VMC Bitmap Filtering

[glorybound]

I am trying to turn off bitmap filtering by using the VMC script, but the on/off is grade out. Also, I am not seeing anything for Blur value.

[Neilg]

you use the integer because there are 3 options. 0, 1 or 2 i think.

e: 0 is pyramidal, 1 is summed and 2 is none.

[glorybound]

Duh, thanks!

you use the integer because there are 3 options. 0, 1 or 2 i think.

e: 0 is pyramidal, 1 is summed and 2 is none.

[3LP]

Why not just disable the filtering in the global parameters?

That's one of the first things I'm doing in new scenes...

Stan

[Neilg]

you need to have a little bit of filtering with high contrast gloss/reflection maps and it can make bump maps look crap.

[glorybound]

Didn't know that, that was there

Why not just disable the filtering in the global parameters?

That's one of the first things I'm doing in new scenes...

Stan

[rikou]

Hi,

I am trying to turn off bitmap filtering by using the VMC script, but the on/off is grade out. Also, I am not seeing anything for Blur value.

Please, tell me where did you find this option ?

Never mind

[glorybound]

For others

[Joelaff]

I know Bobby usually does stills from what I have read of his posts, but I would never, ever disable bitmap filtering for an animation. I think it is really odd this trend for people to suggest doing so. I say do so at your own risk... If you like crawling textures that are overly sharp then feel free.

Renders always require blurring to make them look like photographs. No lens is razor sharp.

Possibly you may turn filtering down a hint for stills, but I would pretty much never go below about 0.3 at the lowest. I think I went down to 0.2 about once in order to make a client happy with sharper type on the side of their box shaped product shot. I still think that was sharper than even a large format photo, which is the majority of what I shot.

There is this (in my opinion misguided) thought by some that filtering should always go to 0.01 or something ridiculous. This is usually promoted by the same people who like to use sharpening image sampling filters like Catmul-Rom or MItchell-Netravali with ringing. While these might work for technical drawings or other stylized renders, they are not at all photographic. Even if you like the over sharpened look you can get more like a real camera by having your render blurry like film and applying sharpening in the post.

Ok, that is my General rant, not directed at any particular individual. Funny how different people like different things. I generally use a Soften filter with a 4.2 pixel radius because that comes close to looking like film to my eye, having shot film for decades.

[glorybound]

I stopped turning it off. It was an extra step and I wasn't seeing any speed improvements, at least anything worth the extra step. Maybe, opacity maps on my trees.

[Joelaff]

I have never seen much speed improvement disabling filtering (I have actually tried it despite my rant above )

I have seen speed improvement increasing the filtering multiplier for GI to 2.0 - 4.0. This new feature (right by the deactivate settings) controls the amount of filtering applied to makes for GI. Increasing this can speed up GI rendering (mainly brute force) in some cases if your maps are contrasts and contributing a lot to the lighting, especially self illuminated.

I have found the area image sampling filter to be the fastest, with slightly higher values typically faster with brute force GI, like area 2.1-3.9. I think soften 4.2 looks the best for most stuff, but it is slower than area.

[Art48]

Personally I turn filtering down, since I think it is always better to have the sharpest information possible and rather blur it in post if I need to do so. You are propably right about it not being very close to photography at all, but we all want to make awesome pictures. ANd I bet if a real camera would be capable of delivering such sharp pictures, everyone would make use of it. Just because something doesnt work in reality doesnt mean that you might not want it in your CG renderings