubsetstringemptyExclude object groups from refractions.
trace:transmitsubsetstringemptyObject groups visible to refractions.
visibility:cameraint1Indicates if object is visible to camera rays.
visibility:indirectint1Indicates if object is visible to indirect (reflection and refraction) rays.
visibility:transmissionint1Indicates if object is visible to shadow rays.
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Added notes:

Emit Color Sets - Emits color sets assigned to objects, this is especially useful when rendering MASH objects with procedural coloring.

Prevent Polygon Cracking - Typically it's expected that you displace subdivision surfaces. However, should you need to displace a polygonal surface with "hard" normals, this option will attempt to prevent the object from coming apart once it's displaced.

Emit Face IDs - This is allows surfaces to make use of Ptex texturing.

Reference Object _WPref and the place3d with the reference object should be parented below the object that you are animating. _WPref is necessary for instances to have the texture stick in the same way. However, during IPR if you move/translate your object and it does not deform, it is not re-evaluated and the _WPref is not updated if only the transform has changed. You will only see the correct values if you restart the render or trigger an update on the mesh somehow (for instance, tweaking the displacement bound).

 

These may also be referred to as "prototype attributes" for clarity versus Instance Attributes which may be varied per instance.

Common

Name
Type
Default
Description
identifier:objectstringemptyObject shape name.
stats:prototypeIdentifierstringemptyIdentifier string used by the stats system when referring to this prototype.

Shading

Name
Type
Default
Description
derivatives:extrapolateint1Extrapolated smooth normals across grid boundaries. Value range: true/false.
displacement:ignorereferenceinstanceint0Indicates if displacement shading should ignore properties of the reference instance.
displacementbound:CoordinateSystemstringobjectThe name of the coordinate system that the displacement bound is measured in.
displacementbound:offscreenint0Apply displacementbound to offscreen geometry when dicing. Geometry that is entirely offscreen, but displaces into view may be prone to undertessellation because of the offscreen dicing strategy. This can be corrected by enabling this control and setting a reasonable displacementbound. Doing so will incur a performance penalty commensurate with the size of the displacement bound.
displacementbound:spherefloat0Maximum displacement distance used to compute object bounds. This value should be as tight as possible.
Ri:OrientationstringoutsideGeometry winding order that determines surface normal. This attribute effects lighting and displacement. Supported values: inside, outside.
trace:autobiasint1Enable automatic raytrace bias. Value range: true/false.
trace:biasfloat0.01Manual raytrace bias in object space. Small values should be used to avoid artifacts such as shadow acne.
trace:displacementsint1Enable displacement shading. Value range: true/false.
trace:sssautobiasint1Enable automatic raytrace bias for subsurface scattering rays. Value range: true/false.
trace:sssbiasfloat1e-4fManual raytrace bias (in object space) for subsurface scattering rays. Small values should be used to avoid artifacts such as surface acne.

Dicing

Name
Type
Default
Description
dice:micropolygonlengthfloat1Micropolygon distance in raster space for "instanceprojection" dicing. Values are expressed in pixel size.
dice:offscreenmultiplierfloat-1Dicing rate multiplier for objects outside the viewing frustum. If a value less than zero is specified, the value from the Option with the same name will be used instead. Value range: -1 or more.
dice:offscreenstrategystringviewfrustumdistanceDicing method of objects outside the viewing frustum. Supported values: viewfrustumdistance, worlddistance, objectdistance, planarprojection, sphericalprojection.
dice:rasterorientint1Turning this off enables non-oriented dicing, a mode of dicing that computes micropolygon sizes using non-oriented raster space rather than screen-aligned raster space. Non-oriented dicing is useful for displacement around edges where projected micropolygon distance can be arbitrarily small. Value range: true/false.
dice:referencecamerastringemptySpecify the camera used for dicing. If no reference camera is specified, RenderMan will use the primary camera.
dice:referenceinstancestringemptySpecify the reference instance used for dicing and displacement shading. The reference instance is used to drive dicing and displacement based on its position, scale, user attributes, and scoped coordinate systems. Reference instances are specified by its identifier:name attribute (instance name). If no reference instance is specified, RenderMan will automatically pick the nearest instance inside the primary camera's view frustum.
dice:strategystringinstanceprojectionDicing method of objects within the viewing frustum. Supported values: instanceprojection, worlddistance, objectdistance, sphericalprojection.
dice:worlddistancelengthfloat-1Micropolygon distance in world space for "worlddistance" dicing or object space for "objectdistance" dicing.
Ri:GeometricApproximationFocusFactorfloat0Allows the renderer to use more coarse dicing for blurry objects due to depth of field.

Points

Name
Type
Default
Description
falloffpowerfloat0For use with points, if not supplied, or set to zero, the points will have a hard edge. A value of 1 is a "reasonable" value that emulates the usual cosine based falloff; this will likely be the goto value for most people doing volumetric particle effects. Values between 0 and 1 makes the falloff faster, eroding the point faster - point has "less presence". Values higher than 1 (up to infinity) makes the falloff slower to the point of being non-existent.

Curves

Name
Type
Default
Description
curve:opacitysamplesint0number of opacity/presence shading samples along a curve for opacity caching, if equal to zero then the value is determined using the dicing oracle and the length of each curve.
curve:widthaffectscurvatureint1When true the curve width of round curves is taken into account in the computation of the tube curvature, otherwise only the curvature along the curve is. This control does not affect curve ribbons. Value range: true/false.

Volume

Name
Type
Default
Description
dice:minlengthfloat-1Volume minimum dice length. Negative indicates to automatically compute this value.
dice:minlengthspacestringemptyCoordinate space of dice:minlength.
Ri:Boundfloat[6]0 0 0 0 0 0Volume bounds.
volume:aggregatestringglobalVolumeAggregateThe name of the volume aggregate to which a volume belongs. If non-empty, the volume will only be rendered if the integrator explicitly uses that named aggregate, or if a surface shader such as PxrSurface binds the named aggregate to its interior.
volume:aggregaterespectvisibilityintemptyIf set to 1, standard visibility attributes will be respected by the volume if it is part of an aggregate. If set to 0, the visibility attributes will be ignored and only the integrator visibility settings will apply. Value range: true/false.
volume:dsominmaxintemptyCurrently only used for aggregate volumes, and only for volumes that use an ImplicitField DSO. If set to 1, the DSO may be able to use stored information from the file directly to compute the minimum and maximum values within the volume. This may allow the renderer to avoid shading the volume up front, greatly decreasing time to first pixel. This can only be enabled if the density signal from the volume is used directly, or if the density signal is modulated only by the DSO itself. Any shading modifications of the density signal requires setting this parameter to off. Value range: true/false.
volume:dsovelocityint0Used only for aggregate volumes that use an ImplicitField DSO. If set to 1, the DSO can provide velocity bounds to the renderer directly via the BoxMotion call. This can allow the renderer to avoid upfront shading of the volume's velocity data when using Eulerian velocity, improving render time and time to first pixel greatly. This can only be enabled if the velocity signal from the DSO is used directly. Value range: true/false.
volume:fpsfloat1The frames per second for volumetric velocity data. The velocity data will be divided by this quantity to derive the velocity for the frame.
volume:shutteroffsetfloat1The shutter offset used to interpret volumetric velocity. A value of 1 will use the current position of the object and the position of the object on the next frame as the time interval to use for motion blur. A value of -1 will use the position of the object on the previous frame and the current position of the object as the time. A value of 0 will generate an interval which begins halfway through the previous frame and ends halfway into the next frame.
volume:velocityshuttercorrectionint0If set to 1, volumetric velocity data for Eulerian motion blur will be assumed to be relative to the entire frame, and will be corrected to match the current shutter interval. If set to 0, no correction will be made. Value range: true/false.

SubdivisionMesh

Name
Type
Default
Description
dice:pretessellateint1Pre-tessellate subdivision geometry to polygons. Value range: true/false.
dice:watertightint0Tessellate geometry with no holes. Watertight geometry requires less raytrace bias. Value range: true/false.
shade:facesetint[n]emptyActive geometry face indexes.
stitchbound:CoordinateSystemstringempty
stitchbound:spherefloat0

NuPatch

Name
Type
Default
Description
trimcurve:sensestringinsideSupported values: inside, outside.

PolygonMesh

Name
Type
Default
Description
polygon:concaveint1Allow concave polygons. Value range: true/false.
polygon:smoothdisplacementint0Output smoothed (per-vertex) normals as Ndsp primvar, if polygon:smoothnormals hasn't already inserted smooth normals. Value range: true/false.
polygon:smoothnormalsint0Smooth (per-vertex) normals if not provided. Value range: true/false.

Procedural

Name
Type
Default
Description
procedural:immediatesubdivideint0Used by RiProcedural to compel a procedural to immediately subdivide (behavior supported via the __immediatesubdivide meta-parameter in RiProcedural2). This attribute is "special" in that it is not inherited into sub-procedural contexts - meaning parent immediate-subdivide procedurals don't accidentally trigger immediate-subdivide children. A value of 0 (the default) disables, 1 enables, and 2 forces all child procedurals to crack immediately.
procedural:reentrantint0Enabling this attribute will cause any subsequent procedural to not lock the global mutex. Note that this requires that the procedural be thread safe. This attribute is disabled by default, i.e. all procedurals remain locked. Value range: true/false.
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