Igors

Hi All It looks really interested. But let's activate a common sense: why, say, V-Ray, Turtle and others RT render leaders do not promise real-time RT tomorrow? :rolleyes: Apparently because this technique has some limitations as Ian wrote. It's absolute normal and it does not mean the technique is bad. So what are those limitations? How are they suitable for us? It would be helpful to know. "Just real-time" says nothing yet, it's only a beautiful dream.

Hello Brian No, only NL can release a new vers of any their plug-in(s). A general explanation is simple: unlike 6.5, versions 7 and 8 are UB and can run on Intel Mac. It can be a prob/bug in plug-in or host. In last case we'll confirm bug and fix it ASAP - but we need an info from Blair about what and how does not work. All plug-ins use same API and we could not know where is a prob in this concrete case. Note: if you can check it with EI7 PPC-CFM vers - please do, it's a helpful info for developer.

Hello Christian "Reflection/Blur" is a popular issue. With moving to Universal Binary the file path convention was changed by Apple, the symbol "/" is now a path separator and old files with such name could not be opened. Please rename it (for example into "Reflection_Blur") and re-save material.

Hello BJ Yeap, kinda :rolleyes: They are in "RT soft shadows" category thus require hundreds of rays per each calculation. It's essentially same in any 3D app. Their difference (from others soft shadows) is a real life illumination model, but it does not make them faster/slower. The "Use GI sampling engine" can help a bit. The best way to have more accurate bounced light is to have more photons. 800K is a very, very modest emission. For comparison: in other app a tutorial considers 3 variants of photon map: 32, 64 and 128 millions of photons respectively. Also it's not clear what kind of accuracy you need. More intensive bounced light can be done with larger "Energy Bias" values and/or "Customize" options. Note that for test purposes you can visualize bounced light only: - GI off - mode "Always Visible" - "Store Direct Light" off We see no reasons to use Light Objects in this scene. If there is no complex light shapes - no necessary to waste extra time to analyze polygons (that Light Object does). IMO a good move is to use appropriate "Block Distance" and count of rays.

Hi, Richard You did nothing wrong, it's an old nasty bug in texturing, not related with concrete shader/image.We see that one of texture's params is invalid and blocks further textures adding, but we don't know what steps/actions caused this. If you can reproduce how to get such situation - it would be very helpful. It's easy to avoid - just delete shader and apply it again, all will be fine.

Hi, Richard Same as automatically send the file to all slaves?:rolleyes: Now EI plugins/shaders cannot do this, need enough serious API improving. This feature request "has a long beard" (solid age) but new API is usable with new plugins only. Thus it's always obscured by other features that produce immediate effect. C'est la vie

Hola Juanxer Ei8 sales are for EITG, so please ask them about Tiger support. However, we're not sure it's "Mac OS version" problem. Here is much more chances it's PPC-specific problem/bug that does not appear on Intel Mac - or even a common/general bug. So anyway please post it in Bug Tracker with screenshots to show artifacts. We've Tiger to check.

Hi, Tomas, Atlantis23, All Using a single (longer) light is more practical, easier to control. Note that 3 lights illumination (with same intensities and sum square) is not equal to produced by a single one. -We set light's intensity 1.0 (was 0.4) it can be changed without re-baking. -Block Distance = 0.3, -Rays Count = 400. -Segment length = 0.1. -Our baking time is 7-8 minutes (Intel Xeon 2.66), database contains 600K points (18 Mb modest database) The considerations are very simple: a large image is planned to render, most probably several times (or many times). Thus it makes a sense to prepare a careful baked photon map because it can be done once. It's absolute possible that wanted result could be achieved with only 1 million of photons or less yet (instead of 5 millions we used). But baking is a single/once step, so we can be a bit wasteful :rolleyes: It's always helpful to see what's baked: turn GI off and set "Always Visible" light mode. With this settings it's very interested to "walk" inside baked room - just animate camera and render with few seconds per frame. You can use more or less photons as you want, anyway the main idea is: first create a draft illumination (baked photon map) for your taste/needs. The final GI illumination will essentially repeat a mimics of the draft one.

Hi again Our settings are slightly different :shy: Segment length is set to 0.1 We used 2 radii 0.05 and 0.1. Using second (bigger) one increases baking time and not absolute necessary. Just bounced photons are typically more disordered/scattered thus it makes a sense to average them in larger radius. We also used one Area Light (with Block Distance) instead of 3 - easier to control. Attachments (from left to right) - Setiing screenshot - Direct light only - Photon map - Final render

Hi, Atlantis23, All Few technical notes: - Area Light is NOT "an array of (radial) lights" (as, btw, old LightPlane shader did). Such approximation is acceptable to simulate environments but creates artifacts closer to the array. - Area Light and GI Sky Light use different calculation techniques but produced illuminations are essentially same. A window (where light comes from) can be considered as "a part of sky". Glad to see EI8 features in use :shy:

Hi, Bill If possible please post the image statistics/info 1) How AreaLight was made? Is it a set of luminance opbjects? 2) How many photons were emitted? Baked in database? Would be interested to see baked map render. 3) Rays counts for GI and Light 4) Render time and photon map time Thanks

Hi All Look at first attachment. Both terrains have same geometry. The difference is that left uses vertices normals, right one - bumped normals. Second attachment shows the trick. First "ResetNormals" shader turns all surfaces normals up. Next (top) bump map is same EXR image that used in plug-in with Bump Factor = Height (in plugin). This technique is not perfect because bump is a cheap/trick. Typically artifacts appear as black outlines at places where model/normal are mismatch. But it's simple and interested to experiment Good luck :rolleyes: ResetNormal(MacUB).zip

Hi, Bill, All We confirm: yes, it's a bug, the combimation: RT transmission + bump + "Use GI sampling engine" does not work properly. Need to render without "GI sampling" (slow)

Hi. Mickael, Gidayoda, All Not too much to add. Of course, we realize that all hardware resources should be used, it's our highest priority. But "what, when, details etc" - you'll know all it step by step when features come in beta (starting this spring). Before this any talk about features list (10 or 100 or any) gives nothing because they are not real things yet :shy: Thx for good words and understanding

Hi, Mark Probably this crash is produced by one of shaders. Try to move some shaders from "EI Shaders" into another location to know which shader crashes. Alternatively you can see CrashReport. The prob is that Variance Editor calls shader to render a small icon but not all third-party shaders "understand" this mode - they make assumptions it's either Camera or "Preview" in Animator (not a third one).

Hi, Bill Can't reproduce it, please post a sample prj (use Bugs Tracking)

Hello Buggsy Yes, a repository of EI materials here - we're talking about this. About your critique of EI texturing workflow - please create another thread and let's discuss there. Not all in one bag please :shy:

Hi, Mike 1) Please use beta4 (attached) where a major bug (reported by Brian White) is fixed. 2) Your EXR image has only 255 values (i.e. it's a copy of 8-bits image saved as EXR). You need first save 8-bits image as EXR and THEN blur it. In next builds we'll add image info/histogram to avoid such confusions 3) You're not first who tries to use EXR2Mesh in a role of "adaptive displacement:" :rolleyes: That is, of course, interested challenge, but, speaking technically, "height map" (EXR2Mesh) and "adaptive displacement" are different things/tasks. EWXR2Mesh_b4(MacUB).zip

Hi, Buggsy, All Beautiful idea, but "how"? We see: need to create "EI materials library" on this forum. Minimal functionality: - user should be able to see some material presets, (maybe with short comments) and have an ability to d/l material files. - author should be able to upload his materials, screenshots and comments into his personal section (maybe with help of admin, "auto" is not necessary - at least at first time). Igors' web knowledges are minimal (or less yet) so maybe our sentences sound naive a bit - no probs if so :rolleyes: Ideas, suggestions and propositions are welcome

Hola Diego, All Of course, thx for good words but let us note: this door was opened at least 2 years ago. Out team had no plans to create MDD plug, it happened "randomly". One serious user (he works in production) asked us about how he can use MDD in his prj. We asked him for model+MDD - he sent. We tried - it works. Then, of course, 2-3 weeks of polishing, creating UI, adding features etc - but it's normal and unavoidable for any product. The only one reason whу the plug was not created before = a full absence of "material" (MDD+model) to test - nothing more :rolleyes:

Hi, Alonzo About fundamental things (like your request). We don't plan to hide EI9 features from users. When any feature comes into beta-testing - it will be declared here, on this forum. But before this nothing will be promised nor dates said. It's much better to count/rely on facts, not on words.

Hola Diego Yes, with EI8 you need BlobMaker 2.3 (we posted this info on EITG forum before EI8 release). Please use attached plm file(s) BlobMaker2.3(Mac UB).plm.zip BlobMaker2.3(Windows).plm.zip

Hi, Juanxer, All We confirm: it's a bug, normals were broken. Please check the attached fix RPF_Saver1.0.1.zip

Note: we'll discuss Stephane's propositions inside developers team first.

Hola Juanxer Bug report + a small sample prj please, if it's a prob of shader it can be fixed soon. (Use Bug Tracking)