Question on FPRIME

[Mattoo]

I found a review that shows how FPrime refines the rendered image, and how realistic it looked after 6 hours. Let's say I let FPrime run fro an untold amount of time. Will it just keep refining it until it looks completly and totally realistic, or is there a limit on the amount of refining, and after a certain time will it just look the same, regardless of how much longer I leave it on?
The amount of "realism" the image has is little to do with how long you leave it to refine - that's purely upto the skill or desire of the artist.

But to answer your question, yes, as far as I'm aware it will continue to refine forever. After it's sampled each pixel it then does sub-pixels - creating the effect of anti-aliasing.

[Crocodilian]

Let's say I let FPrime run fro an untold amount of time. Will it just keep refining it until it looks completly and totally realistic, or is there a limit on the amount of refining, and after a certain time will it just look the same, regardless of how much longer I leave it on?

After a certain point, further rays cast won't change the observed pixels any, or at least in ways that you can see. What I haven't examined is whether or not it will continue to improve the image in ways that you _can't_ see, or not on the screen, anyway.

Remember, internally, LW, and I believe fPrime, are high precision renderers. . .that is, they're not "clamped" to the 24 bit space of an output image-- that's why you can save stuff out as Cineon or other high range images-- and you _will_ see the difference (for example in shadow areas) when/if you go to a high quality film recorder.

My guess is that it precisely in those areas which are just "dark" on screen, but which may show more detail in a high range image where continued fPrime refinement may well make a difference, even when not visible on-screen.

[ThePumpkinKing]

The amount of "realism" the image has is little to do with how long you leave it to refine - that's purely upto the skill or desire of the artist.I realize it is up to the artist, but the renderer does help.

[ThePumpkinKing]

Okay, as long as I started a thread on FPRIME, I might as well ask one more question. If I render two of the exact same pictures, on in FPrime, on in LW for the same amount of time, Will the Fprime render look better than the LW render?

[tibes]

in general fprime is quite a bit faster than lightwave's renderer, so yes the fprime version will probably look better.

note that since fprime does not use the exact same rendering algorithms that lightwave uses, the renders might not look exactly the same however. it's like comparing apples and oranges. Fprime and Lightwave's render are different beasts, but you could make a generalisation that Fprime will give you better results in general, and faster.

[Crocodilian]

Okay, as long as I started a thread on FPRIME, I might as well ask one more question. If I render two of the exact same pictures, on in FPrime, on in LW for the same amount of time, Will the Fprime render look better than the LW render?

fPrime has some advantages and some disadvantages for final renders. Advantage: a better motion blur, depth of field, ability to look at something that's been rendering for an hour and decide "it needs more time in the oven"

Against that, there are some huge disadvantages-- like no volumetrics.

The great advantage of fPrime lies in being able to work interactively with things that you normally can't tweak, most notably radiosity. My fPrime renders look better than the LW renders I did before fPrime-- but so do the renders I do in the LW engine, they look better than they used to, too. . .

Why? because I never could get lighting right, and now I can.

Simple as that.

[MattClary]

Eggggsactly, Crocodilian! I replaced Viper with F-Prime.


If I am rendering something with no added effects, I will render with F-Prime, if I want caustics or some such, I tweak the scene until it is where I want it, then use LightWave's renderer.

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