I thought it a bit time consuming that the smart materials didn't have an option that directly connects to the installed alpha, strips and stencil extensions in the "condition mask" or "edge scattering" and mask field as a quick selection perhaps be clicking a small arrow or next button to cycle through the possibilities rather than having to open and load a texture. A small icon showing the alpha, stencil or strips would help as you cycle through them.
I also mentioned in this thread title, the possibility of selecting a common animation style. This could be plasma, pulsing/flashing, scrolling up, scrolling down, left/right etc and or combos of pulsing and scrolling and this could be assigned to a texture in the smart materials or perhaps just apply it to the whole smart material.. This is also related to my other post about animating material properties http://3dcoat.com/forum/index.php?/topic/21323-animated-materials-for-each-layer/#comment-147512