I'm currently trying to make a scene using depth of field. I usually use the hybrid 2.5D method. With Vue 8 Infinite i seem to be getting alot of artifacts around the focus target, even when i do a 2 pass render. This didn't happen with Vue 7. Has anyone else ran into this problem?

Brad

Haven't tried it yet, but 2 passes, even in previous versions is very low. Can you post a screenshot?

I didn't save the rendered image. I have used the hybrid 2.5D a few times before with vue 7 and had no problems. The picture looked like i was adding blur by hand in photoshop and was scared to get to close to the character, there was a 2 to 4 pixel width around the target that was not blurred out like it should have been. Hopefully they release an update soon to fix it. How do i create a ticket with e-on without having the program crash?

Just go to e-on's main site, and go to support page.

Here is a picture showing the problems i'm having.

Any particular reason you are doing this in Vue rather than in post ? The reason I ask is that with the Z-Depth pass, you get a pretty good DOF effect using the lens blur in Photoshop

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Doing it in photoshop is not only faster, but you can also adjust the dof before deciding how strong you want it to be without rendering the whole image again. So you have more control over it.

I've been pondering if dofpro is worth the bucks. anyone have experience with it?

Quote - Here is a picture showing the problems i'm having.

Slightly OT: what hair is this? I like it.

Wow, indeed, what a mess! Are you suing the POser shader tree? Does it happen with any object (non Poser, for example?)

Like Bruno said, 2 passes does look very little. I always use 5 or 6, never used 2. Have you tried with more than 2?

As to the question why not do this in Photoshop, there are two reasons (for me):

1. the z-depth pass is not anti-aliased by Vue render engine and so the lens blur in photoshop doesn't look good around the edges. This is one of the things I can't understand why e-on doesn't solve. Bryce z-depth is a lot better than Vue's, for example. In order to get a decent z-depth pass, I have to make a render way bigger than necessary.

2. variable transparencies (such as Poser hair props) are not handled properly by the z-depth pass.

I looked now better to the background of your image and it doesn't look good. I mean, it doesn't look like DOF, it looks simply a bad blur. I would say 2 passes is really too low.

I made some tests, and I don't see any problems with DOF on Vue objects, I didn't try it on imported meshes yet, but I suspect it has something to do with Poser. Will wait for your reply on the Poser shader tree used or not. And I agree with Rutra, even if there were no artifacts, the blur desn't look good in the background, but it's because of not enough passes. The artifacts on the figure is something different though.

I'm not using the poser shader tree. These artifacts were not present when i used Vue 7, even with a single pass. I'm not at home right now, so i can't test out other objects yet. I would say there is some problem with Vue 8.

Crowning the hair is Christine Hair from Daz

I'll try it tomorrow with a Poser import to see if this is the cause of the problem.

After a quick test with just vue objects, i do not see the problem either. It's strange that this didn't happen in previous versions of Vue and does with Vue 8.

Didn't have the time to check it on imported objects (Poser and non Poser) today. Will try to find the time tomorrow. If you save the figure as vob and rerender, is it the same?

I will have to try that out!

That was a really good idea Bruno, but unfortuately the results are about the same.

I couldn't even get Vue 8 to do depth of field blur using hybrid 2.5D (everything was in focus all the time).  Ray-tracing worked fine everytime though.

www.youtube.com/user/ShawnDriscollCG

I don't get those artifacts around the edges of a Poser figure - maybe it's depending on the figures, too, just checked one, doesn't matter, if i set the Poser path in Vue to Poser 8 or Poser 7 and render with hybrid 2.5D (the more passes, the stronger the blur effect),  still something isn't working right in Vue 7.5 or Vue 8 anymore, if i try to set up a depth of field area. Comparing it with Vue 6 for instance, where it was working perfect ...

Here a Vue 6 screenshot:
picasaweb.google.de/lh/photo/0D_l2b9tBkdUCgGlba9EMQ

Now a Vue 8 screenshot:
picasaweb.google.de/lh/photo/u_nlOlgrxqifpHxI3pV9aQ

Normally if i start using DOF, i can adjust the blur percentage, focus and focal length, to influence the position and area size of the DOF effect.

Now in Vue 6, as seen in the above screenshot, this area can be adjusted perfectly to include/exclude the objects in the scene to have the blur effect rendered. I've encircled this area in the screenshot.
And it doesn't matter, if i zoom in or out the scene in the side, top and front view windows, this area stays always fixed and you can always tell, where the blur effect will take place and where not.

This seems to be not working anymore in Vue 7.5 and Vue 8 - those the ones i've checked besides Vue 6 ...
If you look at the above Vue 8 screenshot, i've encircled the 'suppose to be' DOF area with yellow and the spot, where the figure is standing and the DOF area gets calculated with a white circle !?
So - while zooming in and out in the side, front and top view windows, this area keeps moving along with the zoom constantly !!  So if you try to setup a DOF area like in Vue 6, it won't work anymore. You have to set the focus-blur-focal values by trial and error, to find the area, where the DOF effect will take place !!
That's not the way, it was made for. Sure, i don't barely use the DOF calculation inside Vue - too timeconsuming - mostly, if needed, i use the z-depth info, too, with a little rework in a paintprogram ...

Even if it doesn't get used many times, it still should work, like it was working with past Vue versions - no reason, why this shouldn't be possible ...

The Vue 8 blur works just fine for me.

A couple of things:

1.  To minimize blur artifacts when using either Hybrid 2.5D or Ray Traced blur, make sure you set Object AA quality to 100%.  I normally use something like 4 min rays 8 max rays and quality set to 100%

2. Here is a comparison of the various Vue blur methods .  For the ray-traced blur, I set max rays to 128 which really increased render times versus the Hybrid blur.  Normally, the Hybrid 2.5 D blur will work just fine with 3 to 5 passes and Object AA quality set to 100%

I always use 100% AA quality for final renders, and my min/ max is usually 8 and 40. I think my problem was mainly from the hair i was using, but i'm not 100% sure yet. I'm surprise to see there is little difference between 1 pass and 5 though. I only used the ray trace method once, it turned out kind of grainy. Thanks for your reply.