Quote - I generally use IMO, rather than IMHO, since my opinion is never humble. :) Simply put, there are two ways of doing things: The wrong way Sam's way :D

OMG! I work with a whole building full of Sams :p

 Poser 5-8 Each with their respective Default Runtimes <A Must have when using Python scripts.

-Just Props (rocks, weapons, cages, etc...)
-Just Environment (Buildings, sceneries, plants etc...)
-Just V3 (All thing V3 related, clothes, textures, Morphs)
-Just V4 (All thing V4 related, clothes, textures, Morphs)
-Just Poses (Body Movement/Positioning Poses ONLY)
-Just Hair
-Just GIRL
-Just Creatures (Dragons, Dogs, Non Human)

 If I Recall Correctly...

More Forum Based Acronyms explained:  [HERE

](http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art2522.asp)For those that like to argue the meaning of things, as with out native language everything can be used in multiple situations... Here is a search for Acronym site showing how many variations there are in use: HERE

Quote - > Quote - Under the Light's  Properties, Adjust the "Shadow" Dial

Higher #'s = Darker / Lower #'s = Lighter

The shadow dial was just what I needed.   Thanks!

I'd assumed the dial adjusted shadow size.  That'll teach me not to assume.

Happy this is a solution for you ;)

 Good  Basics  with Visual references & lessons Here... Dr. Geeps

Under the Light's  Properties, Adjust the "Shadow" Dial

Higher #'s = Darker / Lower #'s = Lighter

Quote -

Does it seem quiet here?  Lot of the people posting to the various IDL threads have suddenly gone silent.

I can't and wont speak for the others.

I think much of the "quietness" is due to the Hinted At changes coming with regards to IDL and how it is different than the present release. 

I too run on a Mac, have the same set of issues as most reported. My present work around has been to do all my setup in P7 and utilize P8 for the rendering only. Once the scene  file is set up and saved, I reopen in P8 without errors on Textures calls.

.02

Quote -
On porn - Had to mention it because it frequently is wrapped up in this type of discussion.  Many people consider "pornography" art.  However, pornography is meant to titilate and not usually meant to project anything more than the sum of its components.  In that respect, most poronography is NOT art.  There could be some that could be considered it though.  It all depends on the intent of the creator and not whether or not that creator was very successful at communicating that intent.

I have seen some pretty amazing things accomplished in this realm of "Non-Art" that I would absolutely categorize as "Performance Art"  :woot: :lol:

Interesting thread....

If I letter a vehicle or paint a sign, is it art?
If I whittle a walking stick, is it art?
If I build a piece of furniture, is it art?
If I create a logo in Photoshop, is it art?
If I purchase content , arrange it in a scene, arrange lighting and render an image, is it art?

Art or not I have no idea.

I have been told, "Oh, you have such wonderful talent", or "You are a wonderful artist" .
So assuming that any of these 'Art Projects" are actually art I would answer yes.

Either way I get paid to do each and every one of these types of "Art" things.
Now the question to ponder is, Because I accept money in exchange for "Art" does that make me a Professional.... 8)

 Out of curiosity, Is it still worth the efforts to mess with IDL or better to just hold off until SR1.

Quote - You are right that it messes up the rendition of a photo, such as used on an EnvSphere. To get the photo directly out as is, you would have to anti-ETM the photo!!! LOL Nobody but us will do that.

But outside of the EnvSphere or reflection map issue, ETM is easier for an "artist" to deal with. Too dark? Increase exposure. Too light? Decrease exposure. Artists will not ponder the math. They will tweak and test render for days. I, on the other hand, will compute the right formula and produce an accurately lit render in the first try. I will also use that formula over and over, because I do not make inconsistent shaders. My components all behave as much as possible to the standards set by reality, which means I'm not having to guess-and-test very much as different element of fhe scene appear out of whack.

Only reason I'm posting these details, is so that people who do not want to waste time can benefit from the experiments, and learn from them, and because I was asked to do so in a couple PMs. For the artists, they should skip the formulas, and just look at the test renders, see which they like best, and copy the two numbers I used, and move on. Copying two numbers does not require a PhD in math.

Some people are actually insulted/irritated by my technical postings and have said so. They can go fuck themselves.

I like the "Quick and Easy" approach of just copying your numbers, it gives me a base to start from, so learning from your examples is in the words of VIsa Ads "Priceless" , after initial settings then I experiment  so I understand WHAT the parameter settings actually do.... 

I find no irritation in being offered Free Education  via someone else's examples and explanations.

I find your Tech posts, at times make me feel like I should not have slept so much through math class ;), but VERY informative non the less. 

Keep it coming! Tech or layman makes no difference to me. :)

"Appreciative Reader"

Material Room ABSOLUTELY lags... (Mac version)
For me it even crashes on occasion...

Although I recall having Issues in P7 when it first released, similar.

Been through this whole scenario a few times...I am in the "Give it time" mode.
It will get better.

Presently I am using P7 for Material and setups, save, reopen in P8 :)

 "With new tools, we must use new techniques.
It isn't fair to just flip on GI, and ignore how that changes things."*

That is the MOST Reasonable Statement I have read yet today :biggrin:

Quote - I think I'm going to go back to the rendering model I'd worked out for myself over in a Challenge thread at DAZ. It will take some modifications, but let me start with the following self quote:

"A ray is traced from the camera until it intersects the gold. For diffuse and specular behavior, the program looks from the intersection point back to the lights, whose locations are known. From the angles and surface properties, an intensity and color of that surface patch are calculated. If there is a Reflection Node attached to the material, a more complicated process goes on. Starting from the intersection point, a ray is launched into the surrounding environment in the unique reflection direction determined by the ray from the camera and the angle of the surface at the intersection. [Angle of reflection = angle of incidence.] This new ray intersects some other surface. For that intersection point, the whole diffuse/specular calculation is done from that new position using the properties of the new material. The result from the secondary ray is used as the incoming light intensityat the first interaction point - the one for the ray from the camera. Note that if we send out rays from the secondary intersection, we can get reflections of reflections. That can get out of hand; the reflection bounce limit puts a stop to this.

As I understand it, the Gather Node does something similar for diffuse surfaces. Here, the direction of the reflected ray is not unique, so the program shoots out a random number of rays in random directions and averages the resulting intensities that come back. Doing that more than once really slows thing down, so don't do that. [It doesn't, I think.]

Ok, that's made everyone's eyes glaze over. I'll go quietly back to rendering. Sorry."

After some further thought, let me phrase it like this - Start with a ray shot from the camera to hit a surface in the scene. It's going to bounce (it has to bounce at least once or this is really boring and simple diffuse or specular) and there are two strategies as to how to aim the next ray. One, which we'll call "raytrace" is used if the direction that the next ray heads off in is known explicitly. This would be the case either if this is the last bounce and it has to head to a light, or if the surface it's coming from is reflective or refractive, in which case the direction angle of the ray is determined by simple optics and the orientation of the surface. The other strategy, which we'll call "indirect illumination" is used if the next direction is not known. In that case, a bundle of rays is shot in random directions and the result of the bundle is the average of all the rays. Note that we can't actually evaluate the results until we know where the secondary rays land, and feed that information backwards along each ray train.

Now we shoot the secondary rays until they hit something (if they escape to space, the answer for that ray is black). At this point, we repeat the algorithm. If we hit something reflective or refractive, we shoot a new "raytrace" ray, whereas otherwise, we make a new bundle of "indirect illumination" rays. This repetition continues until we run out of either "raytrace" or "IDL" bounces along the current ray chain. In order to get any light to go down the ray chain, we have to land on a light as the last step. That's why the last ray in the chain has a known direction (ok, maybe one final ray for each light source) and is a "raytrace" ray. At this point, we can follow the chain back from the light and evaluate the intensity along each ray until we reach the original impact point.

Ok, that covers the Bounce parameters and the Samples parameter. Assuming Intensity is a simple multiplier to effect the balance between bounced and direct light, that leave "Irradiance Sample Size" and the two caches.

Clearly, the complicated tracing of rays get expensive fast. So, rather than do it for every pixel, it is only done at sampled points. The "Irradiance Sample Size" is used to distribute the samples across the rendered image. Say, it set something like how many pixels minimum must be between samples. (It's clearly not that simple as the distribution is concentrated in regions that need finer sampling, but increasing the value does lower the density of red dots, which I'm assuming are at least related to the sample points.) These values are calculated on the first pass and stored in a cache file.

On the second pass, rays are shot from the camera to each pixel (have to do all of them to get the picture!) If the ray hits a reflective or refractive surface, the "raytrace" mechanism is called again and a chain is constructed only of "raytrace" rays until a diffuse or specular suface is hit or the bounce number expires. For the last surface hit, the illumination determined from the first pass is interpolated from the values stored in the cache and used to evaluate the shader at the last point. This tracing has to be done again or the reflections will not be clearly defined. If the camera ray hits a diffuse or specular surface, the illumination is immediately interpolated from the cache and used in the shader at the hit point. That takes care of the "Irradiance Sample Size".

This leaves the two cache values. They are defined to be the number of luminosity points explicitly calculated devided by the number of points interpolated from the cache. This makes a modification of the second pass above. Instead of always interpolating form the cache, a random choice is made between explicit and cached such that the average ratio is the specificed "Irradiance Cache" parameter. For the cached points, interpolation is done; for the others, the whole calculation of Pass 1 is done. The reason for having two parameters is because a reflection is far more sensitive to the eye than a diffuse illumination, so the reflective component might want many more explicit computations than needed elsewhere.

Ok, that is my theory, which is mine and which I call My Theory, and I'm sticking with it for at least the next ten minutes or I think of something better or somebody tells me what the algorithm really is.

Do not take any of the above very seriously - it has to be wrong.

Whichway
 

Well as they say, "Dazzel em with brilliance or Baffle em with BullSh*t",

Either way I find "Your Theory" rather interesting, as a matter of I could actually visualize what was happening to all those little "Ray Tracers" (I see little space ships flying around ;)) 

Heck all I really wanted to do was bookmark this thread, but I just had to comment on this post.

Thanks!

S

 Bookmark.