Some general ?s about rendering..

[DeWeD]

Since I am still in school and dont have to much experience I cant tell you much but here's this:

Mental ray is a very good renderutility but like everything elese in maya it takes some time to get used to and you need to do everything in "the right way". Wich is a problem because this "way" changes with your scene and what ever you are rendering.

Vray is easier to learn I have heard and makes really realistic renders.

The only way I know of rendering effectivly is experience. You ahve to know what options to use and when to use them and I would guess that goes for every renderer.
You can get amazing results with maya software but you have to "cheat" alot.
And that also goes for every renderer i belive. Cheat cheat cheat.

Try using the physical lighting in maya. It is easy to use and renders quickly.
Totally depends on what you are doing though.


DeW

[ndeboar]

1. What are the benefits and drawbacks with mentalray rendering?
Pros: Works straight out of the box, gives great photo real results
Cons: Can be slow (eg depth of field, motion blur, displacments).

2. I think mentalray can bring some realism but rendering time is killing. Is there any alternative method in rendering to get the realism without taking much time?

Renderman based renders are generally faster

3. Usually production houses relay on what kind of rendering? Is it mental ray or software?
I have heard about renderman and all but do not want to step into that.

Well, in vfx, Renderman is the most popular.

4. Also heard about vray. How good it is?
It's awesome. But, you can get pretty similar results in mental ray.

[monarts]

Hello Dew and Nick,
Your replies are really impressing. I just needed an overall idea about the rendering system and I believe, I got it. By the way, I had a look at Nick's portfolio and I really like the works. You got amazing perfection. Well, I am actually into modeling and now I think modeling only will do nothing but a fine rendering also got a vital role in our works.
Let me know if you know about some advanced tutorials of Maya rendering..
Thanks a lot and all the best..
Moncy.

[Theodocious]

to get into a little more detail -

I would argue mental ray is more popular than renderman, at least at most commercial ad houses I've worked at. There is a caveat - renderman is more popular for large-scale fully animated films. It's several orders of magnitude faster for these kinds of production, at certain things. I say certain things because renderman itself is a kind of cheat - without going into technical boring things, it doesn't do raytraced reflections or refractions well, or at all, and you have to approach everything differently, from modeling on up. it's mostly its own system and requires a fair amount of extra and specific knowledge. I don't know it myself so anyone is free to correct me.

Vray is awesome, again for specific things. It is very stable and can handle massive renders that would crash mental ray without tons of tweaking. It handles animation very well, and it's used a lot for outdoor scenes and in architectural viz. It is arguably the simplest to learn, and I feel spits out the best results with the least amount of tweaking. However therein lies it's flaws - sometimes I feel constrained by the renderer, and it doesn't seem to have as many "tricks" as mental ray.

Maybe I'm biased, but mental ray is the winner for me. If you know how to use it, which is not a simple feat, you can get renders as clean as vray and as fast as renderman, you just have to understand its insides a bit more. Nothing can touch it for flexibility, and it gets better every version. I'd say with new jumps in technology coming, like real-time raytracing, I'd learn mental ray first. Many aspects of it carry over into the other two, which I still kind of consider niche renderers. But knowing every tool available certainly can't hurt.

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