DISPLAY luts aren’t baked.
Color Mapping which is clipped to 1.0 IS baked, and into a clipped image at that (the curve itself contains no info on how to look up values above 1.0).
Which is what those curves, and Octane, do (you can NOT apply the curves and have an unclamped image. Not in the VFB, not saved on disk. Apply the curves, and the image is clamped.).
As for the luts list, here’s a few questions i’d need answered to mock a UI up, ideally with each point backed up by example workflows and proper documentation, so that evaluating how to proceed is clear:
Can you name a few general purpose LuTs you’d like added?
I’m sure i could find and convert them in nuke for you to load in the VRay VFB.
Once those are done, would you still want a dropdown to load them?
Would you want a warning when the loading of a LuT changes your display color space to Log?
Should there be a checkbox to make sure the output is linear?
What should be done when a LUT is loaded into the LUT dialog and another is preselected?
How would you make very clear which of the two is applied, or if they’re being applied chained, and if they are, which one is first and which one second (as order matters, very often)?
Would someone not want those presets converted to OCIO, and should we then not make sure we add the dropdown for OCIO descriptors too?
But then, should they match the ones for standard LuTs, or should they be of a different batch, given OCIO is more modern, and has less of an heritage in production to deal with?
Most of all, how would we do all that without making the VFB unwieldy and overcomplicated to use, catering for those users which have been crying out for an UI overhaul and simplification?
Right now, most of the complicated and potentially hazardous color science is relegated to fairly complicated steps across the UI, which insures only those with a precise need will bother, and one can suppose those users know what they are doing.
Add LuTs as a dropdown, and well, you are exposing that to your average joe which needs them like a fish needs a bicycle, and which will likely rue the limitations of such an approach (when mishandled and not backed up by proper post) and wonder why was it put there in the first place.
But the latter are my fears, not actual data.
The questions above are the questions i mulled when the proposal for a DDL of LuTs (1,2,3D whatever.) was suggested, and i still have no answer to any of them, or an answer which isn’t a worry, or leads to major risks for very little potential return.