Textures and material

[franlt]

Hi there,

I see I asked this question last year, but I am having a different problem this year. I do not render that often, so it is difficult for me to get a routine going. These are the issues that I am having.

1. I cannot pick a material and then assign a texture to it, even if I pick a physically based material. I watched the video by Brian James rendering a lamp. (wonderful video),. After picking a physically based material, I then go to the add a texture tab in the materials and drop down and try and pick a texture, all of the textures are grayed out in my library.
2. I can only use the texture as the material, and have limited mapping abilities.
3. Is this a function of the way that my library is set up, or should I download materials from the internet? I just do not get it.
4. I did not produce a file to send, because the problem is generic.
5. I work in metal, so I was trying to pick a hammered brass material and change the displacement of the hammer blows. Cannot do it.
6. Thanks in advance for your help.

[BrianJ (Brian James)]

Hi @franlt ,

I think the issue may be both that the texture map in the hammered brass material is set by default to WCS or world coordinate system / box style. If you click on the texture within the color and bump channels of that material, you can change the size of it. Or, use the Texture Mapping section of the Properties panel when your object with that material assigned to it is selected. In that section of properties, you can click the top option to convert the texture maps in the assigned material from WCS. This will then use whatever mapping method you assign for the object. The default result being by surface UVs. You can change the repeat in this properties page as well or edit the UVs of the model or adjust repeat values in the textures within the material.

You can alternately, drag and drop any texture map (best if tilable) into an empty spot in a Rhino viewport. Then choose to make a material from it. This will put that texture in the color channel of the material and the mapping will already be set to by surface.

I hope that helps.

[franlt]

Thank you for getting back to me. Worse things have happened. In ray trace mode, (at 50 samples, per your suggestion) rendering material and textures with procedurals, and multi textures, Rhino crashed. It has crashed many times during this file. The screen when it goes back on is bright, neon red. The kind of red right before the aliens show up. This red showed up on all my Rhino files. When I powered down and restarted, it would come back. The last time however it stays red. I updated my MacBook to the latest version. When I launched Rhino, it did not turn red, but that file would not open, I could however open my other Rhino files, what a relief. This file is still not opening. I managed to get a copy of one rendering before it crashed, but that was it, no detail renderings Would it help if I purchased V-Ray rendering plug in? It seems like materials and textures, really taxes Rhino and my computer. What is your opinion? I would like to get this file back, as I have to present to my client soon. The file is too big to download. Should I uninstall and reinstall Rhino? Here is the rendering. These are very preliminary sketches of a start up idea.

[David53 (David)]

Whatever you do, don’t buy any plugins until you have stabilsed Rhino.

First thing is to get your SystemInfo and copy it into the forum here. Crashing needs to be addressed first.

[cdordoni]

Use the SystemInfo command in Rhino. It produces Rhino specific information.

It should produce a result like this:

Rhino 8 SR29 2026-3-4 (Rhino 8, 8.29.26063.11001, Git hash:master @ bbd126f84fcdaf7a974615b7c9f4f8667571c147)
License type: Commercial, build 2026-03-04
License details: Cloud Zoo

Windows 10 (10.0.19045 SR0.0) or greater (Physical RAM: 63GB)
.NET 8.0.21

Computer platform: LAPTOP - Plugged in [100% battery remaining]

Non-hybrid graphics configuration.
Primary display and OpenGL: NVIDIA RTX A4000 Laptop GPU (NVidia) Memory: 8GB, Driver date: 10-12-2025 (M-D-Y). OpenGL Ver: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 581.60

Integrated accelerated graphics device with 4 adapter port(s)

• Windows Main Display is laptop’s integrated screen or built-in port
• Secondary monitor attached to adapter port #1
  Primary OpenGL: NVIDIA RTX A4000 Laptop GPU (NVidia) Memory: 8GB, Driver date: 10-12-2025 (M-D-Y). OpenGL Ver: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 581.60

Integrated accelerated graphics device with 4 adapter port(s)

• Windows Main Display is laptop’s integrated screen or built-in port
• Secondary monitor attached to adapter port #1

Secondary graphics devices.
Intel(R) UHD Graphics (Intel) Memory: 2GB, Driver date: 11-3-2025 (M-D-Y).

Integrated graphics device with 4 adapter port(s)

• There are no monitors attached to this device. Laptop lid is probably closed

OpenGL Settings
Safe mode: Off
Use accelerated hardware modes: On
GPU Tessellation is: On
Redraw scene when viewports are exposed: On
Graphics level being used: OpenGL 4.6 (primary GPU’s maximum)

Anti-alias mode: 4x
Mip Map Filtering: Linear
Anisotropic Filtering Mode: High

Vendor Name: NVIDIA Corporation
Render version: 4.6
Shading Language: 4.60 NVIDIA
Driver Date: 10-12-2025
Driver Version: 32.0.15.8160
Maximum Texture size: 32768 x 32768
Z-Buffer depth: 24 bits
Maximum Viewport size: 32768 x 32768
Total Video Memory: 8 GB

Rhino plugins that do not ship with Rhino

Rhino plugins that ship with Rhino
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\Commands.rhp “Commands” 8.29.26063.11001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\rdk.rhp “Renderer Development Kit”
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\RhinoRenderCycles.rhp “Rhino Render” 8.29.26063.11001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\rdk_etoui.rhp “RDK_EtoUI” 8.29.26063.11001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\NamedSnapshots.rhp “Snapshots”
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\MeshCommands.rhp “MeshCommands” 8.29.26063.11001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\RhinoCycles.rhp “RhinoCycles” 8.29.26063.11001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\Toolbars\Toolbars.rhp “Toolbars” 8.29.26063.11001
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\3dxrhino.rhp “3Dconnexion 3D Mouse”
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\Displacement.rhp “Displacement”
C:\Program Files\Rhino 8\Plug-ins\SectionTools.rhp “SectionTools”

[franlt]

Sorry about that. Here is the system info for Rhino. BTW, I think Rhino is stable, but that file is toast. But I really need to know what to do so this will not happen again. Like do I need a different graphics card, or render plug in. Or should I just not use ray trace mode, even with 50 samples.

[David53 (David)]

I think one question I have for now, is what is the size of the file? Why is it so big? Key suspect is probably the meshing on that sofa. That scene shouldn’t be anywhere near a problem size.

What I would do is go back to basics, and see what causes such a large scene. This should be very easy with Rhino.

[franlt]

It is 24.4MG. Is that big? I cannot access the file at all. it does not come up, I do not see any way to retrieve it. Would a plug in like V Ray be better then Rhino render? Thank you for your help. You Rhino folks are awesome. The mesh sofa is a 3d drop in from an Italian furniture company called B &B Italia, it takes up 4 layers, between hardware and fabric. But all designers use them.

[franlt]

I can start a new file, but all of my files are big.

[David53 (David)]

25 Mb isn’t that big. I’d email the support team at McNeel of you have a specific file with a problem. You can upload the file directly to them.

My advice is to get rendering working first in Rhino Cycles (Raytraced). In Rhino 8 it is very capable, and there is no need to be pulled into the renderer subscription hellscape if you don’t need to be.

Is there a specific area you are looking at? Is this interior design or general architecture? There are good guides here to get you up and going again.

[franlt]

What e-mail address should I use to send my file to Rhino? I will get up and running again. I will do as you advised. I design and fabricate furniture, which as artisan crafted is sold in a gallery. You can google my name to see my work. Anyway I have been using mostly grasshopper since 2021 to use parametric design. I have produced many piece. I really do not use Rhino that much. As I fabricate so I do not need to show renderings. I am interested in modeling in Rhino using Nerbs. It is not easy as all of the tools are so varied, it is difficult to know where to start. But I really love Rhino and Grasshopper. Thanks for your help. Fran

[BrianJ (Brian James)]

Hi @franlt ,

Try using the Import command to bring your problem file into a blank Rhino template. I bet the reason you can’t open it directly is the Raytraced mode being active when it was last saved. That combined with your older AMD/Intel Mac and some material or object setting may be the culprit.