Fstorm render

[^Lele^]

Here is my take on fStorm and I have to say that I don't understand what all the fuss is about...

https://media.giphy.com/media/1Z02vuppxP1Pa/giphy.gif

[kosso_olli]

You can also see a gamma shift on the wallpaper behind the shelfes, and the bed cover. I assume these changes are the result of some gamma funk rather than the renderer settings ? (eg reflection bounces?)

Thats what I see think, too. Didn't find a way to fix this. Anyway, this was just a test to see what fStorm does better. Not so much, apart from Tonemapping and Glare, when enabled. If you don't use these features, I see no point in using it.

[re:FORM]

Nice test. Can you check the gamma on your reflection maps? It looks like the fstorm render has either stronger or sharper reflections from the window (more contrasty reflection map maybe?) You can also see a gamma shift on the wallpaper behind the shelfes, and the bed cover. I assume these changes are the result of some gamma funk rather than the renderer settings ? (eg reflection bounces?)

[kosso_olli]

Here is my take on fStorm and I have to say that I don't understand what all the fuss is about...

An overview of what I have done: I opened an old interior scene I had on my disk and converted it both for RT GPU and fStorm. For fStorm I disabled all the tone mapping, contrast, vignetting and stuff, because I wanted to see it's raw result. You can see both images in grey below, and you can see that fStorm has a little more contrast. It doesn't look better or more realistic, it doesn't look worse.
Granted, fStorm looks a bit cleaner for the same amount of time. Some artifacts on the ceiling next to the cutouts though.

With materials however, that's a different story. RT GPU looks much cleaner for the same amount of time (around 9mins for both). Also, something seems wrong with the materials in fStorm. I mean, the pillows look almost identical, but all the rest seems off. I am pretty sure that RT GPU would be way ahead with Light Cache as secondary ray, it was BF/BF in this case. Also, the Vray scene had two sided materials for the lamps
Also, interactivity is the same for both in RT mode. fStorm is not faster in that regard.

Greyshade:



RGB:

[snivlem]

Never tried FStorm due to being on Maya (but I have used octane/corona etc..) but over this last year VRayRT has made huge leaps and bounds I must say. It went from being a novelty to something it is constantly used, no longer do I need a "draft settings" script so I could test materials, I just now fire up RT, tweak and tweak and it's great.

It looks like there is an illusion of these new renderers in that they seem more photorealistic but in reality it's because they are locked down, don't have as many features and just apply a really nice tonemapper and are optimised for small indoor scenes. I do like the unbiased lighting but I'm not sure how much of a discrepancy there is between using a Brute force workflow and some of these unbiased engines in a real world project....especially an exterior render.

I think if V-Ray got a modern filmic tonemapper and better integration of lens effects (subjective I know, but I can't get a nice result usually compared to arionfx or the like) there wouldn't be any difference apart from that you can do with more in V-Ray if you want the flexibility.

It reminds me of people using old proven full frame DSLR that are perfect for work yet Sony come out and release a mirror-less full frame camera changes the game and supposedly makes you a better photographer and people buy in ditching their perfectly good and sometimes better DSLR. In the end using a new renderer might be faster and better at particular things but it won't make you a better artist.

[vlado]

That was the point I was trying to make. When people post how "easy" Fstorm is I was curious if that was that way if you view it as a beginner (which for RT I am).

I guess it all depends on your viewpoint. For example if, for whatever reason, you have to produce a linear image out of FStorm, do you know which three or four options you need to change in order to get it? It should be an "easy" task... (That's outside the fact that for the moment FStorm can't render out an HDR image with the 3ds Max VFB - but that's something that Karba has simply overlooked for the moment.)

it is possible to have that info placed somewhere else on screen to keep your actual image clean. Just my 2cent's. Something very small, but it does effect how "technical" the process gets shown by the renderer and something that also has an effect how people experience how "easy" it is.

That's what we can do with the current VFB implementation right now. We have ideas for expanding the VFB to include extra information, but it's not there yet.

Best regards,
Vlado

[dean_dmoo]

Thanks Vlado!

@ Peter,

That was the point I was trying to make. When people post how "easy" Fstorm is I was curious if that was that way if you view it as a beginner (which for RT I am). As opposed to quite a few here who have years of experience and go very deep into the analysis. It can been interesting to take a look from a different perspective to find out which parts are actually making it seem that way and whether it is worthwhile for Vlado and the team to take it onboard. Is it down to tonemapping? Or down to how noise gets cleaned? Or lack of menu's because it's still a very young piece of software? The way they handle Glare?

I actually turned the statistics off, right at the beginning when the geometry was loading (that Vlado highlights) because I find it ugly having to view the image with the text. Not realising that that also turned off the progress being shown. So for that part my conclusion would be whether it is possible to have that info placed somewhere else on screen to keep your actual image clean. Just my 2cent's. Something very small, but it does effect how "technical" the process gets shown by the renderer and something that also has an effect how people experience how "easy" it is.

[vlado]

All I was looking for was some sort of a more realistic tonemapping...

Yes, will see about that...

Best regards,
Vlado

[peteristrate]

I don't know if it's good or bad that it's the only difference There is an option in V-Ray RT called "Show statistics" that would overlay some information in the VFB, like noise level reached, GPU load etc - see attachments.
Best regards,
Vlado

I think we're getting down to many people not knowing how to use VrayRT (or even VrayAdvanced) properly to get the most of it
I'm super happy with how the VrayRT development goes, given that many features will be implemented as well.
All I was looking for was some sort of a more realistic tonemapping, although not sure if that is the real issue, as we all discussed here.

[vlado]

For me, as pretty much a new user for both, that was the biggest UI difference I saw and what I liked with FStorm. That you could see a countdown of some kind whilst rendering, whereas with RT it was blank. Maybe it was down to settings that I couldnt see that, so let me know. But as a user, I like seeing that kind of feedback, similar to how you see passes in progressive.

I don't know if it's good or bad that it's the only difference There is an option in V-Ray RT called "Show statistics" that would overlay some information in the VFB, like noise level reached, GPU load etc - see attachments.

Best regards,
Vlado

[dean_dmoo]

I'll give it a go then....

A very brief impression of my first 5min experience to see what all the fuss is about.

Tried Fstorm earlier. Ive never really bothered with RT as the scenes I work on are nearly always too big anyway. So for me they are pretty much the same in that respect. Anyhow, opened the chicago loft by BBB, converted and hit render. Didnt work straight away, but a couple of edits got it moving. Huge glare, dramatic image. What I liked was that I could see what was happening, mostly down to the bar at the top of the renderframe, counter for samples, remaining time to cleanup, noise value. Even though initially not much was happening on screen you could see it was doing something, even when my renderframe was staying black.

Tried to change some materials but crashed out of max twice. So opened the scene again to use vrayRT to see how it compares. Scene rendered how it should and I could see file loading and LC progress but once it started rendering there was no feedback
besides the actual image cleaning up. Now had to zoom in and really look to see that it was actually doing anything as at one point I reallu wondered whether it has stopped working.

For me, as pretty much a new user for both, that was the biggest UI difference I saw and what I liked with FStorm. That you could see a countdown of some kind whilst rendering, whereas with RT it was blank. Maybe it was down to settings that I couldnt see that, so let me know. But as a user, I like seeing that kind of feedback, similar to how you see passes in progressive.

[Sbrusse]

We will never get this topic back to the initial purpose

[mitviz]

Well i think the option to have expert n normal hidden was a good way to simplify the ui n maybe the best way so far, hide more there if needed maybe which probably satisfies everyone

[joconnell]

Yeah, although I like the idea of cleaning out what's not supported, I still think having all those settings are relevant for those who does use them, and I could argue of using nearly each of those you pointed out, from time to time.
But getting what's not supported out of the UI would be great as it would avoid confusion.

It's quite tough alright - Autodesk would love to throw out edit mesh and edit poly in favour of a newer method as the swapping between mesh and poly majorly slows down calculations and redraw but there's still people actively using them and there's old scenes to be supported. They'd have to draw a line in the sand and say "from this point, your scenes are no longer supported" and there'd be utter uproar

I'm going to be working on a project soon where I'm going to be heavily using cached Irmap and LC because it makes total sense. You're right that the unfortunate price to having options is a bit more clutter.

[Sbrusse]

Yeah, although I like the idea of cleaning out what's not supported, I still think having all those settings are relevant for those who does use them, and I could argue of using nearly each of those you pointed out, from time to time.
But getting what's not supported out of the UI would be great as it would avoid confusion.

Getting back to FStorm topic, what are your thoughts on getting a build in real time bloom glare lens flare effect in Vray Vlado?