What is your vision of future rendering engine?

[jonathlee]

As Kray 3.0 development is still in progress. I wonder what is your own vision of future render software.

As some user here have experienced with other render software (e.g. Vray, Octane, Maxwell and etc), I wonder what really end users dreamed to have in their workflow besides rendering speed.

• OCL Hybrid Render Engine
• Better control of background environment
• Easier material management and sharing
• Download / upload / improve customizable presets
• Network Rendering / Cloud rendering
• Mobile monitor-able rendering management?

[Janusz Biela]

• OCL Hybrid Render Engine

Yes only this is future - are too many limits with only GPU rendering.
Actually I read a bit about this, if somebody is Interested:

- problem with sharing GPU memory , so if You have two GFX first has 2 Giga second 4 giga then visible will be only 2 Giga from the first (of course speed will be double because two cards)....so must be hybrid system CPU/GPU to avoid it.

- in new GFX cards You have over 2000 CUDA cores (!). You calculate in the same time by 2000 threats ...but is one problem: the amount of data for calculating must be small (exactly perfect for that is Path Tracing code , which is easy to write and very light). Bigger procedures needs more amount of data to calculate - and then starts problems with speed because in some cases increasing amount of cores will bring slower calculations. The same as with intel CPU - the maximum and profitable in the same time amount of virtual cores is 1 . So we have one physical and one virtual. I read: increasing virtual cores (In CPU) will bring slow calculation

- why we have maximum one virtual core....because block of date to execute and calculate are too big and too complicate to calculate. Why must be Hybrid, because in some cases CPU is better then GPU for example calculate of Motion Blur , AA or reflection blur)

- in Octane for example render with full Path Tracing 5 bounce light (this is only MINIMUM to get good renders) take "years" ...even with two High class GFX cards. Why when You see interiors renders from Octane (or similar engines ) they looks quite artificially because to avoid problem with time render they use Direct Light system + OCC (so is not Pure Path Tracing)

- there is also problem with speed - is not that fast as everybody imagine . the first seconds/minutes of render are really fast (Is special trick in code for that to see something, kind of interpolated pixels) but real render comes after many minutes (depends from GFX card) and to see clean render You must wait 2-5 hours....

- unbiased engine renders are fast in basic scenes because is almost nothing to calculate! (for example cars or studio) There is nothing to render: basic models shadows (is not that important amount of polygones), one source of light, OCC . The real render comes in complicate scenes when photons must be calculated in dark corners (for example interiors) with many objects inside. So testing Octane with basic scenes and one source of light is completely nonsense and more nonsense with Direct Light and OCC.

- Unbiased renders engines are very easy to write (everybody can start ) But problems stars when You will try add complicated materials: glass, SSS, reflection blur, Motion blur, DoF , displacement , nodes ,etc

- there are problems also with "hot pixels" randomly especially with reflection/blured surfaces You can notice very bright pixels. This is normal in that kind of engines renders. There are some special modules to reduce it. This coming from not perfect accurate calculations (sic! in Path Tracing even...) ...and this is really big problem

- lags in system during render - in demo Octane for example I could not do anything in system! (firefox, watching video, skype ...even move windows are difficult) - maybe I did something wrong...but lags was very big.

- to render smoothly with Octane for example You need minimum two Titanium GFX card with 6 Giga GPU RAM (each ~ 1000 Euro) and a lot of electricity, one card consume up to 300W! and still You are limited to 6 Giga GPU RAM

If I mistook something or write wrongly please correct me. I can be wrong in some details.

[jonathlee]

As memory management is an issue for GPU + CPU renderer. As the software need to analyze the data then organize which part send to GPU and which part send to CPU. In this case then stand alone software is needed. As Lightwave itself still haven't includ GPU into it package.

Would Photon calculation still affect transparent and translucent surface such as glass, curtains, and etc?

[Janusz Biela]

As memory management is an issue for GPU + CPU renderer. As the software need to analyze the data then organize which part send to GPU and which part send to CPU. In this case then stand alone software is needed.

Yes the biggest problem is with management which part is calculate by CPU and which by GPU. Also problem is with transfer of big block of data. But I do not think so is that hard to do - of course need a lot of data code and the most important: an IDEA.

As Lightwave itself still haven't includ GPU into it package.

Lightwave is not for me "tiger of coding" , it has the worst engine render ever!
And one "small" guy wrote Kray which beats LW in many points. In so many years they did nothing with the most important part of software...

Would Photon calculation still affect transparent and translucent surface such as glass, curtains, and etc?

Refine Your question, please

[jonathlee]

Lightwave is not for me "tiger of coding" , it has the worst engine render ever!
And one "small" guy wrote Kray which beats LW in many points. In so many years they did nothing with the most important part of software...

Totally agree with this


Will photon be blocked by transparent polygon like window glass, curtain, and etc? Since photon calculation sometime mislead by transparent surface or single sided polygon.

[jburford]

For me, would be more integration with other 3D Packages, something like how vRay is.

Am really wanting Cinema 4D support as well as Lightwaves.

[jonathlee]

For me, would be more integration with other 3D Packages, something like how vRay is.

Am really wanting Cinema 4D support as well as Lightwaves.

Hi jburford, Integration with other 3D packages is a definite. However as resources are limited in Kray Development team. Kray 3.0 SDK development has been updated in front of the website > http://www.kraytracing.com/wiki/Kray3_SDK

It would be great if you can get someone who familiar with creating plugins or integration with Cinema 4D to contact Gregorz or Jure would be highly recommended. May be you could create a thread in Cinema 4D forums regarding on the Kray 3.0 SDK availability.

[Janusz Biela]

Will photon be blocked by transparent polygon like window glass, curtain, and etc? Since photon calculation sometime mislead by transparent surface or single sided polygon.

Ok I know what You mean. I think I know where is problem:
- there is nothing to do , if You have transparency then You lose Power from Photons (50% transparency means 50% losing of power of photons coming through glass). But "problem" is with holes where are windows - then small they are then more problems coming by this. So there is minimum two solutions for that:
1. Use Skyportals to "fix" photons
2. Move to separate layer windows glass and turn OFF flags with shadows + raytracing mode.

Actually I do not see any problems with glass. If is something wrong then post render please.