Everything about the MixRGB Node - Getting Started with Blender Nodes

[@Erindale]

Are there any other nodes you want to see me do a deep dive into? Let me know!

[@qubitx64]

I would love to see a deep dive of the math node.

[@melonisferco]

I'd love some displacement one. Just for curiosity. Do you have materials to sell on Gumroad or something like that? Because I saw that Timber procedural material you made and it's INSANE! I'm asking because I've looked for realistic procedural materials, and I don't think that there isn't any tutorial to achieve the level of detail that you can achieve on your materials. I think a lot of people could beneffit from that! You can even create a series making procedural realistic materials.

[@Erindale]

@@melonisferco I've got a few bits and pieces I need to put up on my Gumroad! Just waiting for a free minute! A proper series of realistic 100% procedural materials is being planned - But Timber was over 300 nodes so I want to just cover the basics before I drop people into things like that!

[@melonisferco]

@@Erindale yes, It totally makes sense to first finish the basics. You are very skilled and very good at explaining. Keep It going!!

[@4dshrey]

math node and implication, not too deep but it will be good just to clear the basic functions like (add, subtract, divide ,greater than, smaller than, maximum and minimum)

[@dimitridehouck9506]

Oh God! This is exactly what I was looking for! This was EXTREMELY well explained! This is the stuff no other channel talks about because it isn't flashy enough. But it's pretty essential! Thank you so much for this!

[@Erindale]

Being able to harness mixRGB nodes in shaders is insanely powerful! I use them so frequently but a lot of people get put off by the slightly enigmatic names... Glad this is useful content!

[@kythi3530]

You're the only one to give us this kind of information that couldn't be found elsewhere. Respect.

[@Erindale]

Thanks! It's been a bit of a trial sometimes to learn it without having access to paid courses so I just want to get it out there and accessible!

[@kythi3530]

@@Erindale You're welcome. By the way, do other design softwares use those same equations? (e.g., Photoshop, Illustrator, and After Effects)

[@Erindale]

@@kythi3530 yeah these are fairly universal for blend modes. From my experience Krita has the most blend modes and the documentation is good too. PixImperfect has a great video on photoshop's blend modes but from the point of view of 2D.

[@kythi3530]

@@Erindale Got it, thanks for the info.

[@vstreet7583]

Once again. Absolutely BRILLIANT! It all makes sense now. Such a clear, concise, understandable explanation of the MixRBB node. The visual example is so helpful. Really looking forward to viewing your next tutorials and watching your subscriber numbers grow. Thoroughly enjoyable. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge. THANK YOU! Dg

[@PurzBeats]

So well explained, thank you, I've always just used these modes based on what I 'felt' they were doing because the math seemed too complex!

[@Erindale]

Thanks! The maths isn't really necessary but it's worth knowing the limits of stuff. Intuition is the way forward!

[@MumTheWeiser]

@@Erindale having the math and the visuals explained so clearly make the intuition sooooooooo much stronger

[@melonisferco]

Very well explained Erin. I always used to just cycle between MixRGB options and choose whichever looked better, lol. Now I know what to expect from each option. Thanks!!

[@Erindale]

I was exactly the same! As soon as I took the time to really understand it though it because one of my favourite nodes!

[@MarkBTomlinson]

Fantastic to see the Maths behind the modes. I have used many for years, in various programs, but never thought much about the relationship between the inputs. Very helpful thank you Erin.

[@Erindale]

Thanks! I’d always used them just by eye but, especially when using with displacement, knowing how they really work can be a boon!

[@deltaray3]

they should show this video in high school algebra classes

[@fertuffo1187]

You made my dream come true! Thanks a lot! Finally someone explained what hides behind those modes

[@Erindale]

No worries! Glad it's been useful!

[@activemotionpictures]

8:41 - mind blown. Amazing trick!

[@Erindale]

I'm glad! These nodes are so underused!

[@Miminaptime]

So informative and the voice sooth my anxiety during blender learning

[@pitched7401]

Awesome explanation, something i like to come back from time to time! Little note, that HSV is not how the human eye sees the color. It is a direct conversion to the RGB color model. Hue is the angle on the color wheel (Normalized 0 = 0° and 1 = 360°) Saturation is amount, that the opposite color of the secondary value influences or rather doesn't influence the color. Representing RGB on the color wheel, decreasing Saturation moves the point closer into the white center. One value will always be equal to the Lightness and with a fully saturated color you have another value always at 0. With (normalized) RGB = {0.50, 0.323, 0.00} you have a fully saturated color in the red spectrum. Decreasing Saturation now from 1.0 to 0.5, your RGB is now {0.50, 0.412, 0.250}. See how the secondary color (green in that case gets lower, while blue gets higher, leaving red untouched) Value/Lightness is just the multiplier for the color values. I think you meant YCbCr, which uses two chromatic values and a Luminance to define precieved colors and brightnesses. The formula for this is not intuitive.

[@Cpt.Zenobia]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the formula 1-((1-a)/b) for color burn is undefined when b is black. In the src material.c, the general case for color burning color1 is color1=(1-fac)+(fac*color2); 0 or 1 otherwise. Very good video, thanks.

[@rbettsx]

Brilliant visualisation. Should inspire people (like me) to make visualisations of their own to get their head around things. Couple of notes: RGB not exactly equivalent to XYZ in nodes. It's a gotcha which has cropped up on Blender SE a couple of times recently: If you're casting from XYZ Vector to scalar, that's a simple mean of the components. If you're casting from Color to scalar, it uses relative Luminance, like a RGB > BW node, which can shear the response, if you attempt to do color mix operations on more than one dimension simultaneously. BTW 'Screen' so called because it's the same process as would be used to shoot a photographic half-tones through a screen with transparent dots: (from positive) invert, multiply (light through both) , invert back.

[@Erindale]

Yeah you're right to mention the scalar conversions! RGB and XYZ can handle vector streams interchangeably without altering the data though! I had no idea that's where the screen name comes from! That's really interesting to know thank you!

[@SunsetRacer]

I would love to see these nodes used in procedural buildings with Geometry nodes :) Thank you very much for these precious infos!

[@qubitx64]

I never understood what these modes did i am very glad you did this very great explanation of them and the way you did it was amazingly easy to understand . Thanks alot 😍

[@Erindale]

That's really good to hear! Thank you!

[@CDArena]

Nice! This is very valuable information, but you really have to dig into the blender docs sometimes to get a clear picture. I think we could benefit from a Part 2, with Common Use Examples broken out much like you did at the end for each mode. (Focusing on each mode in a real-world example). Watching your other videos I sort of get the concepts, but when trying to remember the nodes I have to search through them to find it again.

[@Erindale]

Yeah good point! It definitely takes some time to get used to which one and when. I find myself mainly keeping to just mix (masking), linear light (combining noise), add (height maps), dodge, burn (controlling gradients), difference (masking changes to height maps) and soft light (rounding out 0-1 gradients). I'd say they're they key ones in my experience! Dodge and burn could be replaced with map range and difference with math-compare but sometimes it's more effort to abstract things to numbers!

[@yusrighouse]

ah. I stumbled here by accident. I see you're one of those legendary procedural wizards. I shall watch this channel with great interest. Perhaps my dumb brain can learn something.

[@Erindale]

Nodes are a lifestyle choice

[@onnonn9690]

love that tone❤❤❤

[@petebateman143]

Outstanding, as usual.

[@UCaPxueORqDShy1qZ5vb]

Thanks for this tutorial sir love 💓 from India 🇮🇳 😇😊keep doing great work glad to have u sir

[@Erindale]

You're very welcome my friend!

[@MrJana596]

Brilliant explanation of the node. However, I need to understand when and in what situations to use these blend types of the Mix RGB node. Can you explain with examples in another video? Thanks

[@BergOne75]

Thanks ... Coming ftom photoshop I really couldn't make sense of the light modes in Blender. This made it a lot clearer.

[@Erindale]

I'm glad it's useful! The maths should be the same but the way we use them with 2D work is definitely very different!

[@BergOne75]

@@Erindale I never seen the blending modes as math, more as this changes my imagine in this way. So this is ground breaking to me.

[@ericfieldman]

Doubtful you see this, but this was something I never wanted to put the time into trying to figure out myself, and I could never find a clear explanation beyond the artsy "this one makes colors look this way", but now even if I don't remember all the stuff I have a much clearer picture. Thanks!

[@Erindale]

I see all things 😁 really glad to hear this has been useful! A lot of the time it does come down to just making it “look right” but important to also recognise there’s maths in here behaving predictably

[@ericfieldman]

@Erindale hundred percent! When I draw stuff and have to think of what colors to use, there is always some pseudo mathematic logic behind it that I follow, like what general HSV relations to stick within for stuff to look right, making shaded skin redder cause of SSS, etc. Feel like I can't relax until I know why any given thing does what it does. I've been really confused about the node system and a bit attention deficit about researching it, but I'm rewatching your old videos, and I think I'm starting to get it. Definitely at least seeing the value to understanding the stuff. The procedural quilt thing was like magic to me!

[@kadirsugar7894]

Your videos are awesome

[@Erindale]

Thanks so much!

[@pixunPL]

Great tut! Very useful.

[@Erindale]

Thank you!

[@ParadoxTorque]

Very informative. Thank you!

[@Erindale]

Thanks!

[@ThadeousM]

I like the points in these videos where he says basically. That's my time to shine right thur😄 But honestly this is such a useful tool - I'm gonna send it to my photography and 2d gfx friends as this infos universal

[@MumTheWeiser]

Between the math and the visuals - another great one. the way you explain things makes my mind explode with possibilities. and listening to you talk is very soothing. can't wait for the next one

[@Erindale]

Thank you so much! I'm glad it's making sense!

[@Nyubug]

Looking around in the sprite fright blend files It appears Overlay is used to add detail, Soft Light seems to be used quite often to add color variation based on random values, and Linear Light is used to distort texture coordinates while keeping the overall shape. I think its funny because Overlay, Linear Light and Soft Light are the three operations i least understand but seem to be the most used.

[@Erindale]

All three will darken if lower than 0.5 and lighten if greater than 0.5 so allows for a good amount of control with relatively little artist input. They're not the most optimal mathematically but once you know what effect they give, you can do a lot with them.

[@michaelbendavid777]

thanks for the tutorial!

[@Erindale]

You're welcome! Thanks for watching!

[@CanalDoAP-k6e]

Very good! Thanks

[@menso3852]

I can't get my head around overlay. How come multiply (which darkens) is used when b is above .5. I thought brighter colors got made brighter and vice versa with overlay?

[@swagatabhattacharyya204]

Thanks for the tutorial.

[@Erindale]

You're very welcome!

[@razeezar]

Fantastic content as always Erindale - It's handy to return to slightly earlier videos such as one as a useful reference. I couldn't see anyone mention it in the comments here - Since at least Blender 2.92, the RGB and HSV values now coupled 0 to1 linearly. By comparing versions 2.90 (before the change) and 3.0, The RGB value takes precedence - Setting a grey of RGB values 0.5/0.5/0.5 on either version gives V = 0.735 for 2.90, and V = 0.5 in 3.0... For either version, it is the same grey of value 188/188/188 (using the 8-Bit RGB map in an exterior paint software's eyedropper tool as a reference). In any case, it seems like a fairly arbitrary change but one that's good to be aware of (I wasn't, until today!)

[@Erindale]

Yeah good point! It definitely makes it easier for us to use the values directly

[@chamarasilva7700]

Hi, does anyone know the underline math in 'mix' option? I thought it is just multiplication but there is a 'multiply' option separately.

[@Erindale]

A + fac(B-A) Just a standard linear interpolation formula

[@davidmcsween]

Wow, that was really informative! It would have been nice to see an array of each node next to their results... ;-)

[@Erindale]

Ah yeah that would have been a great idea! I will keep it in mind if I do more of these node deep-dive videos! Thanks!

[@Erindale]

The *mix* mode is just interpolating between the two sockets linearly. So it will be something along the lines of (a + (b-a)(Fac)). Essentially saying the first socket add some amount of the distance between the first and second socket!

[@Erindale]

@Captain Reason It will be slightly more complex because there are so many more values contained within a shader but the interpolation method will be the same!

[@Erindale]

Ah thank you! I totally understand CGs position because he’ll get 20k views in the first few hours but for me it’s getting to have interactions that makes it worthwhile and motivates me!

[@rsher_digital-art]

Great work...thanks

[@Erindale]

Thanks Richard!

[@lukayz1363]

thank you!

[@timwallace6486]

I am having difficulty understanding the clamp function. I understand what it does but I don't understand what quantity it is clamping. If you are mixing 2 images in the default mix mode. What are you limiting? Is it volts, miles, or some other magical characteristic? According to your tutorial, the output port is yellow indicating it is a combination of 3 pieces of information but they have to be measured in some standard or reference. An RGB is not a reference. You can't have 1-RGb or .5 RGB. I have searched the internet and there are many tutorials explaining the clamp function but none explain what I am clamping. Is it luminance, saturation, contrast? It has to be a measurable quantity, I'm just not sure what. Please clarify. Thanks

[@Erindale]

It will simply clamp the values to the 0..1 range. If you're outputting an RGB vector like (0.8, 1.2, -0.3), turning on clamp will clamp that vector to (0.8, 1.0, 0.0). Don't look at RGB as a single block. When we're dealing with shaders and proceduralism at large, it's simply a vec3. RGB or XYZ is immaterial.

[@muhammadshahzaibanwar9302]

hi, can you tell me where to look for to know the mathematical relations on which various nodes are designed as you are mentioning in your video, i could not find these formulas in the blender docs. if anyone can let me know it would be a huge help.

[@Erindale]

They're standard maths for blend modes which are the same in Photoshop, Krita, Gimp etc. Krita documentation has more info I think and otherwise just finding the Wikipedia page for each blend mode 👍 You could also look at the Blender source code on GitHub

[@aranyak1881]

This is super informative, albeit a little complicated but nonetheless really helpful, thanks!

[@Erindale]

Thanks so much! Glad there's something in it

[@gameginger5529]

the most important node in blender history

[@Erindale]

Yes! Seriously underused!

[@menso3852]

Nice vids. i've been consuming this one gradually over the last few days. How do you make the scale (thing with lines for whatever x is) behind your demo plane? All i can think of is lots of seperate XYZ, compare and mix nodes coming out of the texture coordinates, one for each line. I'm guessing there is a nicer way. Can you point me to some decent resources on this?

[@menso3852]

don't worry about it, found it on your randomness and tiling video

[@atifmohammed1903]

Holy shit, I dont comment on KZbin, but man this video was so informative and was conveyed the best of information

[@Erindale]

Thanks so much! That means a lot!

[@hugoantunesartwithblender]

Really usefull, thanks ;)

[@Erindale]

Thank you! I'm glad!

[@Great.Milenko]

NICE, but very mathsy. would be nice to have a visual breakdown of this with say, two white overlapping circles on an otherwise black plane kinda like a Venn diagram. to better show how the mixing is done. other than that this was super useful , thanks a bunch!

[@Erindale]

The blend modes are actually just standard across graphics software so maybe check out PixImperfect's video on Photoshop blend modes where he goes through much more visually

[@drendelous]

more such videos im begging you

[@Erindale]

They're in the works!

[@bocingaming5298]

*Erindale* I looking for your next video

[@Erindale]

Thank you!

[@lmwald]

Fantastic. How do you know all the formulas. Are you the engineer?

[@Erindale]

I'm not involved in th development but there are pages in the documentation as well as looking at the actual source code where you can find the formulae. These blend modes are fairly standard across image editing software as well

[@dafff08]

2 years later and the blender wiki still doesnt even cover half of the video. tbh, this video should be linked in the wiki.

[@colouredpages]

This was too fast... simply flow of words....even when i slowed it down...humbly..!

[@Erindale]

They can take a bit of pausing and coming back to and testing things for it to sink in! Apologies for the fast pace!

[@Nyubug]

My brain.

[@PeteDraperVFX]

Great content, however please don’t edit the audio so much as to trim out any dead space as it’s more difficult to follow as it sounds like you’re saying everything in a single breath without any pauses!! Let the video be as long as it needs to to be informative, even if it’s over an hour. The content is good, people will watch no matter how long it is; you’re not limited by time on KZbin so trim, yes, but let it be natural like you’re reading. I feel like I’m trying to force a breath when watching 😜

[@Erindale]

Thanks for the feedback! I'll try and script them slightly more. So far I've just said whatever comes to mind so I end up over editing! I'll go easy on the next one, thanks again!

[@PeteDraperVFX]

Erindale no problem. The best way I found is just let the info flow out, even turning off your brain / mouth filter so you’re not second guessing yourself when you’re talking. If I realised I was ever talking shite I’d make a loud sound in the mic so there was a waveform peak in the edit, then just redo from the last point without stopping recording... keeps it free flowing. Additionally, I also used to work off two systems - one with the final scene I was building and one with the completed scene I was referring to (which was also a rebuild of the original scene so it was fresh in my head) as to ensure that what I was talking about was at the forefront of my brain. As someone who used to have a slight speech impediment, I used to slur, ummm and errr a lot when I was second guessing myself but over time I realised to just let the info flow out and it’s a lot easier. Public speaking is now a lot easier and I enjoy lecturing on the work and processes unlike before. Keep the conversation natural; scripting isn’t necessary, just a few bullet points for yourself. When I’m presenting, the captions on screen are primarily for me to flow the conversation and so I can see what the next slide is going to be so it seems natural and tried and tested. Above all, don’t feel the need to heavily edit the audio; a lot of people do for some bizarre reason, possibly because they’re under the impression that people have a short attention span and may turn off. That might be true for some demographics, but yours is one where people will sit and absorb, no matter how long it takes. Ps it also means less editing time :)

[@vickryfadillah]

Still don't get it

[@Erindale]

Best to just use it and learn when it does what you need

[@StevenYen]

not gonna lie I have no idea what's going on 😅 I hope that I'll be able to understand slowly as I continue learning

[@Erindale]

Haha it's something that you might come back to once or twice for reference. A lot of people just scroll through to find what looks about right but it can really help to understand what's actually happening so you can just use what you need

[@lb2571]

That what i need about infomation. But your voice so hard to listen and quick.

[@bensoontm5244]

I dont understand anything at all... xd

[@mahmooda559]

Your taking to fast

[@Erindale]

My more recent videos are a bit slower

[@ronaldvenegas7802]

Very fast not good

[@Erindale]

You can adjust playback speed with the settings button in the player