Rendering animations, next versions....

[caje]

What are my options if I want to buy Vray4Rhino for my animation work rendering.
Is it possible?
Can I use my network for speeding up rendering time?
Wich improvements, new options will bring the new version?
What are my options in trainig this fine soft. (books, video tutorials...)
Thank you

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Well first of all there is no built in animation support within Rhino 3 or 4. To render animations with Rhino you will need another program called Bongo. Bongo itself is not really the best animation tool, and it has its problems. Currently I believe its the only animation tool out there for Rhino. I have been told that Rhino4 will expand some of what is capable with Bongo, and there is a service release that will allow bongo to work with Rhino4.

As for animation on our end it is certainly possible with Vray. We do not have a network rendering (individual frames on multiple machines) or distributed rendering (one frame across multiple machines)functionality...yet. We have been working on finding a solution for both and McNeel is looking to add that functionality within RCM as well. Rhino 4 will have significant improvements for working with Vray. Mapping will be 1000 times easier and there will also be better viewport display and meshing options. There are also numerous other improvements in Rhino 4 which will greatly increase your workflow, so my suggestion would definitely be to upgrade. We will probably be releasing a beta version of vfr4 after our upcoming service release.

As for training we have several options, and the first is right here. Our website/forum is the best resource for learning how to use Vfr. We have tutorials and our users are always willing to help others out. Its also common for us to take a look at scenes which are causing problems, so let us know whats going on and if we can't solve it for you we can take a look at your scene ourselves. We also have a new Vray Book which is close to being completed and that as will be an excelent resource as well (its already out if you know chinese). We can also do on site training if needed.

[caje]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Thank you for you answer Dalomar.
So to conclude.
There isnt yet a good animation solution available for Rhino, meaning you cannot make interior flythroughs, and as for network rendering thats also off, until maybe next release.
Bad news.

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Well Bongo can do fly throughs, but for much else its limited. I'm not sure what your intentions are, but if you want to move around a static scene than it should be fine.

As for dist/net rendering, yea its bad that its not there. Remember Vray is starting to open new doors for how people use Rhino, and in some cases there just isn't anything there yet. In Max vray uses backburner for net rendering which is a max function not a vray one. And I don't believe the dist rendering function is available in the vray sdk. I wish I could tell you better news, but the truth is the truth.

[Micha_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Flythrough and turntable animations can be done per rhino animation tools (look at render toolbar).
Bongo can be used for simple design animations.

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Yea I completely for got about those :-[. Have you used them Micha? Its been quite a while for me, and from what I remember there wasn't too much flexibility with them. I didn't actually render the sequence though, it was just to see in the viewport.

[caje]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

What are you saying now guys?!

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Okay, so I am sorry for providing the misinformation from my previous post. There are built in animation tools in rhino. they are however very basic. Go to Tools on the main menu bar and then go to Toolbar Layout. That will popup a dialog box, and on the bottom half of it are all of the different toolbars in Rhino. Find the Animation toolbar, and it should appear on your screen. The first Icon will help you set up your animation. To do so, just make a curve for the camera path and Rhino guides you through the rest. Just make sure you choose renderfull for the capture method. Once you've set everything up just press the red record button and vray will begin to render.

Sorry again for the misinformation, I was assuming you were looking for more of a keyframe type animator. Hopefully this will meet your needs, and if it does from an animation side, then Vray will be able to render it.

[craiggorton]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Vray can use those built in "animation" tools. I think what may be confusing is the definition of animation.
Bongo is used (correct me if I'm wrong) when you want geometry in the scene to actually move, like a crane lifting up. I don't use Bongo.
The built-in tools like turntable, fly-through, etc., will move the camera through a static scene and capture frames by rendering each frame. I've done this successfully. You can especially increase speed by using "save irradiance map" options so that the IM passes become much faster.

Cheers

[caje]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Can you post your animation?
Yes... I was amimg at static scenes where only the camera moves...
Its a bad that the network thing isnt available

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

The thing about the built in "animation" tools is that its difficult to control the camera. All the tools use is a curve as an input. You can either use one curve for a free camera, or use two with one being for the camera and another being for the target. The problem becomes that there is no control on how the camera moves on those curves in the sense that is just a consistent speed. You can't adjust speed or anything. I still think its possible to do a decent walkthrough, but it will probably take alot of patience. As for Bongo, it can do moving geometry and camera movements. I don't believe that it can do animation of parameters (such as focal length), materials, or things like control points. I have been told that rhino 4 frees things up a bit with those things, but I am not 100% sure.

The thing about how the built in animation tools work is that its through a script. It doesn't actually store any keyframes or any real movements. All the script does is have a series of points(derived from the curve) and moves the camera to each of those points with a render in between. Because of that I am not sure how or if network rendering would even work. For network rendering you need to have the capability of retrieving the camera position for any given time so that multiple machines can use that information to render. I don't think the capability is there within these built in "animation" tools. I guess thats kind of a double whammy.

[caje]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Yes, this sucks
Any chance this will somehow be fixed or done until the next release?
Your, but then again not you, missing few crucial things for archViz, boosting speed with network jobs and animation presentations

[dalomar_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Well, as far as the built in animation tools (the script ones) I think its just the nature of the beast. With bongo though it is something that we need to get on. So even if we did have it I don't think you would be able to take advantage of it unless you had bongo, which would be another plugin to buy/learn. Although I don't want to decrease the value behind what you request, you also must realize that animating with/inside of rhino is not something that many users even do. That being said it is an important function, and we realize that it is somthing that we will need to support in the future.

[caje]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

Although I don't want to decrease the value behind what you request, you also must realize that animating with/inside of rhino is not something that many users even do.

Maybe until now, when you made available this CG engine thats widely used in archviz purposses.

[Travis Serio_cg]

Re: Rendering animations, next versions....

i noticed when trying an animation that rhino doesnt seem to realize that vray is rendering. it will hit you with the "please wait until render is finished" message box. So you wait until it finishes the render, click the OK button and it moves to the next frame and prompts the dialog again. It does seem to save the images though. Am I doing something wrong?