Random Color Switch

The Random Color switches randomly between a palette of user-defined colors or textures. You control the total number of color inputs and how likely each color may appear, giving you the ability to make certain colors appear more often than others. The chance a color has to appear is controlled by setting the weight for each input. On top of that, it's easy to add additional randomization using the built-in Color Jitter controls.

Examples

How to use it

First decide how the randomization will be distributed in your scene, this is controlled by the Input ID Mode. You can either set the Input ID Mode to a built-in ID like “Name ID” or use a custom ID by selecting “User Data” and connecting a user data node like Integer User Data as used in the example below.

Next set the number of colors you want in your palette and connect textures to the color inputs if necessary. If you want some colors to show up more often than others, you can increase or decrease their Weight value.

Additional color randomization can be added with the built-in Color Jitter parameters.

Colorize a Maxon Noise

You can also use a Random Color Switch to colorize a Maxon Noise with your own color palette. Here's what to do:

Create a Random Color Switch, then set up your color palette and set the Input ID Mode to User Data .
Create a Maxon Noise and connect it to a Multiply node.
Connect the Multiply node to the User Data input on the Random Color Switch

The Multiply node is used to push the greyscale color values of the noise into a broader range of numerical values to drive the ID randomization. Increasing the multiplication value increases the total number of IDs to choose from and results in more potential for variety.

Multiply: 0 - 100

Now you can change the seed until you find a random result you like, add additional randomization with the Color Jitter options, or try different noise types.


Changing the Random Color Switch's Seed	Enabling Color Jitter	Changing the Maxon Noise type

Parameters

Input ID Mode

Controls what attribute the randomization is based on.

Name ID - Randomization is based on an objects name in the scene.
Object ID - Randomization is based on the Redshift Object ID that a user can set on each object. This works exactly the same as using an Integer User Data node with the "RSObjectID" attribute.
UserData ID - Randomization is based on a custom user attribute. Frequently this is accomplished with an Integer User Data node as the "User Data input" which references an attribute added to objects in the scene.

Redshift reserves the following intrinsic attributes:

RSObjectID - An integer ID that Redshift tracks which can be set by the user per-object.
RSNameID - A string ID that Redshift tracks based on the names of scene objects.

Shader Switch Jitter

Seed

Controls the seed used to determine the random shader assigned per ID. After your weights are set up, change the seed until you get the result you want.

Note, when objects share the same ID they receive the same shader as demonstrated in the User Data example below.


Changing the Seed Input ID: Name ID	Changing the Seed User Data

Shaders

Weight

Controls the probability a shader is used per ID. Higher values make the shader more likely to appear while lower values make it less likely to appear. The chance a shader has to appear is dependent on the number of other shaders and their individual weights. For example, with two shaders, a shader with a weight of 0.5 is half as likely to appear as a shader with a weight of 1.0. A shader with a weight of 0 has no chance to appear.

Weighting does not guarantee a certain ratio of shaders. For example, equivalent weights do not guarantee an even spread of shaders. If you have two shaders and they use the same weight you can think of it like flipping a coin, you are likely to get a ratio close to 50/50 but that is not guaranteed. Each unique ID represents an instance of flipping the coin with an equivalent chance to land on either side. Changing the seed re-flips the coin for each ID with a chance to change the outcome.


Shader Weights: 1 - 1 - 1 Changing the seed for different outcomes	1 - 0.5 - 0	0.1 - 0 - 1

The weights are automatically normalized across all inputs, this makes it easy to control the probability without manually calculating the weight for each shader. For example, if you have 3 shaders and each has a weight of 1.0 then they each have an effective probability of 33%. If instead each shader used a weight of 0.33 the result is the same.

In the first example below the weight ratio 3/1/1 is used and this matches the second example using 0.6/0.2/0.2 because that is the normalized version of 3/1/1. Automatic normalization means you can adjust probability weighting with ease, if you want a shader to appear more often just increase the weight. If you want it to appear less often then decrease the weight. If you want some shaders to have an equal likelihood of appearing then use the same weight.


Shader Weights: 3 - 1 - 1	0.6 - 0.5 - 0.2

Color Jitter

Enabled

Toggles color randomization for each ID. When enabled, the source color is randomly offset per ID based on the hue, saturation, and value variation parameters.

Note, when objects share the same ID they receive the same randomization as demonstrated in the User Data example below.


Color Jitter: Disabled Input ID: Name ID	Enabled Name ID	Disabled User Data	Enabled User Data

Hue Variation Min & Max

Controls how far the hue can be offset from the source color's original hue in degrees along a color wheel. Positive values rotate the hue clockwise while negative values rotate the hue counterclockwise.

Higher ranges between the min and max result in a greater potential for hue variation, a value of 0 for both results in no change. In the examples below, note how there is more variation when the minimum value (red square) is farther from the maximum value (green circle). In the last example the min and max are animated across the entire hue offset range but they maintain the same 70 degree difference, this moves the source color across the entire color wheel but keeps the level of variation low and consistent.


⯁ Value Min: 0 to -180 ⬤ Value Max: 0 to +180	Value Min: 0 to -360 Value Max: 0 to +360	Value Min: -360 to +290 Value Max: -290 to +360

Saturation Variation Min & Max

Controls how far the saturation can be offset from the source color's original saturation level. Positive values make the color more saturated while negative values make it less saturated.

Higher ranges between the min and max result in a greater potential for variation, a value of 0 for both results in no change. In the example below, note how there is more variation when the minimum value (red square) is farther from the maximum value (green circle). It is expected behavior that previously greyscale values take on color if random saturation is increased.

⯁ Saturation Min: 0 to -1
⬤ Saturation Max: 0 to +1

Value Variation Min & Max

Controls how far the color value can be offset from the source color's original value. Positive values make the color brighter while negative values make it darker.

Higher ranges between the min and max result in a greater potential for value variation, a value of 0 for both results in no change. In the example below, note how there is more variation when the minimum value (red square) is farther from the maximum value (green circle).

⯁ Value Min: 0 to -1
⬤ Value Max: 0 to +1

Overview