Chaos Scatter

[^Lele^]

Argh.
Is it the CPU or the GPU, did you check what was being used?

[GregoryVFX]

Argh.
Is it the CPU or the GPU, did you check what was being used?

Where do I check that ?

[^Lele^]

Something like the task manager, or GPU-Z or analogous.
My idea is that if it's the CPU, perhaps it has to do with the recalculation of some of the scatter properties, while if it's the GPU maybe for some reason it's not being d3d cached, f.e.
The devs will surely know best, but i am curious myself as well.

[GregoryVFX]

Oh right....
No I didn't bother; the results speak for themselves.
Hope we can get some decent performance out of it, or else it might not get the traction it should have...

[^Lele^]

I tested myself: the CPU isn't bothered at all, and surprisingly the GPU isn't either (mine doesn't even clock up from idle).
The speed (or lack thereof) seems truly similar to non-cached direct3d (so perhaps it's not a terribly difficult fix.).
Perhaps however the non-caching is due to the fact that the instances can be individually edited in the viewport, and the caching, much like for modelling, has adverse performance considerations.

[GregoryVFX]

Then, what Tyflow does differently?
Cause you can edit the instances there too and still have the performance.

[^Lele^]

Then, what Tyflow does differently?
Cause you can edit the instances there too and still have the performance.

Not exactly in the same way, the two tools are markedly different, even if some features overlap.
It could be an oversight, it could be a limitation, but only a dev may be able to tell.

[GregoryVFX]

Dunno; Scatter looks like a useful tool with a targeted application usage, were Tyflow is of course more broad and generic and you need to create that functionality yourself.
Scatter easy of use would be a no-brainer for large scale scattering, if gets the same performance displaying instances as Tyflow does.
If not, it's still gonna be useful, if you can live without diplaying instances in the viewport.

[^Lele^]

If not, it's still gonna be useful, if you can live without diplaying instances in the viewport.

Historically, that is precisely what rendertime scatterers do: show 1k instances, render 100 million of those efficiently (gravel, trees, and so on. Cfr. Forest Pro.).
Anything else is a bonus.

[Xntric]

Thanks Michael,

I forgot a few imporant FP features to add to the list:

- Other types of exclusion/inclusion area geometries including Chaos Scatter objects and painting.
- I just tested this and either I'm doing something wrong or it's not possible yet, but add the ability to add animated geometries, and the ability to offset the animation (by increments or randomly or...)

I'd like to add the ability to scatter objects on displaced surfaces to that list.

[JonasNöll]

Hi, is there a way to make the slope limitation fade in and out? At the moment there is a sharp cut at whatever value is set. Would look much nicer if you could define a transition area where the scaling and density is maybe reduced (similar like for the spline near and far area)...

[luis_felipe]

Valoraría mucho que VRay SCatter se centre inicialmente mas en la velocidad de renderizado y facilidad de uso. El solo hecho de arrastrar directamente una scattering ya pre configurado y listo para su uso a un plano del dibujo o área de dibujo, es muy ágil y rápido para hacer presentaciones y diseños muy rápidos

[racoonart]

My 2 cents regarding scatter... Right now, Chaos scatter is comparatively bare-bones. I presume that this is on purpose. However, there are a few features that are just absolutely necessary for the vast majority of our scenes (not everyone's, ours) :
- Elevation cut-offs - with density/scale falloffs! Right now you need to use a mask to exclude mountains.
- Same for slope
- Clumping. Different species/variations should have some clumping in certain conditions. Not having this feature really limits the use cases for us - or requires a lot of additional manual work.
- I don't understand the density falloff of curves in "areas". It doesn't seem to do anything, at least not without scale on 1.0 as well.

It's obviously not meant to be a forestpack, so I'm not going to request features in that category, but these "basic" points up there would be the minimum for us to be able to use chaos scatter in our scenes.

[oglu]

One more vote for clumping!

[anders]

Does Chaos Scatter needs it's own license, since installing the latest build I get an error that I need a license, even if vray6 is working just fine?