Cornell Box

[Wegg]

Second attempt.http://www.eggington.net/%7EWegg/Messiah/ImageB.png

[tjnyc]

Did you increase your raytrace shadow quality to 6 or 10 to smooth out the shadow?

[Wegg]

Yea I put the shadow quality up to 10. Sorry for not mentioning that.

This one isn't practicle. http://www.eggington.net/%7EWegg/Messiah/ImageC.png

[Julez4001]

What type of machine are you on?

[Wegg]

I'm on a Dual 2ghz Athlon MP with a gig of ram.

Now we are getting somewhere.

http://www.eggington.net/%7EWegg/Messiah/ImageD.png

[Wegg]

Ooo baby. . . I knew I could figure something sexy/cool/fast out. . . http://www.eggington.net/%7EWegg/Messiah/ImageE.png

[Julez4001]

Good test.

Take th last scene and slap a texture and bumpmap on the ball.

[Wegg]

Well I think the point of the Cornell box is to keep the textures simple so you can see how the light works. But I suppose a bump map would be cool huh. . .

[chikega]

I was wondering when you were going to finally succumb to using GI Noise Reduction, Wegg - ;) Nice studies! :)

[tjnyc]

Wegg,

Have you tried changing the ball material to glass and turning on caustics(aproximated) with GI Noise Reduction on. I did some test with GI Noise Reduction and Caustics in the previous version, but caustic didn't work when GI Noise Reduction was on.


Cheers,

[Wegg]

I have used noise reduction in the past but I got some really blotchy nasty results. This is the first time I have ever sat down in a controlled envirnment and played with it till it works. It isn't exactly intuative. . . <shrug>.

Anyway I rendered a little animation over night. Nothing amazing but I am VERY happy with the results. http://www.eggington.net/~Wegg/Messiah/TestOn2.mov <small version> http://www.eggington.net/~Wegg/Messiah/Test.mov Big uncompressed version.

The ONLY thing I can see that could be an issue is the antialiasing of the line between the ceiling and the walls. There appears to be a lot of noise. I only had AA set to 4 but. . . still it shouldn't be THAT noisy. . . you know? Anyway. . . this probably concludes my test for now.

[ThomasHelzle]

I hated GI noise reduction first too since I followed the manual :)

But like you, I found that if you set the photons to 1,000,000+, the Radius as small as possible (0.25 = 25cm is my default, depending on the scene) and the Count to something like 1000, you can get good results if you crank up the Tolerance. Settings from 5-10 are what I like most, it leaves a bit of cloudiness without washing stuff out too much.
The Photon amount doesn't slow rendering down much so going as high as possible helps a lot in my experience.
GI samples is mostly between 3 and 6 here, GI depth between 2 and 3.

The cool thing is that the AA pass is much faster since the image has almost no grain. But I use hardly any setting above 2 or 3 Enhanced, 1.5, RG.

This is for still images though - animation is much harder.

Sad that the basic shader doesn't support the noise reduction :(

Cheers,

[Julez4001]

Ah Wegg
That was the perfect time to use the Melt effect. You know you don't get to many oppurtunities.

[Wegg]

http://www.eggington.net/%7EWegg/Messiah/Green.png
Some SSS and bump/displace.

Wish I could tint the SSS color. . . Like in G2.

http://www.eggington.net/~Wegg/Messiah/TranslucentOn2.mov (http://www.eggington.net/%7EWegg/Messiah/TranslucentOn2.mov)

[SergO]

Sad that the basic shader doesn't support the noise reduction :(

Cheers, in addition to that:

-Not affected by the main "GI intensity" setting
-Not affected by Diffuse, eg a 0% diffuse material will still be fully illuminated by radiosity.
-Its Radiosity cannot be locally turned Off... If it could be turned Off you would be able to blend its other effects with say a matte shader can can use radiosity properly.

Cheers
Serg

[SergO]

Basically the only way to control the radiosity intensity in a Basic Shader material is by reducing the brightness of the Enviroment.

Serg

[Taron333]

OH DAMN....you're right...I must have switched things around and totally missed that. Originally I had this all hooked up fine, but during the great improvements, this stuff went to craps..hahaha...sorry, my bad! I don't even know how I missed that...very strange! Well thank you very much! Although it is really eery....but you can be certain it'll be patched in a flash!

Taron

[SergO]

Cool Taron!!
do we have to wait for the next big patch, or can you release it by itself?

Wegg,
How did you do the translucency in the jelly thing? are my eyes fooling me or is that a soft SSS shadow?

Cheers

Serg

[Julez4001]

http://www.eggington.net/%7EWegg/Messiah/Green.png
Some SSS and bump/displace.

Wish I could tint the SSS color. . . Like in G2.

http://www.eggington.net/~Wegg/Messiah/TranslucentOn2.mov


Fake it if you can with weightspot and secondary shader.

taron - hurry up with that shader patch (cracks whip!)

[Wegg]

No thats a normal shadow. Not even trans. . . mu. . . gah whats that word. . . <launch Messiah> transmisive. Radiosity just takes the "Glow" from the jelly's SSS and bounces it around casting green light onto it's shadow. Pretty spiffy huh!

[Taron333]

Sure thing...it will be a separate patch...shader update...no worries...probably tomorrow! :P

[SergO]

just a quick reminder re the patch ;)

Serg

[Taron333]

Hey, thanx...I just released it...should be posted by now...hmmm...I don't keep track of the postings. I may be that it goes through the beta again, but I wanted to drop this version of the basicShader right away on you, because it has only minor changes....radiosity now is controlled by the sum of diffuse and extension strength. OH ah ja, and I added a smoother translucency to it...a tiny scatter, kind of micro scatter...so it's a little slower, but nicer. As soon as the bigger thing is finished, there will be a whole new version of the basic shader that will regard all shadow types as well. I'm really sorry and angry that I couldn't give you that already...it's a process! But it's leaping there now, really...lot's of things are happening and very soon there'll be a major fun addition! :smile:

Thanx for your patience! Oh, and happy New Year, in case I didn't say that yet...

Taron

[SergO]

Hi Taron :)
will the patch be on the pmg download page?

thanks :)
Serg

[Taron333]

Patch is there now! (http://www.projectmessiah.com/x2/downloads_main.htm)

[AlexK]

Thanks to you from Regensburg, Germany. :thumbsup:

[SergO]

Hi Taron

Unfortunatelu I think this one is still broken :(

Transluncency doesnt work at all now, nothing happens with any the extended lighting types.

-If I set the diffuse to 0%, radiosity is still rendered at full intensity.
-GI Intensity doesnt affect basic shader.
-Noise reduction doesnt affect basic shader

Maybe a config file thing?

If its not practical to fix these 3 things (I regard these as pretty major bugs that will kick my ass at some point, in fact they already have otherwise I wouldnt be saying this :) ), or even if this is easily fixable, or if it has already been fixed... A good feature for for it would be an Option to turn Off its radiosity completely. No sarcasm is intended ;) , really, there is actually a good reason :D

A practical example:
For example, in the skin shader I'm currently working on, I want to have different materials for different shading components (or passes) such as diffuse, sss, specular, reflection, etc... (I mean, as in the blending options in the "Surfaces" tab...)
This is great for organisational purposes... You dont have to be looking at a vast spaghetti like shading tree, instead treat things more like layers in Photoshop... and in this case its a great way to seperate the Specular bump intensity from the Diffuse, which is essential for skin, and other layered/laquered materials.
Also, because the options for saving out passes in Messiah are so limited, its also a great way to organise rendering passes for export!

Now, there is only one thing preventing me from using this workflow... BasicShader. I need to seperate the sss from the radiosity, because, when I add the sss material with the diffuse material (in the manner described above) the Basic Shader's radiosity solution will inevitably add to it, therefore giving incorrect result, and doubling rendering time because Diffuse material is already doing radiosity.

Right now, BasicShader is forcing me to go about things its way, rather than allowing me the flexibility that a shading tree is supposed to give.

Plz let me know if my explanation is not clear

Cheers

Serg

[SergO]

Hi,

I deleted configs, translucency still broken. The only thing that appears to be working is the Xtend Shade mode, I suspect because this mode doesnt do any volumetric stuff.

I managed to get it to show some corrupted stuff with the other modes though.
Load the Butch model, add Distant light, aim camera etc...

Add Basic shader and set it to:
Light Function-> Extended
Xtension Ammount 1.0
Xtension Depth 1.0
Xtension Strengh 1.0

Connect BasicShader to CustomShading material's radiance

Render and you see that nothing sss related is evident on the image, even after entering ridiculous values. Looks like plain diffuse shading.

Set Render Geometry to Pre-Generated Polys... Render now shows and some weird thing goin on... Butch looks like he got a tshirt on.

Turn On Double Sided... Render doesnt show any sss, just plain diffuse shading.

Hope this helps find the reason why it doesnt work.

Cheers

Serg

[SergO]

Can anyone else confirm this stuff? wonderin if its just me.

Thanks
Serg

[SergO]

Would be a good idea to remove the link to the broken BasicShader from the site... The only way to restore the previous mostly-working BasicShader is to install 2.0 then 2.1 again.

Cheers

Serg

PS. who do I contact regarding bugs? found a couple related to rendering today.

[Taron333]

Thanx for the info, but don't hesitate to contact me personally if problems appear to persist. I will look into it immediately or at least asap. :thumbsup:

[SergO]

From the looks of your post I can only think that there is a misunderstanding or something :)

I'm not looking for advice... The purpose of my first post, was to inform you and other BasicShader users, that the update to BasicShader that was posted on pmg's website is not working (Its various Xtension modes are not working at all...somebody pleeeaaase confirm this) .... and also a feature request to have an option to turn its radiosity off completely, including one of many practical examples of why that would be a good thing (in addition to the noise shading reduction flaw).

It seems that the BasicShader you are using yourself is working... on my second post I asked here if anyone else had the same problem. Unfortunately it seems no one else can be bothered right now to confirm/deny that its broken.

THanks

Serg

[chikega]

Can anyone else confirm this stuff? wonderin if its just me.

Thanks
Serg
Serg - sorry, I didn't get to you sooner. The latest basicshader appears to be not functioning properly. I set up the Butch scene as you described above, but I went one step further and turned down the diffuse level to 0 in order to see a pure SSS effect. The latest basic shader produced a completely black butch. I then loaded the previous basic shader and re-rendered and light is being transmitted properly within him. So, Serg, you're not going crazy. I confirm your findings. :)

[chikega]

Here are the renders confirming Serg's findings:

Butch render with previous basic shader:
http://www.3ddmd.com/images/Messiah/basicshader1.jpg

Butch render with latest basic shader:
http://www.3ddmd.com/images/Messiah/basicshader2.jpg

[SergO]

Hi Chikega,
Dont worry, you have nothing to be sorry about, and thanks for the illustrated examples... I guess seeing is believing :)

I was 99.9% sure I wasnt crazy... well... at least certainly not to the point where I'm hallucinating about how best to ensure a happy long term intimate relationship with BasicShader, intercourse included :D

Cheers
Serg

[chikega]

ROTFL - I like your sense of humor, Serg. :scream:

I have two separate versions of messiah - one with the new basic shader and one with the older one - and what's interesting is that I loaded the scene into the messiah with the new basic shader and it rendered correctly. I saved and reopened and it still renders correctly. I then tried to recreate the scene from scratch and it doesn't work. I tried this several times and each time I duplicated my findings. For some reason, creating the setup in the older version will open correctly in the newer version - very strange. :shrug:

[Taron333]

....BIG BIG BIG apologies, I'm so sorry guys! I really screwed up this time. No need to justify this much more, I wanted to give it to you quick, yet, I was too hasty. In my attempt to make it twice as good, I actually succeeded, yet, only to mess up the standarts...hehe...if you check, use a spot light and find out that what was working still works. HOWEVER, I've got the new version written and compiled and sent off for posting just now!

I humbley lower my head in shame and beg for your forgiveness. :banghead:

However, I hope soon you will see what kept me from fixing it last week already...I've made a little short-film that shows also again some more basicShading with the new stuff! :D

So again, SergO, you've done a good job making lots of noise and I've got a medal for you dangling around as a reminder that you've been the first to complain. I kinda prefer however to get ALSO a private note on things like that at times, especially if it's urgent in any way, because I can't always browse around on the list....good job however! So yeah....if you have any troubles, please don't hesitate to write to my email at projectmessiah.com (taron @ ....) I just don't want to keep the spam down, hope that works that way?!

Ok, I'll drop another note as soon as it is posted! I think and hope I've learned my lesson, but yeah...we shall find out (yikes)! I've got new pretty stuff brewing that may hopefully make up with the mess as well....and introduce some very new mess... :rolleyes:

All the best to all of you!

Taron

[chikega]

Preliminary testing seems to be positive thus far ....
http://www.3ddmd.com/images/Messiah/ButchSSS.jpg
http://www.3ddmd.com/images/Messiah/ScorpiusSkin.jpg

[Taron333]

Excellente!!! :bounce:

So just that everybody knows, the new version is online and replaced! So just go ahead and download it now! :)

[Leebre]

However, I hope soon you will see what kept me from fixing it last week already...I've made a little short-film that shows also again some more basicShading with the new stuff! :D


Cool, can't wait!

BTW, great music. I'm listening to Themepark Secrets right now and I'm going to add it to my playlist. :applause:

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