There is something really cool I wish I could tell people.  Bummer.

pjz99   what do you mean?
about poser 8 or SP1 or IDL? 

Quote - right.  except, from what i read of Blender's area lights, i think you don't really have much shadow control.  you can't change falloff either.  and apparently you can set samples on it.  

i think you have shadow control and you have the distance parameter. of course area lights are not meant to have sharp shadows. they are area lights after all.

Quote -

to me, that sounds like an iteration issue.  so the IDL is calculated then the reflection.  i'm not sure it's nearly as complex as caustics to ask the renderer re-run the IDL at least once after the reflection.  or to allow for control over how many times it does iterate as a quality setting.  especially if  IDL doesn't affect specularity.

look a mirror can not bounce soft lighting. a mirror will bounce more sharp lighting since its a mirror. we can not use IDL soft bounced light for mirrors. we can fake it with an extra light.
maybe if we can in tell poser that insted of the mirror use a white diffuse shader. so we would have reflection but firefly would use a white diffuse for bounced light.

You'll have a very hard time getting that to work, because the brightness emitted by the diffuse (or ambient) shader you're thinking of will show in the render over the reflection - the mirror will be solid white (or whatever color you set it to).

If you're really desparate to do bounced light from a mirror, you could try this.

Create a second surface slightly behind the mirror of approximately the same shape. Doesn't have to be exact. Set this up as a diffuse reflector however you like - perhaps just plain white with DV = 100%.

Then set the actual mirror to be invisible to ray-tracing. Assuming you don't need to see the mirror in another mirror, it would work.

The glowing cube is lighting the sphere, even though the wall between blocks the light.

perhaps pj will be able to tell us the good news, once the big day arrives next week.
the idea of putting a diffuse surface inside the mirror is good IMVHO.
one other thing to try: add specular to diffuse surface or mirror surface.
it should have no effect on GIbounces.

Well it's not really anything major, just a cool and convenient thing.

BB - What happens in the B&W setup if you make the ball reflective and visible to raytracing? (My renderer is occupied for the time being.) This is confusing me a little since the image in the mirror says that at least the first ray shot from the camera does see the mirror in raytracing mode, or something like it, I think.

Whichway
 

With the latest beta sr update I just did a render and the bounced idl was most evident, it kind of took me by surprise. Bounced it off of a reflective floor and wall...looked really cool.

Really great improvement ... "je fais ma petite chieuse" ( No  !!!  not the head ! ) but, please can you post the general settings ( not the python ), your specs for this test and the render time of this scene ?

Thx :-)

woot!  yes, that definitely solves the problem.  i'm afraid i don't understand what you mean by DV = 100% or precisely the shader setup on the diffuse bouncer.  but that is much more realistic. 

i am waiting for SP1 to again starting to render. i will get shadow samples and better IDL

come on come on come on :)

Quote - woot!  yes, that definitely solves the problem.  i'm afraid i don't understand what you mean by DV = 100% or precisely the shader setup on the diffuse bouncer.  but that is much more realistic. 

I guess DV=Diffuse Value :)

cob, for diffuse surface to bounce 100% of the diffuse light, try diffuse value = 1, diffuse colour = white, all other channels 0.

DV is my abbreviation for Diffuse_Value. Sorry.

DC = Diffuse_Color
DV = Diffuse_Value
SC = Specular_Color
SV = Specular_value
RC = Reflection_Color
RV = Reflection_Value
AD = Alternate_Diffuse
AS = Alternate_Specular
B=Bump
D=Displacement
AC=Ambient_Color
AV=Ambient_Value
Transparency=T

These are abbreviations I use when I'm typing in a hurry. I'm in a hurry a lot lately. I'm making a lot of real money and don't have time to talk to you guys so much. Sorry.

Refraction_Color and Refraction_Value I always spell out.

Construct the 2 walls of boxes set at X=25% Y at 700% and Z at 800%, and turned at 45° left-right.
Next construct roof and floor from boxes X=25% Y=1200, and Z= 1000%
You get the idea, I copied the side wall and played around.
Now,
For ALL walls roof, floor, and middle ball;
set :
Diffuse color white, with a standard  Reflect node.
Reflection color white, with a standard  Sphere node.

The setup should look like this ( click to enlarge )

No takers?
Come on guys, the more info SM can get, the more examples, the more tickets with even more details, the closer SM can get to understanding how to improve IDL.

And that is what we all want, no?
The sooner a solution can be found, the sooner SR1 will be out.
The scene is not that complicated, and tells a lot. (Takes about 30 min to render on a average PC., with IC at 50 and IQ at 50)

I didn't have time to look at this, yet. But just taking a quick look above, you know your wall shader is wacky, right?

You're using reflection as part of the diffuse color calculation. That's a nono.

You've got a Sphere_Map with solid white plugged into Reflection_Color. That's just going to give you a white glowing surface, except you also have Reflect_Lite_Mult turned on, which causes the Reflection_Color to be multiplied with the amount of light striking the surface there and added into the whole things. With a 50% light, that means glowing white 50%.

I'm not sure what is to be learned from this setup.

@BB

I know the nodes are off, but what I learn (think to learn from this render)

The side walls, the middle ball, the roof and the floor all have the same material and node settings.

The side walls and the middle ball render perfect. (even with those materials and nodes)
But? ? The roof and the floor are to cry for.

It can be, and I do not know the internals for the calculations,but It could be that horizontal calculations are OK. But that vertical calculations have a problem. Or view angle?

Regarding  your comments, you are right on both.
*"You're using reflection as part of the diffuse color calculation. That's a nono."

*When only using this, (and omitting the Sphere map)  it gave a nice reflection of the figure on the side walls and the middle ball. Actually, the reflections are better then the figure itself.

*"You've got a Sphere_Map with solid white plugged into Reflection_Color. That's just going to give you a white glowing surface, except you also have Reflect_Lite_Mult turned on, which causes the Reflection_Color to be multiplied with the amount of light striking the surface there and added into the whole things. With a 50% light, that means glowing white 50%."

*Correct again. When removing the Reflect node from the diffuse color, and just using this White Sphere_Map into the Reflection_Color, I had a White glowing middle ball, with very soft color relections from the 4 color balls. And no artifacts on the middle ball.

All calculated "reflected" balls are at their correct position.
The middle ball reflects the figure and the balls, all at their correct position.
Problems are only on the roof, and the floor with a lot of horizontal and vertical color rupture lines.
in therorie thy should have the same quality as the side walls, but they do not.

Next try, I"ll tilt the roof, and see what happens.

I have a theorie:
When you see the scene in the preview mode:
the side walls are gray, and the roof and floor are black.
Tilt the roof, or the floor untill they turn gray in the preview window,  and they will render fine.
That is my theory. (Runnig a test render right now.)

now i'm confused.

Too many Balls? ;-)
I feel like a child with Santa? ? ;-) ;-)

vilters,

Hmmm. I'll look at it, but here's the thing. The floor and ceiling are at a very shallow angle with respect to the light source. But with the shader set up the way it is, those horizontal surfaces will give off as much diffuse reflection as the walls, and they shouldn't. Based on the Lambertian model of diffuse reflection, the floor and ceiling should be barely lit by the light source, contrary to how you've got it set up. I think

But I'll do the experiment, and figure it out. You may be right that something isn't behaving correctly.

vilters,

Do you mean for the light, use an infinite light from the front? That is exactly parallel to the floor and ceiling, and should not light them at all.

The floor improved by 500% ? ? ? ? ? (was still black in the preview)

Lessons learned and observations.

1. The roof did indeed render all relections, even put a shadow for Aly's body around her feet.

2. When watching the render go, I noticed the red and yellow imperfections in the reflection.
   Where do thy come from? Initially I thought from the floor, But?

3. The middle ball, and the side walls render perfect.

4. The floor: vast improvement on the floor. Just by slightly changing the view angle.

5. Major imperfections? The red and yellow on the roof,  the bue ball, the white between Aly's legs, the line on her chest, and the arms of the main figure. The reflected arms on the side walls are perfect..

Way past bedtime now.
 

As you tilt the roof , you reposition the view to get the full picture again.

Ahaaaaa; but this repositioning, to re-center the image also changes the lights origin.

 But is is an infinite light! So it should not matter. So to answer your question, yes it is one infinite light. And should not light them at all.................... (with the horizontal roof, that is)
With the horizontal floor an roof, in theory, only reflections would count.

By repositioning, your eye is looking at a different angle . . . that is all.

Think we are having a private conversation here. ;-)

I thought you were going to bed, LOL!

You're going to feel sick tomorrow. Get some sleep. I'll poke around.

I found that I still haven't downloaded the released content - I only have broken beta content for Alyson. Trying to download the full package like an ordinary Poser buyer is maddening. My downloads keep aborting, the server is disconnecting me. Grr. So I don't have the properly dressed Alyson to match your picture. Does that matter?

OMG !!!

Character does not matter, any character will do.

Went to bed, came back. Yeah, I know, but when I hit a knot?

In the first test the floor and roof are horizontal, and the infinite light should not touch them.

Reflections from the side panels also come back to the infinite at an angle due to the canted walls .
Except, balls, they start reflections to all directions. And are glowing in all directions (ambient 5).
Roof and floor should only react to reflections.

In the second test with the tilted roof.
Same thing, but now the floor is lit by the roof reflection also.
(notice the body shadow around the feet.) Nice!
Infinite light bounces off the roof, to the floor, making it "better"? that "solves" a first mystery.

View angle may be important but this light from the roof does the job.

Still tinkering about the red - yellow imperfections on the roof. . . . .  
The Blue ball, the white between the knees, the chest. . . 

And the "hard" rendering of the roof and floor when no infinite light hits them?

They are too "brutal" to be caused by a ball.....

Just hope SM follows this, post;
i posted a ticket, but is is quite hard to explain all this in words. And all the evolutions. . .

PS, sorry, for some word choices, but English is not my first language.

On this, I am gonna try to get some sleep……. 3AM now. . .
Have a nice evening, i'll great ya all in the morning. ;-)

The "box" is 50% diffuse white, 50% reflection. This is a material that could exist in real life, but no known material behaves this way. (Real reflection is not uniform at all angles of incidence - one must implement the Fresnel effect for realism.)

Anyway, such as it is, these materials obey the law of conservation of energy. The render looks fine to me.

Yep - this is bizarro world. But, ummm, so what? 

The whole point of GI is to calculate a physically correct global illumination solution. This means that what the shaders do interacts with the lighting. If the shaders are programmed to calculate nonsense, then the lighting is nonsense.

Quote - My downloads keep aborting, the server is disconnecting me. Grr. So I don't have the properly dressed Alyson to match your picture.

If you're in need of clothes, I've a tank top freebie on my website, newly refitted to Alyson.

I have set up this scene and if I render with the included settings it takes about 35 mins.  (including the hair - which I left out here). As soon as I add IDL it takes 14+ hours just to do the precalculating. (I went to bed after 14 hours and it was about 2/3rds done) When I got back it had rendered about 2 rows and stopped as if the render was done.

Now first of all.  Are my settings wrong?  I am not sure if it should be taking so long and if there is a way to make it faster. 

I would appreciate any help/suggestions re this but please be patient as I lost when it comes to half the stuff you guys talk about. ;)

My system info is:
Intel Cuad CPU Q660 @2.4GHz
4GB RAM
Windows 7 64bit

Thank you in advance.

Forgot to mention the image is just the floor and the wall behind her.

Irradiance caching of 100 seems excessive - I find 50 is fine for most scenes, you'll probably get away with less for this scene.

You don't need 4 raytrace bounces: 1 will suffice.

Also turn any screensavers off when doing overnight renders, it seems to cause the render to hang.

Honey_ZA - I've been away for a while so haven't caught up with everything that's been happening with IDL, but there are a few things that I do know might be worth checking with your scene and settings.

Firstly, I know that using AO on lights AND materials in conjunction with IDL is a problem (and isn't necessary for this technique). AO anywhere in your scene will add a lot of render time.
Transparency is also a known issue and can also slow down  IDL renders.
There may also be problems with Reflection and refraction related to the RT bounce settings in the native Poser render dialogue - there's another render dialogue by Dimension3d that has a few more settings that may help with this (in one of the Poser scrips menus I think).

I need to catch up properly so there may be other factors. I'm of the understanding that the upcoming SR1 for P8 will improve things vastly re render times, so it's probably worth waiting for this.