The C4D Renderer vs The Rest!

#81

The only RENDERER feature that would be nice in Cinema is displacement.

  • subpixel displacement;
  • better/faster motion blur;
  • much faster area shadows;
  • soft shadow caching;
  • NPR system;
  • SSS;
  • two-point perspective;
  • dof;
  • improved GI (speed and quality).
#82

Originally posted by Brent Turbo
PRman: fast, solid, amazing displacement, deep shadows, and that’s about it. That’s why it’s the most used, but again, what makes it “the best”?

  • fully programmable - you don’t have to wait for some company to implement your desired feature, simply implement it yourself
  • application independant, integrates perfectly into production pipelines
  • focus on film production (motion blur and depth of field are more important than ray tracing or GI)
#83

Its all very well saying dont bring in the skill of the artist when talking about the relative merits of various renderers. How does one assess the quality of this renderer or that renderer- only by the work of a particular artist. If you take a peek at various ‘free’ 3d artist galleries on the web you’ll notice that the vast majority of it is very poor- not the sort of stuff to sell the software.

Obviously software does matter- we’re not just talking about tubes of oil paint…

The fact is that many artists in 3d are struggling to get ‘great’ imagery with their chosen software, where a few others, with the same software are producing mind boggling quality images…

In a recent interview, Maxon have said that there is no prospect of tagging on the ability to use external renderers, like Brazil, Mray etc, but there may be the possiblity in the near future to export to Renderman. Well, if people want and can afford these add ons, why dont they migrate to an app that uses them, like XSI or Maya? Why, at the present moment in development, would people wanting to use those renderers, want to work out
of c4d anyway? What does c4d have in the way of modelling versatility and animation features, that XSI and Maya don’t have?

Much better for Maxon to build and improve on the features c4d has already, in order to make it the most desirable working environment. Worry about add on renderers then.

#84

Everybody talking about programming and coding shaders now, and sometimes they are the same people who always complain about Thinking Particles being too complex for them or even unable to touch a Xpresso node. There are tons of things we still don’t have, ngons, some decent modeling tools, some lacking channels in the material manager (the refraction one for example), some decent CA tool, NLA, a decent axis… And you’d like to have a programmable renderer? Why? Because it’s “cool”? Maxon won’t take any of the 3rd party renderers out there to C4D and i thank god for that. How many people here have tested Vray, finalRender or Brazil in a production environment? Do you want Prman? Ok cool, but 1st it’d be nice to have texture trees. Do you want Mental Ray? Forget it, as I already said you won’t see any 3rd party renderer integrated into C4D, and i’m happy about it, i don’t wanna pay 2 grand per render node to get a “programmable renderer”, i wanna render the damn thing, i don’t wanna spend my time coding shaders. Do you want some good DOF? Have you ever heard the word “compositing?” I got a lot of friends who use Mental Ray on XSI, do you think they use Mental Ray’s DOF and wait an age for Mental Ray applying the post effect? :rolleyes:

#85

Cool down.

This thread is about C4D’s renderer vs other renderers, so it is appropriate to point out that C4D is using a 2D blur for DOF and motion blur instead of stochastic sampling as well as stating that programmable shaders are a nice feature that C4D doesn’t have.

We all know that C4D lacks ngons, proper NURBS and other things - but that’s not the topic of this thread.

#86

Originally posted by Brent Turbo
My point is, use a renderer that’s right for YOU.[/B]

but that’s the point, isn’t it? with max, maya, whatever you CAN USE your renderer of choice. with cinema? what choices do we got?

i’m not having a whole list of things i would like to see in cinemas renderer (CA-tool-improvements are on top of MY list :smiley: ) but better DOF and motionblur would be sweet! it’s true that it can be faked in post and i often do this, but especially when it comes to motionblur i would rather be able to rely on my 3D-renderings than to fake it… :shrug:

#87

this for me has been a great thread and very informative.

  1. it tells me everyones needs are often very different.
  2. people like the c4d renderer and would like to see development on that rather than external renderer support.
  3. c4d renderer is actually more competitive than i first thought.
  4. i still think its unusual not to have external support, but only time will tell…the jury is still out imho

i posed the question in the first place as a result of reading a thread comparing mray vs prman…i wanted to know how we stacked up…and what peoples perceptions of our renderer where versus the so called competition.

there are some very nice features we miss…some of which can be faked in post anyway…i just wanna thank those that contributed to this thread for there input as it didn’t turn out to be a negative thread or a bashing exercise.
so good on ya all…
:thumbsup:
i also look forward to c4d developments for the AR module makes my mouth water with the thought of it all.

#88

Originally posted by stew
[B]Cool down.

This thread is about C4D’s renderer vs other renderers, so it is appropriate to point out that C4D is using a 2D blur for DOF and motion blur instead of stochastic sampling as well as stating that programmable shaders are a nice feature that C4D doesn’t have.

We all know that C4D lacks ngons, proper NURBS and other things - but that’s not the topic of this thread. [/B]

That’s not the topic but does it make sense to ask something we already know it’s secondary when we still don’t have something primary? Maxon’s not Alias or Softimage, you can’t ask them to add everything we still don’t have all at once.

#89

thirdeye_01…i don’t think anybody is asking for everything all at once…but we all have different needs…eg olli and mjv need and want ca tools…thirdeye_01 and squid want ngons…flingster wants shader tree…
are these all primary or secondary…?

so who wins? dunno not for me to decide…maxon decide. but we all essentially pay the same amount of bucks for the software so our needs are all legitimate imho…and as such should be open for discussion as with any other thread. its not something to get frustrated about for either side. one thing i would say is open discussion like this usually brings out why something is primary or secondary… :shrug:

we all want the type of development lifecycle users have seen in c4d over the last few years…impressive and making the industry sit up and watch…long may it continue…but the pace of this market in recent years has really sped up as the competition has become more competitive…leading us all in part to have unrealistic goals in development of c4d. only maxon can decide if they can manage there customers requirement effectively.

#90

Originally posted by Martin Kay
[B]Its all very well saying dont bring in the skill of the artist when talking about the relative merits of various renderers. How does one assess the quality of this renderer or that renderer- only by the work of a particular artist. If you take a peek at various ‘free’ 3d artist galleries on the web you’ll notice that the vast majority of it is very poor- not the sort of stuff to sell the software.

Obviously software does matter- we’re not just talking about tubes of oil paint…

The fact is that many artists in 3d are struggling to get ‘great’ imagery with their chosen software, where a few others, with the same software are producing mind boggling quality images…

In a recent interview, Maxon have said that there is no prospect of tagging on the ability to use external renderers, like Brazil, Mray etc, but there may be the possiblity in the near future to export to Renderman. Well, if people want and can afford these add ons, why dont they migrate to an app that uses them, like XSI or Maya? Why, at the present moment in development, would people wanting to use those renderers, want to work out
of c4d anyway? What does c4d have in the way of modelling versatility and animation features, that XSI and Maya don’t have?

Much better for Maxon to build and improve on the features c4d has already, in order to make it the most desirable working environment. Worry about add on renderers then. [/B]

Renderman doesn’t necessary mean PRMAN, there are other alternatives like AIR which many Hollywood shops are using in their renderfarms. It is equal feature for feature to PRMAN but doesn’t cost as much. Of course no one beats PRMAN when it comes to displacement and motion blur.

#91

Originally posted by flingster
[B]thirdeye_01…i don’t think anybody is asking for everything all at once…but we all have different needs…eg olli and mjv need and want ca tools…thirdeye_01 and squid want ngons…flingster wants shader tree…
are these all primary or secondary…?

so who wins? dunno not for me to decide…maxon decide. but we all essentially pay the same amount of bucks for the software so our needs are all legitimate imho…and as such should be open for discussion as with any other thread. its not something to get frustrated about for either side. one thing i would say is open discussion like this usually brings out why something is primary or secondary… :shrug:

we all want the type of development lifecycle users have seen in c4d over the last few years…impressive and making the industry sit up and watch…long may it continue…but the pace of this market in recent years has really sped up as the competition has become more competitive…leading us all in part to have unrealistic goals in development of c4d. only maxon can decide if they can manage there customers requirement effectively. [/B]

I basically agree with all you said but i think priorities are priorities. You certainly may be entitled to think real DOF and motion blur are primary, same thing about John Doe thinking the most important thing is micro poly displacement. I think the priorities are basically the same things others had for a long time and we still don’t have, which are more or less the same things the majority of the users are asking.

#92

thats what makes it such interesting times for us c4d users…:thumbsup:

can’t wait for a point update let alone v9!
:beer:

#93

This discussion is really deja vu for me. Some months back, the LW forum was a buzz with LW aging renderer comparison to all others. MRay, PRMan, Brazil and C4D was brought up as better renderers to LW. It got heated, and the debate was never resolved. So, don’t let the grass is greener thing be an issue. I finally jumped on C4D once it had better features and controls for lights. This is one of the key most important thing for me that an app must have, that is one of the reason why quality images do come out of Maya. I’ve seen amazing stuff with just cubes that a now current Blue Sky TD had done with Maya by getting creative with lights. Check out the workflow that Stahlberg did in Maya with the fairy and the dragon in the cave thingy, it came out amazing do to his work with lights. I seriously would recommend for those of you who want to really improve the quality of their images to get the Gnomon Rendering DVDs by Jeremy Engleman, a good 90% of the stuff he covers is really independent of app, and as long as you know how things work in Maya and C4D it would be easy to figure out what does what.

#94

for anybody who is interested…cinema rib export plugin…mat savard developing…in beta at the moment please report all bugs to him…

http://savards.fuzehost.com/ribexporter/download.htm

other renders…not sure if these were already posted or not…excuse if they have…

air
http://www.sitexgraphics.com/index.html

aqsis
http://www.aqsis.com/

3delight
http://www.3delight.com/index.htm

tjnyc: thanks for dvd tip…

#95

hey thats for the plugin link flingster
it says for ver 6 and above that means ce also right?
anyhow if others want to try it there is also
pixie
http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~okan/Pixie/pixie.htm

forgot to mention shaderman for Creating shaders.
looks alot like mayas hypershade.
shaderman
http://www.dream.com.ua/thetool.html
there is a tutorial on the site to get you started.

#96

If or when cinema gets node based architecture, the cinema render will improve accordingly. Until that, if you want realy awsome flexibility, Cinema is just not for you. And that goes for everything that cinema does.

#97

sorry that’s bunkum. node based architecture will not improve the cinema render engine, it’s purely a different way of coding shaders (something which you can do in cinema with C++ or COFFEE easily enough).

cinema already has a shader tree, it’s just not node based.

cinema has nodes for expressions, it’s easy to use, but it’s not as flexible, fast or powerful as scripts (COFFEE or otherwise) or plugins. nodes are only an easy way to code in a visual manner. they don’t bring any more power or flexibility than coding in any other way (in fact generally less).

#98

Originally posted by mdme_sadie
nodes are only an easy way to code in a visual manner. they don’t bring any more power or flexibility than coding in any other way (in fact generally less).

I agree, but IMO nodes are the best compromise between ease of use and flexibility. There are a few things that you can do only in code and not in nodes, but in most cases nodes are sufficient.

#99

Originally posted by tjnyc
I seriously would recommend for those of you who want to really improve the quality of their images to get the Gnomon Rendering DVDs by Jeremy Engleman, a good 90% of the stuff he covers is really independent of app, and as long as you know how things work in Maya and C4D it would be easy to figure out what does what.

Thanks for the tip :slight_smile:

Which ones could you REALLY recommend - there are four DVD’s, and I can’t buy them all at once.

Cheers,
BaRa

#100

That is a tough call really, because all 4 DVDs cover important stuff that a user should know. Light Effects is probably the one that will prove a bit difficult to translate to C4D from Maya as some stuff that are possible in Maya just isn’t so in C4D. The first 2 DVDs are definitely a must. The first has an excellent instruction on 3-point lighting setup from a simple example to a more complex one. He also shows many examples that you can get alot of ideas from, like simulating radiosity with several distant lights crossing in opposite direction to one another, faking underwater caustics and underwater particles. You get a good education with his instructions that even if you can’t do it in C4D you get the idea of what his workflow and thoughts are in creating lighting and shadows for a scene. The thing about lights which many newbie and beginners fail with a typically obvious CG look is that lights and light effects in a scene shouldn’t be even and clean. There are direct illuminations, indirect illuminations, ambient illumination, bright spots, dark spots, uneven patterns, dust, and so on. It really is more of an art when lighting a scene and Jeremy Engleman is one of the best at painting a scene with lights.