Vray 2.0: 2 paid updates per year?

[Neilg]

To be honest I really enjoyed learning vray from scattered tutorials and pure trial & error. You got back exactly what you put in, and really felt like you were achieving something. It was also much much easier for me to learn than mental ray, i thought that was a mess.
Had I grown up on presets theres no way i'd know half the stuff I do on it. I think the guide on spot3d is fantastic for actually learning the software and goes into incredible depth on why all the different methods look different and how they work, then you've got vray materials.de too.

[AJ Jefferies]

If you ever tried learning Vray on your own with no outside help such as I did many years ago, it was very daunting.

I did & I do remember

I also tried learning Mental Ray and by comparison V-ray was like a breath of fresh air (a fact I still think is true) - so it's all relative.

The only time you ever really want to "tweak" the settings is for an animation, a high quality rendering, or if time is a big issue

Well that is pretty much is 99% of my day!

I'm not saying keep things complicated for the sake of it, I just wouldn't like the idea of losing control for the sake of keeping things (seemingly) simple. I appreciate I may be in the minority though!

[thablanch]

I agree with your points AJ, but my talk here is regarding the potential new users. They do not want lo learn a software, they just want to use it. (That would be why SketchUp is so popular.. nothing to learn, you just do) Most people using Vray are not "pros" like you and me, they want something to be rendered, that's it.

A double interface could be cool, as jujubee mentionned, noobs and pros could have their best shoot at the software.

I know I'm getting way of topic, as this thread is about paying updates, but we are talking about presets: I really hope that Vray 2.0 will be able to read ProMaterials ( or what ever they call them now) I had to use Mental Ray too many times in the last year...

[jujubee]

I just wouldn't like the idea of losing control for the sake of keeping things (seemingly) simple.

There's no reason why anyone would have to "lose control." It can just be an additional option.

The only reason why I think anyone wouldn't want presets to be introduced are:
1) Makes them feel less useful.
2) Increases the threat of competition.
3) Jeopardizes the safety of their jobs.
4) Bitter that they had to do all the "hard work" and someone else got off easy.

I know I'm getting way of topic, as this thread is about paying updates, but we are talking about presets: I really hope that Vray 2.0 will be able to read ProMaterials ( or what ever they call them now) I had to use Mental Ray too many times in the last year...

Would be nice but, don't hold your breath. I asked for presets many years ago and the only thing that ever came out were the SSS shaders.

[thablanch]

The Pro materials are not supported yet; we hope to release an expansion pack for sp3 to support those too sometime soon.

Best regards,
Vlado

I do not hold my breath on this, but I really do hope...

[AJ Jefferies]

The only reason why I think anyone wouldn't want presets to be introduced are:
1) Makes them feel less useful.
2) Increases the threat of competition.
3) Jeopardizes the safety of their jobs.
4) Bitter that they had to do all the "hard work" and someone else got off easy.

Well that paints me in a great light! My apologies if that's how I've come across.

I certainly would never chastise people for taking a simpler/faster route - the tools we have at our disposal now are all much quicker & more powerful than they were 10 years ago...

I was actually thinking that it would be a shame for users (new or old) to come to rely on presets, because no-one works exactly the same way & no two jobs are the same. Do you use irradiance or brute force? Physical or normal camera? LWF? Caustics? Ambient Occlusion?

Anyway, we've definitely strayed off topic, so I'll stop now. Although I will add one more thing - if I lose out on work because the software I use becomes more accessible to others, then I was focussed on the wrong thing!

[jujubee]

Well that paints me in a great light!

Sorry lol. I just can't figure out why people get so defensive whenever someone mentions presets, but you're not the first to come down on that suggestion. It reminds me of the people who always argue that Linux is better than Windows. Personally, I just want to focus more on the art/end-results than the actual technique involving a constant focus on tweaks/optimizations. I'm not looking to create my own paintbrush, oils, and canvas from scratch. That's why programs such as Maxwell and Fryrender appeal to a lot of artists because they obtain a "best-fit" scenario right out of the box.

Anyways, speaking of paid updates... Has MR become any easier?

[Neilg]

It's more to do with knowing theres a gang of people that can make great renders in one exact way but have absolutley no idea how it works or what it's doing to get there.

I dont know why I care about this either, it's completley irrelevant.

[plastic_]

It's a null argument, I may as well say, all the dialogs in max are superfluous, real pros should use maxscript commands for everything. Like in old autocad days. That would get rid of all the point&click amateurs. Maybe a render labor union should be founded to ensure Complicated Workflow Protection.

[jujubee]

LOL Plastic... That's pretty funny. I beginning to think the real pros should code the renderer engines themselves from BASIC or Cobalt. Now that would be impressive.

[instinct]

For me it is a mixed topic. I am not too much for presets because i personally prolly wouldnt use them as they are usually restricting. For example the FastSSS2 material. While it is a nice way to quickly get a very nice result you cannot seperate its components (diff,spec,sss,backsacatter etc) into renderelements for flexibility in post so i am back to using a blend mat. Now while i think it is perfectly fine if it suits other ppl's workflows it does draw quite some dev time that is not spend on features that would be of more use for me...so it is a plain egoistical rant :P

Regards,
Thorsten

[jujubee]

It's not that much development time I think if done properly. Just set up a framework for us end-users to create our own materials with categories/labels and to upload them to a server where others can download them later.

The server would have ratings and comments with restricted access (just like this forum), just like the Vray Materials website. Not only would it be useful, but I think it could give Chaos additional sales because people would want to access those preset material libraries.

As for the question of development time, I see that most of the time has been taken of the core of Vray these past couple of years and put on other developments such as Vray for Maya, SU, RT, PDPlayer, etc. It's already been getting thinned out.

[instinct]

Maya and PDPlayer are different teams if i am not mistaken. To make things work right it will take quite some devtime. But i gotta admit that i missunderstood your request hehe. I was interpreting it as the Skinshader and things like that (Stoneshader, Rockshader, Metalshader you name it).

Regards,
Thorsten

[jujubee]

I think the core of Vray is still Chaos, but then the rest of the work happens with other developers such as ASGVis. I think Chaos is handling the Maya version too.

I didn't bring up the request in this thread either, but have a long time ago in the past (and gave up back then...)

Wonder whatever happened to the standalone... Perhaps once these are all done, that will eventually happen?

[rmejia]

It's not that much development time I think if done properly. Just set up a framework for us end-users to create our own materials with categories/labels and to upload them to a server where others can download them later.

The server would have ratings and comments with restricted access (just like this forum), just like the Vray Materials website. Not only would it be useful, but I think it could give Chaos additional sales because people would want to access those preset material libraries.

I think this would be great. An official area in the chaosgroup website with shared materials for registered users. Like the vraymaterials website but with greater control over what get's submitted. There is a lot of junk at the unofficial vraymaterials website. Maybe it could be opened up for volunteers to review the submissions, something like the Apple app store review to maintain some quality to the materials submitted. I've downloaded many materials from that place and had to delete them almost instantly because they were awful.