Faking SSS in ice blocks

V-Ray V-Ray for 3ds Max General
1

Hi,

We’re currently doing a rendering where a bottle is “stuck” inside a fractured (but still not exploded) ice block.
I made an ice shader using a VRayBlendMtl containing one glossy refractive glass shader and a SSS2 material, blending them together.

Now the thing looks really nice and works really good on something like a simple ice cube. As soon as I threw the shader on a multiple fractured ice block (no intersecting faces, no coplanar faces etc.) the rendertimes just skyrocket (mainly the AA pass and the primary GI bounce pass (irradiance map) take ages.

Now is there a way to fake the light scattering and brightening inside the ice block which looks somehow similar (maybe even with some photoshop) and renders faster?

2

First of all, which V-Ray version are you using?

Second, it might be possible the bake the SSS effect to (animated) textures and use that.

Best regards,
Vlado

3

Hi,

Currently using VRay 3.00.04 (Maybe updating to 05 in the next weeks).

As for the baking, I don’t even need animated stuff, it’s going to be a still image. How would I go about baking that? I mean wouldn’t it have to be a 3D texture? I’m talking really transparent ice, not a solid SSS like marble or skin.