Refining processed vraymaps

[cgrande]

I have incrementally added to a series of animations within the same space or group of spaces. Some areas of the animation converge so the final vrmap is getting prety fast and big.
Given this, is it now possible to go back and increase the settings (such as passes and HSph.subs and Interp. samples to get even better results. I've noticed that I started with 2 passes and now got it to 4 passes and its seems to look like its adding more information on the 3rd and 4th pass because it really slows down. In some areas i have seen an improvement but really havnet gone rendering more frames.
The other question is if I calculate every 15 frames can I go back and calculate every 8 frames with higher or exact settings? Will this mess up the map? Again, I'm only raising the level of quality in all of these cases.
Lastly, if I use the vrmap viewer to merge other maps with different settings is that a problem? I have an exterior set of animations and interior set so I'm doing them independantly.

Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

[cgrande]

Just waiting for anyone to shed any light on this. Is it like progressive refinement? Can we add additional passes by altering the min or max rate and get better quality? Can we change other indirect illumination settings to get better quality?

[RErender]

I don't think anyone has ever tried all that, let us know how it works.

[cgrande]

dont have time to experiment right now, that is the problem but someone here on the boards if not chaos themselves should now in theary if it works. I'm essentially just wanting to add more sample points to clean up shadows and details.

[RErender]

In theory it should work, changeing the increment should not be a problem. Though if a imap gets too large it can be a drag on rendering.

[cgrande]

right now the map is only 22megs so I think that will be fine. What do you think?

[RErender]

I have not noticed any problems except with files over 200mb, but most of the imaps we create are in the 20-40mb range.

[cgrande]

very useful information, thanks

[losbellos]

As I remember someone already asked this quite some time ago and Vlado answered yes, you can do it.

But actually you could simply ttry with few teapot its really takes few minutes...

[vlado]

Given this, is it now possible to go back and increase the settings (such as passes and HSph.subs and Interp. samples to get even better results.

You can change the Min/Max rate and the threshold settings safely, but it is not a good idea to change the hemispheric subdivs.

The other question is if I calculate every 15 frames can I go back and calculate every 8 frames with higher or exact settings? Will this mess up the map?

Yes, you can do that; it will not mess up the irradiance map.

Lastly, if I use the vrmap viewer to merge other maps with different settings is that a problem? I have an exterior set of animations and interior set so I'm doing them independantly.

Yes, you can do that, it's not a problem.

Best regards,
Vlado