Thomo

Can anyone explain the benefit of the proxy plugin to me? How does it differ from copying objects/groups with display set to "none" and moving and rotating them etc.? Does it save on display memory only or does it also have a "magic trick" that reduces Camera render memory also. Sorry if this is a silly question but I'd really like to buy it if it makes a big difference. Thanks Greg

Hi, I'd love some tips on realistic car paint in EIAS if anyone has any please. I've tried various approaches but I'm finding the reflections to be too strong, or not strong enough, or too sharp or too dull / blurred /metallic. How should I try to get that metallic underlay with blurred specular highlights and then the polish with hard speculars on top? Any suggestions most welcome. I see some nice work in the gallery!! Much better than my attached file. Many thanks,

Cool, they look really nice. Sooo... what are your light sources? The question has been asked before. Are we sharing yet? This forum? :-)

Hi Vic, Nice job. Came up well in the end. Good improvements. One question; why is there no shadow under the sofa in the foreground? What was your lighting setup? That is, where are your lights? The floor tiles came up well, was that Tomas's glossy? Looking forward to some more great images. Thanks Greg

Hi Steven, I am not sure exactly what you are asking but..... Yes I do some post work in Photoshop. Using exposure and raising the gamma initially. I mostly render to a "beauty pass" and add chromatic abberation, ambient occlusion (an overlay from an EIAS output) and colour correction in Photoshop. Some other adjustments sometimes. As EIAS does not render floating point at this stage it is not a "true" solution to use LWF. I find that lighting is more responsive when rendering in gamma 2.2 within EIAS using LWF. Not sure if this really answers your question but hope it helps. Thanks.

Hi, Happy New Year to all! I can't seem to get email notifications going for this forum so sorry for any delayed responses. Seems to have been a problem for a while!? Anyway. Tomas's responses are spot on in my opinion. The new texture filter shader is the way to go for linear work flow, ie working in Gamma 2.2. (it's also great for other things too!) I apply it to every texture (cut and paste) with the appropriate settings. I put it first in the list of textures of any material and it affects all textures below it. (Modify RGB, power R2.2 G2.2 B.22). So in answer to your question Vic, no I don't "strip" the gamma from textures in PS. The texture filter in EIAS V9 does it with ease. In V8, well yes you would have to adjust all your textures in PS or some other. The reason I find gamma 2.2 so useful is especially interior (and exterior most times) scenes such as yours is the adjustment of lights. Every light adjustment becomes much more predictable. Otherwise "fill" lights are needed everywhere. Which in my opinion forfeits the realism you questioned firstly. Light drop-offs etc. become "seeable" with each adjustment.

A couple more links I can find right now. Feeling like a bit of a nerd working the weekend before Christmas now. Hope some of this helps, Cheers http://vimeo.com/8119194 http://3d.about.com/od/Creating-3D-The-CG-Pipeline/tp/8-Tips-To-Increase-Realism-In-Your-Renders.htm

Forgot to add. Copying photos is great practice. I find a lot of Arch Vis work is observation of the real world and in your case real photos. Cheers,

Hi Vic, Some quick points on some very good responses already. I agree with Richard, this type of post is great for everyone. Nice rendering and good improvements from good suggestions. My little bit of input would be; -GI Glossy for "blurred reflections", Tomas always has the right answer! It's a great add to V9 and quick and controllable. -Are you using Photons for lights? If not, I strongly suggest you do. Fast, good looking and very flexible for lighting setups. - Lighting setups; quadraric drop-off with lights, customise tab in properties, both great and easy to use once you get the hang of it. - Modelling; round or bevel edges and vertexes in all elements. Specular highlights (sometimes very subtle) make good in roads towards photo realistic final images. - Specular and Normal or Bump maps with textures are important. These are all subtle effects but I find lots of subtlety adds up to a more photographic result. I use "CrazyBump" at the moment (there are others) to generate spec, normal, displace maps from your texture maps. Free to use. - The "I Store" in your image looks like it has an interior with a mapped plane, the perspective looks wrong, maybe it is a reflection over the top but within EIAS, adding polygons as models is not a render time problem I find. Especially the ability with V9 to download or buy pre-modelled and textured .obj files to add in. - Fresnel reflections with glass add more subtle realism I find. - HDRI, especially with the new sIBL with V9, can be a great way to light a scene to start with. Then add special lights for interior lighting (with photons). -As previously mentioned post process can add realism. Personally I use colour correction, blur, noise, chromatic abberation, vignetting and depth of field (DOF. The layer shader in EIAS seems really good, I personally haven't figured out how to use it for me, the manual is perhaps confusing me, I'm sure I'm just missing something) there are other ways if you Google it. - Ambient Occlusion I still use (some would argue) http://forums.cgsociety.org/archive/index.php/t-461334.html -Gamma 2.2, Linear workflow (LWF). To me this is critical for Arch Vis. (some will argue). EIAS doesn't output full floating point yet but the workflow is still very relevant. NB: The new texture filter shader in V9 makes this process very easy (regarding "stripping" gamma from textures "on the fly"). This link is ok, I had a great one I can't find right now, maybe post later. http://www.ronenbekerman.com/linear-workflow-made-simple/ -All of these are very subtle effects which add up! - My final suggestion would be to set up a scene with simple primitive objects first. Get your lights working and then add detailed models. This method I find very, very useful. I hope some of this is as useful as the previous posts, good luck with your best render ever. Its all practice. I actually never knew this part of the forum existed. Doh! Great thing to have. Merry Christmas,

Thanks Michael, It was actually your discussions relating to animated walkthroughs that triggered my question. The texture filter shader is a great way to "edit" textures on the fly and since we are working in a 2.2 gamma linear work flow it is very useful to "strip" the gamma from the textures rather than having a separate, second set of textures. I'll keep experimenting on render time hits and post some results later. Thanks again, Greg

Hi, I am using the new texture filter shader quite a bit and I am wondering if this has a significant impact on render times. Currently I am doing some architectural camera animations and have read some previous posts regarding the memory / render time hit that is incurred using shaders. Would I be better of editing my texture maps in Photoshop and avoiding texture filter? Texture filter is a great addition to EIAS, particularly in my case for work flow. Thanks for any input. Greg

Apologies, I misread some of the previous posts re. quick look.

Quick look, that works well. Mac and works also when replacing, etc textures in EIAS. I think it is Leopard upwards though. Can zoom as well. It's great for all digital camera info as well. Can get focal length etc from most cameras. http://www.macosxtips.co.uk/index_files/make-the-most-of-quick-look.php Just a thought. However, can check the "compute preview image" tab when placing textures in EIAS.

Yes I'm going to try that for sure. Never knew you could with UV's too. Thanks a lot!

Ok Tomas, Thanks.

I'm happy with EIAS as the tool of choice. I have and continue to kick around in the playground with good, temperamental programs. My point is the that Camera 9 can and Camera 8 can't. But been able to, on almost bragging rights for a long time now. I'm confident that EIAS 9 will be another step forward, but crikey! can I get some 3D grass and cars rendered yet? Camrea 9 can do it. Just too long now. Sorry Tomas, you're Good.

It's been a while and there is no doubt it is a task that is arduous. To release EIAS 9. But I keep seeing posts that Camera 9 can handle the renders that Camera 8 can't. Seems to me that this is true. Is it possible that we can use Camera 9 with Renderama and get some of these big renders done? I can't render the size of files I need to because Camera 8 can't do it. No matter how many modern processors I use. Camera 9 can be used, as said in other posts and has been done. It is true if I had Camera 9 now I could render what I need to render? The full release of EIAS 9 is being delayed for perfection and that is great, but it has been a while and time is moving on. To mention the competition now for high end renders that is getting difficult to compete with. How long do we wait? I hope this post is perceived in the light it is intended. Thanks

Hi Tomas, Thanks for that. I had read about this technique and will try it. What about the darkness of the backdrop and reflections? Am I missing something. Should I be doing something to the HDRI before I use it or is there some setting I adjust?

Hi, I have followed the very useful tutorials for HDRI lighting. I am a little confused as to how to treat the rotoscope, refection and refraction. When I use the hdri map, the background and reflections are very dark. The lighting works fine. Should I be converting these back to 16bit in photoshop for backdrop and refections? Should I just use the maps for IBL or also add other lights. Very new to this but I am getting some good results. Many thanks, Greg

Hi Tomas, Sorry for not posting, I've been in transit for a couple of days. All cameras do have 2GB assigned. I am having trouble with most of my renders over renderama now. What I don't understand is why some strips (one or two) will not render, (sometimes they do after maybe 48-72 hrs) but all the other strips in the still image will render in a matter of moments with no problems. I will need to send a couple of renders to you if that is ok. Some clients are getting pretty anxious now and I really need to get these rendered. Let me know if this is still ok and i'll speak tomorrow and arrange to send the files. Thanks again. Thomo

It does not work at 40 rays with AA turned on. Local mode is the same problem. One strip only. Same strip every time (I've tried many different numbers of strips). Same strip on all slaves. 100 rays with no AA works fine. Any help, thanks. Been at this for 2 days now !! :-(

Hi Tomas, Ok that works fine now. So what is the likely cause? Strange just one strip will not render. Just about to try with AA on at 40 rays now.

Ok I'll try that. I am not using secondary rays, way too slow. Using a separate light as secondary GI. I was using 200 primary rays and 0 secondary. I'll switch back to 40 and turn off Anti Alias. Thanks again and I'll let you know how I go.

Yes it renders ok. What should I do?

Hi, This is a new one to me as I have had most renderama error messages in the past. All were fixable thanks to this forum but this is a new one. Renderama hangs on one strip and will not render it. I am rendering a still image. I have tried dividing into all different numbers of strips, same thing. It will render the same image at low res. 960, but when I go to 3600 it hangs. No error messages of any sort. Rendering over 64 bit PC's and Mac. Has anyone seen this before? Thanks