I know you already got Vue 5, but I promised I would try to get a sample of lighting options in Vue 5 applied to Poser characters, so here it goes...

The problem with Radiosity from what I've seen here is sort of what I suspected- it ads TOO MUCH detail for a female character. The skin looks a little blotchy. But it IS the most realistic looking lighting-wise. I can't wait to get my own copy (tomarrow hopefully) and try other mixes. Probably more of a mix of Radiosity 50% and GI 50%, if that's possible. The human skull renders (in Lightwave) look great with Radiosity because you get all the bone textures. The other thing I want to try is what Vue calls "post-processing" effects. It sounds like you might be able to correct some washed-out effects, or overly dark renders, by adjusting the Post Processing. --will have to wait and see I guess.

There is also the fact that I did not spend the same amount of time I would on a normal picture. I was just trying to get a good result without spending too much time tweaking to get something perfect :) The post processing is a great addition - it allows you to alter the color balance (HSV) and gamma for example. If you are looking for it, check out the properties of the camera. It is a little tricky to find at first :)

Thanks much Agiel, this is exactly the kind of test I wanted and the last image, is exactly the kind of result I was looking for ;-) I too have found that adding some sunlight detracts from the "purity" of radiosity lighting - but hey, we're not scientists, we're artists and as such we are allowed to break every rule that we want! ;-) So you say in the last picture you gave 30 % ambiance? This must mean 70% sunlight, but judging form what I see I would say the opposite (30% sunlight and 70% ambience), are you sure?

I meant I set the slider to 30% (with 0% being full ambient and 100% full sunlight). Glad you liked the test :)

"The problem with Radiosity from what I've seen here is sort of what I suspected- it ads TOO MUCH detail for a female character. The skin looks a little blotchy."

The "blotchy" renders you get when using radiosity more than likely comes from artifacting, due to low settings. I have no idea how much control Vue gives you over the radiosity solution, but in other programs, when using radiosity in a scene with lots of crisp corners and/or edges, this is where the artifacts will show up the most, but not necessarily the ONLY places. Usually, this can be solved by increasing the sampling values, but again... I don't know how Vue handles radiosity parameters. I'm assuming Vue takes most of the control away from the user, because setting up a complex scene for radiosity can have a steep learning curve in and of itself. Perhaps the Pro version will give the user more control over the various parameters of radiosity (more than just a 0%-100% slider) like "recursion limit", "error bounds" and "sampling" to improve renders even further, and get rid of artifacting. However, I doubt the Esprit version will see such control. Message edited on: 10/05/2004 23:11

Vue 5 has a combination of a few parameters to play with. The most important one is the Quality Boost (0 is default, + 4 is maximum and - 4 minimum). It controls how fine the sampling is and results in higher quality (and rendering time too). There are also a couple of Ligh Gain controls, that allow you to amplify the overall intensity of the light. Finally, you have the Ambient vs Sunlight control, which allows you to control the influence of ambient light in your scene. The right combination of these parameters depend on your scele (close up portrait or large scale landscapes will require different settings).

That's not too bad then. Still, there's a lot that seems left out, but might show up in the Pro version. For instance, "refine iterations", "filtering", "exposure control", "rays per sample", "regathering", etc. Does Vue 5 allow you to pre-render the radiosity calc, then re-use the result (for speeding up test renders, etc?)

Agiel, did you remove the spot/pointlight in the HDRI one. With HDRI in Carrara 3 you can light the scene with the HDRI file alone, with the skylight box checked that is.

I quite often find that if other lights are added it can lose that realistic factor that HDRI provides & look washed out. It is also very differcult to render a quality indoor scene, even with all the numerous parameter dials included in the C3 render engine. Can you do an outdoor scene for us to see please?

Rokol.

Message edited on: 10/06/2004 00:26

Message edited on: 10/06/2004 00:29

BTW Agiel, I know we all appreciate the time you are taking to do these tests, and I hope I didn't sound critical. There are so MANY parameters to tweak and things to try... But I think we WILL be seeing some astonishing Vue renders as people get their hands on the software and spend some time making the all necessary test renders.

What kind of render times for these shots? (ballpark)

About 1h for most shots, 3 hours for the radiosity ones. Remember that I am still using the beta version, which should be significantly slower than the final release.

Ouch! 3 hours? Can't imagine rendering a poster with good quality on radiosity! Makes me wonder if it will be worse than the 24-hour MojoWorld 3600 x 2400 I did last weekend. Agiel, I like renders in post 4 and 5 (I guess, 'cause I like shadows a lot on my human forms). But, the sharp (artifacts?) around the adam's apple and shoulder bones...have you experimented with some sort of higher quality settings with those lighting settings that can reduce those "black" thingies? Otherwise, I would consider those unusable. (crossing my fingers) Also, the shoulders exhibit some "polygoning" (the left shoulder). I haven't done any close-ups like these with V4 so I don't have anything to compare it to. But I'm thinking you don't get the same kind of "faceting" I see if you rendered the same scene in Poser 4. I don't suppose there is anything that can be done as V4 (or V5) doesn't have that "poly-rounding" feature that Poser 5 seems to have (I don't have Poser 5...just repeating what I've read).

I have seen these artifacts happen sometimes with Poser characters. the happen especially when a light is tangent to the surface of a mesh. I usually don't pay attention to them though - a little touch of Painter and they disappear very easily.

Vue's post processing is not much different than taking the image into photoshop and adjusting it there. It's not 'part' of the render in any sense, just allows you to tweak the brightness or colors after the image is rendered. Good for animation, doesn't have much use for still images unless you have no other software.

That's not too bad then. Still, there's a lot that seems left out, but might show up in the Pro version. For instance, "refine iterations", "filtering", "exposure control", "rays per sample", "regathering", etc. Does Vue 5 allow you to pre-render the radiosity calc, then re-use the result (for speeding up test renders, etc?) << Yes, alot of "tweaks" left out of the "pro" version (infinite appears to have these) [5infinite is the new pro, while 5pro is new 5'standard' - go figure]. And no, in the Pro[standard], there's no storing of the solution. On the plus side, it's far far smoother (and faster) and easier to tweak than many other radiosity generators such as Lightwave's and Truespace (actually, Truespace's sucks, no offense). Where it falls down is that it's not entirely accurate (light bouncing off a mirror has no different effect on the solution than light bouncing off a white wall)