[Chimera-users] Is RTX support planned?

[Tom Goddard]

Hi Gökhan,

  We haven't considered working on raytracing in ChimeraX yet.  What advantage do you think it would have?  One that I can think of is that having multiples models with transparency could work correctly with raytracing.

  ChimeraX uses the same material for all surfaces now which defines how light bounces off it, how shiny it is.  The ChimeraX material command controls those settings

	https://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/commands/material.html <https://www.cgl.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/commands/material.html>

We may in the future allow different models to use different materials.

  ChimeraX also allows using textures on surfaces with the "color image" command, although good use cases are hard to come by:

	https://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/commands/color.html#image <https://www.rbvi.ucsf.edu/chimerax/docs/user/commands/color.html#image>

Generic 3D modeling packages like Blender, Cinema4d, Maya, ... work poorly or not at all with vertex colors which ChimeraX uses for multi-color surfaces like coloring a molecule surface by electrostatic potential.  But sometimes people want to export those colorings from ChimeraX, for instance to print a 3D color surface and so they want the colors in a texture.  So I have been looking at that use and will probably try to allow electrostatic and hydrophobic coloring to use a texture and to export as GLTF, OBJ, Collada or other 3D formats using texture colors in the next several months.

	Tom



> On Sep 25, 2020, at 1:42 AM, Gokhan Tolun <gokhan at uow.edu.au> wrote:
> 
> Hi Tom,
>  
> Are there any plans to implement RTX (real-time ray tracing) support to ChimeraX (and even better, allow the use of physically modelled materials and textures)?
>  
> Thanks,
>  
> Gökhan
>  
>  
> Gökhan Tolun <https://scholars.uow.edu.au/display/gokhan_tolun>, M.S., Ph.D.
> Senior Lecturer
> School of Chemistry and Molecular Bioscience <https://www.uow.edu.au/science-medicine-health/schools-entities/school-of-chemistry-and-molecular-bioscience/> | Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health (SMAH) <https://smah.uow.edu.au/index.html> | Room 125 / Building 18
> Molecular Horizons Research Institute <https://www.uow.edu.au/molecular-horizons/index.html>
> Illawarra Health and Medical Research Institute <https://www.ihmri.org.au/researchers/gokhan-tolun/>
> University of Wollongong NSW 2522 Australia
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