is clamp max ray intensity broken in latest vray nightly?

[andybot_cg]

This scene rendered with Nov. 7 standalone build (27043) has crazy fireflies (which is coming from the HDRI in the environment slot) but the build (26961) from September 30 renders fine (both are 3.45.01 named nightly builds). Seems the only difference is "max ray intensity" clamp is working in one, and not the other (If I turn it off with the Sept 30 build, the renders are almost identical.) Since I tracked it to the max ray intensity - I can fix it if I plug the sky node in the GI slot and leave my HDRI in the environment slot. However, the lighting I get is different than my HDRI.

Is there some change in how this is handled in Vray, or is this a bug? Is there any way to increase the samples in the HDRI when it's plugged into the environment slot, or am I limited to using the dome light in this case (with the ability to increase samples?)

-Andy

[vlado]

You should use a dome light.

The way the clamping works has been modified a bit, as it caused issues with light portals and other light sources.

For future V-Ray versions, we will create a dome light internally to handle the environment sampling.

Best regards,
Vlado

[andybot_cg]

OK, thanks. I did some more testing and yes, everything works fine with dome light. Only thing was I wanted to control the background independently from the lighting. I guess I can just set up two dome lights for that case, one for GI and one for background.

[andybot_cg]

light portals and other light sources.

hmmm, I'll have to check this with some other scenes that I was having trouble with light portals - may be the same issue. Guess I'll have to change my environment set-up throughout similar scenes.

[andybot_cg]

whatever you did with 3.5, it's awesome! HDRI in a dome light is working better than ever! Thanks

[vlado]

Good to know

Best regards,
Vlado