wouldn't it be nice to have interactive control over post-effects?

[christianS]

Hi

If remember right, ther was a plugin by Paul for that kind of stuff. Not for the built in post effects, but for several filters included in the plugin. I Think it also had some kind of relighting post effect, or am i mixing up two plugs?

Chris

[tapaul]

yes, and it was pretty nifty.However nobody purchased it, so it was a complete waste of time and cleary not someting that more than a handfull of people are interested in.

cheers

[georgedrakakis]

does anyone remember the name of the plugin?

[fluffouille]

Finaltouch, if I remember well?

*edit*
Indeed, Finaltouch : http://www.c4dplugs.com/viewPlug.php?RECORD_KEY(PluginsRec)=ID&ID(PluginsRec)=533 (http://www.c4dplugs.com/viewPlug.php?RECORD_KEY%28PluginsRec%29=ID&ID%28PluginsRec%29=533)

Paul, maybe the market wasn't ready back then, and is more mature now for this kind of tools?

[LucentDreams]

no I think its a matter of being one of those handy workflow tools that everyone would love to have, but most can't justify it enough to pay separately for it :(

[georgedrakakis]

tnx guys,
i'll give it a try.

[laiels]

Well I was one of the few who purchased it. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work in R10. In fact it doesn't work in 9.6 either. Based on Tupaul's post I guess it would be futile for me to ask him to update it to work with R10?

[vid2k2]

Just wondering, did Maxon morph FinalTouch into Multipass?
Many similarities.

sample video footage link goes to 3DAttack and is 404 ???

[georgedrakakis]

fluffy's link is correct and it finally points to:
http://www.tools4d.com/finaltouch/final.htm

[LemonNado]

Is that tool still supported? It's not listed on the 'official' website.
Cheers
Rainer

[tapaul]

Is that tool still supported? It's not listed on the 'official' website.
Cheers
Rainer

its no longer supported.
I will delete this page (and others) shortly.

[Per-Anders]

Just wondering, did Maxon morph FinalTouch into Multipass?
Many similarities.

sample video footage link goes to 3DAttack and is 404 ???

LOL, nope, Cinema's multipass rendering capabilities existed a long long time before final touch did, no idea when they were first introduced to Cinema.

[Duffdaddy]

no I think its a matter of being one of those handy workflow tools that everyone would love to have, but most can't justify it enough to pay separately for it :(

I'd second that. This tool was on my wish for a long time, but, without adequate justification, plug-in overload (I own waaay to many), and the fact I was waiting on the release of v10 at the time, I postponed my purchase.
I'm surprise there was so little interest. Sounded truly fab.

[ChrisCousins]

...I'm surprise there was so little interest. Sounded truly fab...

The thing is, even this tool didn't do what the O.P. was asking for, ie a way of altering the settings of a post effect without having to wait for the whole scene to re-render. Effects like 'Highlights', 'Glow' etc are extremely sensitive, changing a threshold value 1 or 2% can be the difference between no effect and complete blow-out, and if you're working at print resolutions there's no way to get an accurate display of the effect except to do a full-res render.

If nothing in a render has changed except the post effect's settings, why isn't it possible for Cinema to re-use the original render and re-process the post effect when a setting is changed?

I've pretty much given up on using post-effects for this reason, it's just easier to render 32-bit and work outside the app.

[Joseppi]

snip...Effects like 'Highlights', 'Glow' etc are extremely sensitive, changing a threshold value 1 or 2% can be the difference between no effect and complete blow-out, and if you're working at print resolutions there's no way to get an accurate display of the effect except to do a full-res render...

Yes, the post effects are not "smart scaling" or "smart preview." The amount of an effect that looks right on your preview windows, disappears at print rez, requiring a new print rez render. In a production environment there is often little extra time to risk using cinema's post effects. The prudent approach is to take your base render, and Photoshop it in post.

But in terms of control, what about the "post effect" option in multipass rendering? Post Effects are listed as a multipass option... If you did the starburst lensflare, would that put the flare in a separate Photoshop layer?

Joe

[JoelOtron]

LOL, nope, Cinema's multipass rendering capabilities existed a long long time before final touch did, no idea when they were first introduced to Cinema.

Its trivia time.
R7 (aka C4d XL7) in 2001 I believe. May have been a point upgrade.

[Incarnadine]

I very much agree with Chris, re-running a multi-hour render just to attempt to tweak a post effect is a serious pain. If nothing else has changed, it should be possible to do so while still in the picture viewer. I can accept that after saving/closing it might not be do-able, but while still open...

[georgedrakakis]

The thing is, even this tool didn't do what the O.P. was asking for, ie a way of altering the settings of a post effect without having to wait for the whole scene to re-render. Effects like 'Highlights', 'Glow' etc are extremely sensitive, changing a threshold value 1 or 2% can be the difference between no effect and complete blow-out, and if you're working at print resolutions there's no way to get an accurate display of the effect except to do a full-res render.

If nothing in a render has changed except the post effect's settings, why isn't it possible for Cinema to re-use the original render and re-process the post effect when a setting is changed?

I've pretty much given up on using post-effects for this reason, it's just easier to render 32-bit and work outside the app.

well, i asked maxon support about it:

''Hello *****,
in the rendersettings you can only estimate the values and the results,
and if you want to change something you have to re-render.
i am talking about interactive change of the settings,
something like this image attached''

and i got this answer:


''Hello,
Now i understand you. But to realize this we have to program the whole cinema new,
make new prices, and a new renderer.
To realize such big project we have to rewrite the entire software and we have to force every customer to buy Advanced Render.
I think, no one at maxon would do such work. It even won't work as on your picture, because to change
posteffects, you can't take an image only, the 3D-information has to be in your systemmemory.
To have this in your memory, you have to render again, so you got a vicious circle.
Another clue is, you really need tons of memory to realize this interactive.
(size of your pic * every pass you want * bitrate = memoryusage)
(3.6MB * 3 effects * 8bit = 864MB)
This was a picture with 256 colors, 3 effects (maybe only shadows) and resolution of 1200*960
pixel, a really easy simple picture needs nearly 1GB memory.
How much is needed for a great picture then? Maybe in a few years this will be possible.''

[lllab]

well i was one of those who bought final touche.

was very nice i must say. sadly i moved soon on to other renderengines.
i liked very much the interactive curve editing of the renderer. happily the vraybuffer supports at least some of the final touche capabilities, like the curve editing like psd but at the unclamped hdr colors...
maybe maxon should imlement finaltouche as they did with sniper pro?

cheers
stefan

[Simon Wicker]

instead of using the post effects filters most people would have better results and more control if they did all of this kind of thing in post using a compositing package like after effects or shake.

i would place all of the effects like lens blur and glows, etc, in this category.

the most important post effects that we need to have in a tweakable mode would be those related to colour correction like gamma, exposure and colour mapping.

i've been doing a few tests of cinema against maxwell and it just isn't possible to get the same kind of light distribution in cinema without using an exposure control on the image. while it is possible to do this later by rendering to a floating point format and then adjusting the exposure in photoshop this is too clunky to be properly useful (i think of my inital render as the base 'negative' in photographic terms) and while i don't mind making subtle colour corrections the first pass still has to be well 'exposed' so i can see as the image is being rendered whether i have matched how i see the image in my head.

for this reason alone a nice tweakable gamma/exposure control would be welcome.

cheers, simon w.

p.s. what maxon says surely can't be true as the same limitation would apply to any image taken into a compositing application. it isn't as if a lens blur in cinema uses data not available outside the app - the lensblur is still just a 2d effect driven by a depth pass and doesn't make use of any miracle 3d information to get a better blur when objects crossover or appear behind transparencies.

[Joseppi]

...snip...Another clue is, you really need tons of memory to realize this interactive. (size of your pic * every pass you want * bitrate = memoryusage)
(3.6MB * 3 effects * 8bit = 864MB) This was a picture with 256 colors, 3 effects (maybe only shadows) and resolution of 1200*960
pixel, a really easy simple picture needs nearly 1GB memory.
How much is needed for a great picture then? Maybe in a few years this will be possible.''


a 3.6 MB picture = 864 MB to process, and hope the results are what you want... wow... I guess the translation is use Photoshop and/or After Effects to post process. Photoshop isn't going to strain applying a post effect to a 3.6 MB file.

I've used AR a bit, but it seems there is little instance where it would be better than AE or Photoshop.

I think I have just been "scared sober" out of using AR... I hope this doesn't come back to haunt me.. "I experimented with AR before... I was young, and in college... everyone was drinking... one thing led to another... and... (sob) the next thing I knew, I was using AR..."

Joe

[williamsburroughs]

Anyone not familiar with this book, truly owes it to themselves to invest in it:
http://www.3drender.com/light/index.html

It will set you free to embrace the Post Life. :)

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