Settings and workflow for animation

[rsquires]

I know it's only Wednesday but it would be nice if someone who has experience of doing flicker free animation using Vray could share their thoughts. I have looked on the net and it seems that a way to go is to render an irradiance map pass first.

http://maxforums.org/thread.aspx?tid=322258

It's seems fairly straightforward but the explanation here is a bit bare bones.

I'd like to give this a go soon as I have an animation I am working on that could use it.

I am interested in flythrough or camera animation for starters but would love to see how to handle a scene that has animated objects too

regards

Richard

[stefan]

you can render the IR prepass for flythrough use multiframe incemental and use the "save on renderend" option to save it to disk

use the settings like this for the IR Map:
Min. rate -3
Max rate -1

HSph. subd. 75
Interp. samples 50

Clr, Nrm and Dist 0,3
Blur GI 0

then you render the animation and set the IR to "from file" using the saved file

also use good AA for animation.

cheers
stefan

[rsquires]

I did try something like that but I got a very weird frame rendering out in the end with black and flat colours. I had obviously done something very wrong so I need a bit more hand holding.

When you do the first IR pass do you leave the secondary bounce as none?

I can't seem to find the Blur GI where is it?

After this has finished, when you render the file what settings do you use. Brute force Light Cache. I have no idea? Or is the lighting just derived form the previous IR pass

What is good AA for animation. I know you can set it to very high values but it would be good to know what an average is for good animation.

Sorry to be so not together but this is all very new

regards

rich

[Kokosing]

I've been meaning to try this:

http://www.spot3d.com/vray/help/150R1/tutorials_imap2.htm

It's written for max users, but I think you can bring the principal ideas across. The video example at the end is stunning.

W

[Kokosing]

OK, I've just tried the workflow I linked in the previous post. And oh boy! It works really well - and is very quick.

It's a multistage process where you generate lightmaps for the entire animation from both the Light Cache model and the IRMap model. These are then applied accross the whole animation. The result is that you get flicker-free camera animations that are lightning fast.

If you want to use the tutorial I linked to (which is written for Max,) you'll have to poke around a little to find the settings. I ignored all the details about the Max Sky and background. Instead I used a C4D sun as a Vray sun (beginning of VRAY 4 C4D manual) and turned on physical sun and physical sky.

Remeber to tick autosave file before you render the flythrough maps. They save when you render.

When you render the IRMap sequence, you can switch off the save box in the C4D render settings. You'll need to change the frame step here as well.

Finally, don't forget to switch 'render final image' back on after you calculate the maps.

Good luck,

W

[rsquires]

I have the tutorial printed out beside me and I am following it word for word and I am stuck. In the tutorial it says

1.16 Render frame 360 for example. Note that we only render one frame, the Flythrough modes forces the light cache to be computed for the entire animation.

Now do I do a traditional render or just in the viewport as when I do this I just get frame 360 and no preview that builds up like the image in the tutorial. It's confusing me. I am rendering the whole sequence by hitting the Render to picture viewer button which is rendering from frame 1.

Also I am not getting the vrlmap extension to the file. Do I have to manually write this. On a mac for those wondering.

It's not quick! It's painfully slow I have calculated the first lightcache it seems ( this took 40 minutes or so for 50 frames) and I am now doing the second one ( with World scale mode etc) and it is taking about 11 mins per frame. That can't be right! I am definatley doing something wrong here. Also why would you calculate 2 light cache passes?

Just so you are aware I am doing a simple fly around Franz's chair scene.

Please help out this bear with very little brain

regards

rich

[edub]

I've been following that workflow as well, and it's coming out nicely! I'm not sure you need to worry so much about the test renders - I just kept plugging along w/ the tutorial.
I thought I was doing something wrong when viewing my test animation, but realised that I had only completed step 1, :)

It's a bit confusing to a newbie, I'll have to admit, but maybe someone will eventually rewrite to tut?

Maybe this thread should be moved to the tutorial section?

[rsquires]

Hi edub

how long is your animation and how long is Cinema taking to calculate the light cache pass. I am getting some seriously long times that make me wonder why I'd do it this way. It's supposed to be quick for crying out loud and this is taking longer than any frame I have renderered straight out of Vray. It makes no sense to me

regards

rich

[edub]

I'm doing test with a 90 frame simple camera animation, using a scene of a kitchen (downloaded a while back, somewhere) which is fairly small.

I can't remember how long it took to calculate the lightcache, as I was working on other stuff while it was rendering in the background, but I would guess 10-20 mins.

I'm on an 8-core mac pro, btw.

[rsquires]

I don't think I have calculated the light cache correctly. I have got to the end of the tutorial and the image is very dark like it isn't using it at all. This is like torture aaaargh

regards

rich

[rsquires]

I have got to Part II: Calculating the irradiance map. When it says in 2.1 Set the primary engine to Irradiance map does it mean that the previous Light Cache goes in the secondary engine. Doesn't mention that it should. Also what settings do you guys have for the basic parameters?

I'm getting there I think, it's just been long an very confusing

regards

richard

[rsquires]

Well after a lot of stumbles I have rendered a flicker free GI animation and it is pretty cool. Time taken after doing the lightcache and irradiance 59 mins for 50 frames.

http://homepage.mac.com/rsquires/3d/vray/vray_anim.mov

I am still not that happy with the walls as they seem to have some splotches on them in the pre sorenson movie. I am going to experiment with doing the light cache again as I am not sure it was completely correct or accurate enough. But I'd appreciate any thoughts about that.

The tutorial is confusing if you have never done anything like this before and it has taken me the entire time to figure out that it is an iterative process, meaning the lightcache that you do first contributes to the irradiance as its secondary multiplier. It wasn't obvious in the tutorial that that was the case and I just calculated the irradiance without the light cache, thinking that the final render would need both passes rather than just the irradiance pass. Confused, I was.

Anyway I fought my way through and came out the other side smiling. It is a much more involved process than I first thought but the end result is more than pleasing.

On a side note the camera used in the animation was SteadyCam Pro with a Vray camera tag

regards

Rich

[akiefer]

Hi Rich,

I should say that looks pretty decent? I'll have to try that route with this test scene since the first time I did it it flickered all over the place and on one frame actually literally blew away the walls (they were gone physically...)

Albert
http://www.sectora.net

[rsquires]

Hi Albert

I just did another test and it came out great. I set the Light cache at the start to 1200 and did it on world setting ( in the manual it says it's better for animation). I then did my irradiance pass and used the lightcache I'd just created as the secondary bounce and rendered a 75 frame animation every 5 frames. I think the settings were similar to the tutorial settings for the irradiance pass. I then took this pass and rendered all the frames. Here's a sorenson video of the anim (please excuse the completely crap scene, willow is the name of our cat)

http://homepage.mac.com/rsquires/3d/vray/studio_light-test.mov

It doesn't quite do it justice but the original is silky smooth. I took it into After Effects to glow the hilights a bit and do some level tweaking.

I know there are artefacts on the back wall where it meets the floor, what is the best way to avoid this. It was made from 2 planes so I guess that might be a cause. Also what settings would people tinker with when this happens. Is it part of the Light Cache or the IR pass

Anyway next up is animated objects and if anyones got any thoughts there it would be good

regards

rich

[Kokosing]

@RSquires - Glad you got it working. I was pretty excited when I rendered out my first animation.

As for animating objects, there's a tut for that at the same source. The method for animation is different, so if you have a camera move and an animation, you need to render in two passes: one for all static objects (done the same as the flythrough method. And one for the animated objects. You then have to comp them together.

The tut also mentions a vray plug-in for Max which allows you to limit the render to a sphere shaped area around the animated objects. So for instance you have a character walking in front of a wall with the camera moving. On the animation pass you attach this sphere plugin to the character and then you only render the necessary part of the frame. The plugin includes a falloff to create a soft edge around the action.

I wonder if this would benefit us?

W

[DanieleF]

Hi guys,
because the animation procedure requires multiple step, i'm going to write a module for the VrayBridge that automates them.
So stay tuned!

Cheers,
Daniele

[stefan]

:-)
geat Daniele!
cheers
stefan

[rendertaxi]

hi guys,

i´m following this post here as i´m also trying to render out my first fly-through animation in vray.
so far so good, i will try to follow the steps in the tutorial.. but how can i take advantage of our c4d net renderer? anyone has an idea how to take the netrenderer in the workflow? do i compute the gi maps first on one machine and then send it to the farm? do all the computers need the vraybridge plugin in their plugin folder?

thanks for your help!

cheers, alex

[rendertaxi]

hi again,

so far i got to get it going. The quality i have achieved in the end makes me wonder if i did something wrong..

when i calculate the lightcache first, do i need to do it for every frame? for a better understanding: animation 2000 frames, arch exterior 800.000 polys. i set the scale to world (although it says in the tutorial: use screen for exteriors, why?) and render one frame of the animation.
it calculates a lightcache for 25 min and testframes all along the animation show samples everywhere.
or am i supposed to render the ligthcache for all 2000 frames, each 25 min? then it won´t be a speed advantage anymore..
for the irradiance map it is quite clear to render on base of the lightcache and to set the step to 5 or 10.

how did you do it with the lightcache? has anyone experience with 2000+ frames animation with vray?

thanks for your help.

alex

[rsquires]

hi rendertaxi

that tutorial doesn't make it clear. I thought you had to render all the frames for the lightcache and it turned into a huge long drawn out mess. Here's what you do.

Simply put your playhead anywhere in the timeline, and render a viewport image with lightcache in both primary and secondary. I used a value of 1200 for mine and set it to flythrough mode. For some reason Vray for C4D doesn't show an image build up of the lightcache. You need to turn off render final image ( I don't know whether that's needed but I did it anyway) and choose autosave and name your file. Magically this then creates a lightcache for the entire scene duration. On a mac it doesn't give you a file name at the end so you either need to add this yourself or make sure you name inclues lightcache.

Then once this is done ( depending on scene size and length can take some time) turn the light cache settings from flythrough to read from file place the newly created lightcache into the read from file dialogue.

Then onto the Irradiance. Change your Primary Gi to Irradiance. Your secondary is now reading the lightcache from file and will boost the Irradiance primary pass. Here it s important to switch off render frames. Set it to multiframe incremental.

You then render the sequence, and choose a step setting like every 5 frames. This is dependant on how quick the camera moves I guess. It does come up with a dialogue about not being able to save or something like that but just ignore it.

Once these are done. You place the Irradiance file as your primary bounce and no secondary. Then render remember to uncheck the don't render final image and to bring your animation steps back to 1.

This is how I did the second animation that you can find further up the thread.

It is a sort of long winded process but it does produce a great result

regards

rich

[Laurent]

gees, reminds me of early divx processing, step one, tow, tree....

[DanieleF]

Great rsquires,
this is the exact procedure for producing a walkthrough animation.
Just be sure that you are not using not using the Use light cache for glossy rays option because on the contrary you should leave the LC as secondary engine for GI when calculating the final sequence.

Cheers
Daniele

[rendertaxi]

richard,

thank you very much for making that clear again.. it really takes time to get used to that workflow!

one question i have left: imagine the current timeline of the animation: 2200 frames. it consists of 5 sequences, thus 5 different cameras and a stage object switching the cameras. does the flythrough mode building the lightcache consider the whole timeline or just the sequence of the current camera? lets say camera 3 covers frames 900-1199.. the lightcache should still be calculated for the whole range of the timeline given in the document preset in c4d, right?

and another thing i wonder: why is it recommended in the tutorial to use the SCREEN mode for exteriors instead of the WORLD mode for the lightcache? now i used world mode to have equal samples in the whole model..

thank you. it´s nice to fiddle this out together..

regards, alex

[stefan]

i use for animation screen, it seems faster and smoother.

also i use relativly high sample size like 0.05 or even 0.1and low sample count like 750

and i use IR map for primary chache -3/-1

for walkthrough i renderer only every 10th frame as gi path ( set step 10 in c4d option) and the render final animtion with saved passes. work like charm.
here and extremly fast.

i am doing another HD animation this weekend with tracked background.

stefan

[stefan]

hehe,
i just test rendered a GI solution for 250frame animation in 16 minutes:-)
it is a calm camera animation so i rendered with step 10 frames.

the file is a 96mb arch viz project with a realworld movie in the background. (used tcastudios free steadyplane plugin)
(a matched camera)

now i render the final shading with ca 2min per frame:-)

cheers
stefan

p.s.:

here the steps, was very easy:
1) set GI to IRMap multiframe incremental & LC
2) set both to be saved to disk, and to not render final image under vray options
3) set frame step to 10 (in c4d output settings)
4) rendered gi pass for the whole animation - took just 16min.
5) set IRmap & LC to "from file" mode
6) set framestep to 1 again
7) rendering final animation. in may case the frames calculate only 2 min per frame as gi as already calculated in prepass:-)

[rendertaxi]

stefan,

thank you for your hints for a better workflow.

now i´m running into the problem of running out of memory.. c4d shows 50% cpu usage and 1.980.292 K of used memory on win xp32 (3GB switch). the frame buffer shows: rendering frame 1596/2201 but it doesn´t continue rendering.. i´m right now doing the irradiance map, frame step set to 5... it seems like the render is stuck. did i have to untick "don´t delete map" in the irradiance settings?
no irr.-map is saved in the place i specified.. what can i do to prevent running in this situation?

thanks for you help.

regards, alex

[stefan]

Hi rendertaxi,
dont know exatcly, how big is your scene? i just rendered a huge file over weekend, sadly cant show as it is for a client.

we soon make the new automated wizard fro animation available too.
also if it is really huge i hope in next days we can deliver the 64bit version.
this will have no memory limit( not one ye can reach with 3d yet;-)
no i think dont untick delete map.

you can also send me the file or a link to it i will look into it and see the settings. then i can help best:-)

cheers
stefan

[rendertaxi]

stefan,
thanks for your offer for sending you the file. i would need to contact the client for permission, so here screenshots of the settings in c4d:

http://www.rendertaxi.de/mxl_images/vray_settings_01.jpg
http://www.rendertaxi.de/mxl_images/vray_settings_02.jpg

poly count is 1.5 Mio. right now re-rendering the irradiance map, but only for half of the animation to prevent memory problems..
resolution is 1024x576 px, archviz exterior.

thanks! alex

[rhodesy]

automated system sounds great daniele thanks for that as i too was struggling to get decent animation times/results but i've not read these tuts yet - even so it seems like there is a demand for an easy animation button!

[stefan]

hi rendertaxi,
on first sight:
your light cache is way to high, thats why you run out of memory.

i use 500-1500max, also dont use world size!
use screensize and not a too low values for sample size. to low values make the image noisy.

for animation i use 0.05-0.1 screensample size

dont use multipliers for gi values! i wouldnt do that, that should be in 99.9% 1 not 1.2.

cheers
stefan

[rendertaxi]

stefan,

thank you for your critics.. ;-) and your quick replies.
i will try and see the difference.

more answers need more questions:

why shall one not use multipliers for gi values? i used it to boost the light in the shadow.. how can i make sure light goes deep enough in the building? in AR i would use the ray depth in settings to light up the shadows.

lightcache: but when it´s precalculated, does it still need to be loaded into memory? you´re right, calculating the lightcache took pretty much memory.

alex

[stefan]

use color mappig for those things.

multiplier in gi just destroys calibration. u can use it of course, i would not personally.

cheers
stefan

[sketchbook]

Hi guys,
because the animation procedure requires multiple step, i'm going to write a module for the VrayBridge that automates them.
So stay tuned!

Cheers,
Daniele

any idea of when this might be available? i am starting an animation and need to decide asap which render i shall be using.

thanks!

[stefan]

also without it is really not very complicated!
please try:-)

cheers
stefan

[sketchbook]

easy for you to say! :)

who has the time to learn things?

hehe

[stefan]

well it is basicly 2 steps:

1)render only gi with save options on.

2) render final image with gi set to from file

takes just a very few minutes to setup:-)

thats it.
cheers
stefan

[rendertaxi]

i have a question concerning net-rendering in a hybrid network (win-mac).

if i use this workflow and now want to integrate a macbookpro from a friend in the network to render the vray animation as well, i get problems with the paths to the IR- and LC-Maps as mac os uses different path names..

how would one solve this situation?

thanks for any hints.

[sketchbook]

thanks stefan,

i thought it must be confusing after first reading this thread. there were some issues people seamed to be having.

if it's as easy as this, why are you guys working on a setup file for this need? or wizard as you call it. seams it should be done, or not needed.

don't take this as a rant, you guys are doing great and your updates and fast in coming. i am loving vray!

[stefan]

we make the wizrad because we know it can be even easier:-)

but that really doens tmean it is very comlicated.
but dont worry, i know all of you have to learn much and this is not easy.
and we want to make it as comfortable as possible.

we are at version1.0 yet, and for sure we will hear your wishes.

cheers
stefan

[stefan]

rendertaxi, we will try to add the possibility to have relatice paths in the from file dialog. this is usefull for mixed enviroments. you will then be able to save your IR+LC map in the tex folder (or just do an save as project).
i had that too yesterday and already talked with renato about it:-)

cheers
stefan

[rendertaxi]

great! ;-)

then it´s worth thinking about buying a octa core mac.. hehe..

cheers, alex

[stefan]

yes i have some, can recommend them:-)

cheers
stefan

[vidar3d]

Maybe this is a stupid question. I get that the IR should be set to multiframe but what should the LC be set to? Single Frame, Fly through or what?

[Robert G]

Yes, set it to Fly through. There is some Tutorial for max which describes it all.
There is a link some where on this forum, maybe do a search.

Regards, Robert

[stefan]

either to flythrouzgh or you use brute force(for object animation)....
cheers
stefan

[vidar3d]

Fantastic! Worked like a charm. Thanks guys.

[darianr]

This is absolutely fan-freaking-tastic!

I have a question though, and maybe one of you experts can save me days of trial and error.

I am doing a flyover animation of a development park, and I am having my sun move to go from mid-day to night. Since the sun is changing so dramatically, do I need to alter this method at all?

I may animate some cars driving around on roads and some other things moving. So, would I need to use brute force rather than lightcache since this would be considered an object animation?

[DieGolum]

Hi guys,
because the animation procedure requires multiple step, i'm going to write a module for the VrayBridge that automates them.
So stay tuned!

Cheers,
Daniele

Thank you Daniele, That is fantastic!!! :D

we really need this module.

Merry Christmas for all :)

Cheers,
Diego

[govinda]

Hi guys,
because the animation procedure requires multiple step, i'm going to write a module for the VrayBridge that automates them.
So stay tuned!

Cheers,
Daniele
Pleeeeeease. :)

[thiagoguima]

hey guys,

do you know, by any change, why I am not being able to save my irmap file when I use the multiframe incremental option?

cheers,

[sketchbook]

has this multiple step WIZARD been implemented yet?

[charlemagne]

well it is basicly 2 steps:

1)render only gi with save options on.

2) render final image with gi set to from file

takes just a very few minutes to setup:-)

thats it.
cheers
stefan

Hi Stefan,
when I'm following your advice here, I get the Lightcache map calculated for every n'th frame as well, although I would need it calculated only once, am I right?

Guess these are the steps to follow: correct me if I'm wrong:
1. Render and save Light Cache in Flythrough mode (rendering one frame is sufficient)
2. Render and save Irradiance map for primary bounces every x frames (frame step value in C4D's output tab), with the 'from file' for the light cache secondary bounces. Use light cache solution calculated in (1)
3. Render final frames with 'from file' in Irradance map (2), and 'from file' in Light Cache (1)

I have some more questions:
1. I don't really understand what's been told about the 'Use light cache for glossy rays' checkbox.
2. Has anyone tested precalculating a smaller solution than the final frame size? Would that work? I'll test it right away, but I'm currently calculating a solution here.

Edit.: I just did an Irradiance map calc every 10 frames, and now I'm rendering the final animation, and I see that in some frames I get a partially black image. Would that be because every 10 frames is too little for the animation I'm doing? I'ts a short flythrough of a kitchen. /Edit

by the way, this forum is a great help! :D oh, and VrayforC4D also. saved my day the first week I had it :D

bye,

ch.