Rendering question - Polyloop

psaldari · 14th March 2006, 14:57

Hi people,
I have one curiosity. I have watched the images gallery of this site, my compliments to the artists because there are a lot of beautiful images; but I have noticed that the realism of the renderings does not catch up the levels of other images created with other softwares that I can see in Internet (some images have an incredible realism).
My question is: is it a limit of the artists or is it a limit of the Carrara rendering engine?

cheers
Paolo

jtbullet · 14th March 2006, 15:07

Its all in the artist. Most 3d renderings you see have been tweaked considerably in photoshop. Also keep in mind that other applications like max and maya have hundreds of plugins available to assist in rendering. I believe max now has mental ray built in, and that is an extremely strong built-in renderer. Slow though, but very realistic. This realism comes at price however, and these advanced shaders are more like self contained program code than a visual browser system for texture building.

If you are looking for something a step between carrara and max, you could try cinema 4d. It is extremely stable and fast. Carrara still gets my vote, because it is very user friendly powerful, AND affordable, try finding that combination, its hard to do. Cinema is great, max and maya are powerful, but there are images from the cheapest software that you cannot identify as being from a non-professional application. In my experience, the higher the price goes, the more people are required to complete projects. Max and maya aren usually studio apps that will have many people working to complete a project. Cinema and carrara are more suited to small groups of people who are not working on compartmentalized tasks, i.e. one guy may texture, rig, and animate, while in max or maya a lot of times there are guys who just rig, and guys who just model, etc. I know there are exceptions and a lot of phenomenal artists who are one-man shows on each of these programs, so take what I say with a grain of salt. Achieving a "look" has more to do with practice, knowing your renderer, and knowing how to do post work. On the renderer, learning how to do multi pass rendering will give you abilities in photoshop that you simply cannot achieve in the rendering app alone.
Good luck!

psaldari · 14th March 2006, 15:12

Thanks for your answer, truly exaustive

Paolo

jtbullet · 14th March 2006, 15:14

Yeah a lot of people say I am exhausting ;)

manleystanley · 14th March 2006, 15:31

Sounds funny but if you want to check out an excellent deicated rendering program try Kerkythea. It's freeware but has a nice selection of rendering methods.

psaldari · 14th March 2006, 19:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by manleystanley

Sounds funny but if you want to check out an excellent deicated rendering program try Kerkythea. It's freeware but has a nice selection of rendering methods.

argh..., it's only for windows...

AWBenson · 14th March 2006, 22:01

Keep in mind that many people don't use "all" the options available to them in rendering in Carrara. Carrara 5 has subsurface scattering, fesnel effects, blurry reflections, true motion blur, HDRI, etc. Each of these take a huge chunk of rendering time, regardless if you have the most powerful desktop available today, you are going to wait a long time to get the final output.

Because of this, many people (myself included) render with reduced settings or simply not use certain advanced features often. Sometimes huge rendering settings can be realistically faked in PhotoShop and still allow you to render at a good speed.

Lightning is another important characteristic in realism as well as UV unwrapping/texturing (for dirt, grime and wear & tear). These are often advanced topics that few have truely mastered. Without these, extremely few image can be made to look real.

mykyl1966 · 14th March 2006, 22:04

Yup things like SSS and blurry reflections I just dont use due to the painfully slow nature of these beasts. For most things I do I would rather a fake option of these.

Cheers

Mike R

psaldari · 14th March 2006, 22:31

it would be a lot interesting a tutorial that it explains like slowly
leaving from one simple scene (plane, cube, sphere) and carrying it to a
extreme rendering. Anyone?

Paolo

14th March 2006, 14:57	#1 (permalink)
psaldari NURBS Booleans are your friend Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Treviso - Italy Posts: 115	Rendering question Hi people, I have one curiosity. I have watched the images gallery of this site, my compliments to the artists because there are a lot of beautiful images; but I have noticed that the realism of the renderings does not catch up the levels of other images created with other softwares that I can see in Internet (some images have an incredible realism). My question is: is it a limit of the artists or is it a limit of the Carrara rendering engine? cheers Paolo

14th March 2006, 22:01	#7 (permalink)
AWBenson Box modeling Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Miami, FL Posts: 292	Keep in mind that many people don't use "all" the options available to them in rendering in Carrara. Carrara 5 has subsurface scattering, fesnel effects, blurry reflections, true motion blur, HDRI, etc. Each of these take a huge chunk of rendering time, regardless if you have the most powerful desktop available today, you are going to wait a long time to get the final output. Because of this, many people (myself included) render with reduced settings or simply not use certain advanced features often. Sometimes huge rendering settings can be realistically faked in PhotoShop and still allow you to render at a good speed. Lightning is another important characteristic in realism as well as UV unwrapping/texturing (for dirt, grime and wear & tear). These are often advanced topics that few have truely mastered. Without these, extremely few image can be made to look real. __________________ Andrew Benson AKA: AWBenson www.awbenson.com andrew (at) awbenson (dot) com

14th March 2006, 22:04	#8 (permalink)
mykyl1966 Box modeling Join Date: Jun 2004 Posts: 278	Yup things like SSS and blurry reflections I just dont use due to the painfully slow nature of these beasts. For most things I do I would rather a fake option of these. Cheers Mike R __________________ I dont believe everything I think.

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14th March 2006, 15:07	#2 (permalink)
jtbullet Box modeling Join Date: Jul 2005 Posts: 237	Its all in the artist. Most 3d renderings you see have been tweaked considerably in photoshop. Also keep in mind that other applications like max and maya have hundreds of plugins available to assist in rendering. I believe max now has mental ray built in, and that is an extremely strong built-in renderer. Slow though, but very realistic. This realism comes at price however, and these advanced shaders are more like self contained program code than a visual browser system for texture building. If you are looking for something a step between carrara and max, you could try cinema 4d. It is extremely stable and fast. Carrara still gets my vote, because it is very user friendly powerful, AND affordable, try finding that combination, its hard to do. Cinema is great, max and maya are powerful, but there are images from the cheapest software that you cannot identify as being from a non-professional application. In my experience, the higher the price goes, the more people are required to complete projects. Max and maya aren usually studio apps that will have many people working to complete a project. Cinema and carrara are more suited to small groups of people who are not working on compartmentalized tasks, i.e. one guy may texture, rig, and animate, while in max or maya a lot of times there are guys who just rig, and guys who just model, etc. I know there are exceptions and a lot of phenomenal artists who are one-man shows on each of these programs, so take what I say with a grain of salt. Achieving a "look" has more to do with practice, knowing your renderer, and knowing how to do post work. On the renderer, learning how to do multi pass rendering will give you abilities in photoshop that you simply cannot achieve in the rendering app alone. Good luck!

14th March 2006, 15:12	#3 (permalink)
psaldari NURBS Booleans are your friend Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Treviso - Italy Posts: 115	Thanks for your answer, truly exaustive Paolo

14th March 2006, 15:14	#4 (permalink)
jtbullet Box modeling Join Date: Jul 2005 Posts: 237	Yeah a lot of people say I am exhausting ;)

14th March 2006, 15:31	#5 (permalink)
manleystanley Box modeling Join Date: Feb 2006 Posts: 327	Sounds funny but if you want to check out an excellent deicated rendering program try Kerkythea. It's freeware but has a nice selection of rendering methods.

14th March 2006, 22:31	#9 (permalink)
psaldari NURBS Booleans are your friend Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Treviso - Italy Posts: 115	it would be a lot interesting a tutorial that it explains like slowly leaving from one simple scene (plane, cube, sphere) and carrying it to a extreme rendering. Anyone? Paolo