VRAY 2 to VRAY 3.0

[ntavian]

So I recently had to upgrade to VRay 3.0 due to the fact that Vray 2.0 was not compatible with SU 2017
My Questions is What is the work flow when trying to re render or do a revision to an old file created with VRay 2.0
things look completely different. glass is no longer transparent, materials look darker, or simply cannot find them, due to SU putting maps in some temp folder, lighting is yellow, renders are noisy
WTF is going on, Vray 2.0 was a simple program that did not take that much effort to make my designers bad models look good, now its a pain in the ass,
glass now needs thinkness?
initially thought this was a big step forward, but after using the program for a while I now see to despise it.
Somebody please tell me what I am doing wrong
and is anyone else having any of these same issues

[andybot_cg]

I've seen the same issues as you, trying to render my old vray2.0 models looked like garbage. I found most of the issue is that GPU rendering lacks a lot of support for converting old vfs2 materials to vfs3 (for example the reflection layer of the old material setups). Thus, choosing CPU instead gets a lot closer to being able to "plug-n-play" old models with vfs3. It also helps to reset to default settings and start from there, as the options settings from vfs2 to vfs3 are, on the whole, not compatible. I'm also waiting for the promised hotfix that should address a fair number of bugs in the initial release. As with all things Vray for Sketchup, patience is advised

Andy

[ntavian]

thanks for your response
I am a bit relieved that I am not the only one having issues
not exactly sure what you mean about GPU rendering or choosing CPU instead gets a lot closer?
all I know is I feel like yes they did improve a few things but overall this program has gotten worse and harder to use right out of the box
I know VRAY tries to be as physically accurate as possible, but I just want a simple program that doesn't take that much effort to produce a halfway decent render
SMH

[andybot_cg]

There are two rendering engines, CPU and GPU. They don't always render materials the same, and right now, some of the conversion from vfs2 materials is not handled correctly in GPU rendering. When you render with CPU, the materials look a lot closer to how they used to look in vfs2.

They made a huge overhaul to the render engine, so currently, you may be better off clearing the scene of vfs2 information and starting from scratch. I'm moderately hopeful they can fix the importing of old materials, but I have no idea Chaos Group's timeframe for getting us the fixes, and if they will fully resolve the issues. Yep, I've been shaking my head too.

[ntavian]

sorry for the dumb question, but how and where do I switch rendering engines from CPU to GPU
thanks

[andybot_cg]

sure - it's the "GPU acceleration" switch. When it's enabled, Vray uses the GPU to render.

[delineator]

I know VRAY tries to be as physically accurate as possible, but I just want a simple program that doesn't take that much effort to produce a halfway decent render

Lots to unpack here. I hope you have your usability issues solved, but I would honestly suggest if your using SU, to go out and get your feet wet with other rendering platforms. First and foremost, vray is not physically accurate (at least not how you and I are using it), and that isn't really the point to vray. Note that sliders default to multipliers and scales, instead of watts, lumens, etc. Physical accuracy is a whole other thing with render engines, and there are some that really hone in on this because the way light behaves needs to be as accurate as possible for specific use cases (in architecture, light studies and light plots).

This will give you a rough idea of different types of engines (bias vs unbiased engines).

Out of the gate, vray is incredibly powerful, somewhat complex, and has a somewhat higher learning curve. Luckily for SU users, there are probably 20 easy to access render engines that you may want to try out. Its really going to come down to how you are using the engine and what type of workflow you want.

[andybot_cg]

@delineator, I think you're a bit off base. He's not talking about the render engine, he's talking about workflow. The jump from vfs2 to vfs3 broke a lot of workflow, especially as it relates to textures and materials, and it may take some time to figure out what works and what doesn't. There are specific fixes that got implemented to repair some workflow breaks, and there are hopefully more coming. For example, when you lose connection between the SU texture and the Vray material, there's a button in the textures to allow you to re-link that texture back to SU. @ntavian, If you have other oddities you're trying to figure out don't hesitate to ask.

[konstantin_chaos]

So I recently had to upgrade to VRay 3.0 due to the fact that Vray 2.0 was not compatible with SU 2017
My Questions is What is the work flow when trying to re render or do a revision to an old file created with VRay 2.0
things look completely different. glass is no longer transparent, materials look darker, or simply cannot find them, due to SU putting maps in some temp folder, lighting is yellow, renders are noisy
WTF is going on, Vray 2.0 was a simple program that did not take that much effort to make my designers bad models look good, now its a pain in the ass,
glass now needs thinkness?
initially thought this was a big step forward, but after using the program for a while I now see to despise it.
Somebody please tell me what I am doing wrong
and is anyone else having any of these same issues

Hi ntavian,

The jump from V-Ray 2 to V-Ray 3 was quite a big one for us at Chaosgroup.
Our intention with this new version was to have a much simpler software that still gives you access to all the tools required for creating high-end visualizations.
We were successful with that task but to achieve it we had to change a lot.
To account for the changes, when you load a V-Ray 2 scene with the new version, there is an 'Upgrade' script (it's running silently) in place, that changes some scene settings and material parameters to give you similar rendered results.
There are some things that will not match exactly. An example for that is the camera exposure.
But usually you can match your V-Ray 2 renderings with a couple of minor scene changes.
For more information on the migration you can check out this section in the documentation:

https://docs.chaosgroup.com/display/...vious+Versions

If your scenes render completely different, then please share some scene examples that we can test and possibly improve our upgrade script.

Another thing that I have to point out is:
When you start working on a new project, using the new V-Ray version you'll appreciate what we did, I believe.
The general workflow in V-Ray 3 is much more streamlined and intuitive.
The whole scene management is centralized in the 'Asset Editor'.
There is a material library with 500+ materials available out of the box.

In order to get familiar with the new interface and workflow you can check out the V-Ray for SketchUp quick start videos on the documentation page or on our YouTube channel 'ChaosgroupTV'

Regards,
Konstantin