Speed up Lighting - Revision history

Bassam: /* Render Layers */

2013-11-29T17:48:38Z

Render Layers

Bassam: /* Render Layers */

2013-11-29T17:47:22Z

Render Layers

Bassam: /* Render Properties */

2013-11-29T00:32:28Z

Render Properties

Bassam: /* Settings */

2013-11-29T00:17:07Z

Settings

Bassam: /* Settings */

2013-11-29T00:00:15Z

Settings

Bassam: /* Settings */

2013-11-28T23:58:17Z

Settings

Bassam: /* Settings */

2013-11-28T23:44:27Z

Settings

Bassam: /* Workflow */

2013-11-27T18:45:26Z

Workflow

Bassam at 02:26, 27 November 2013

2013-11-27T02:26:23Z

Bassam at 23:12, 26 November 2013

2013-11-26T23:12:26Z

@@ Line 65: / Line 65: @@
 ==== Render Layers ====
-[[File:settings_renderlayers.jpg|182px|thumb|right|Render Settings]]Render layers are not strictly optimization tools, but they have several features which aid in optimizing scenes for fast lighting.
+[[File:settings_renderlayers.jpg|182px|thumb|right|Render Layers Settings]]Render layers are not strictly optimization tools, but they have several features which aid in optimizing scenes for fast lighting.
 # Exclude: Along with the Layer settings, helps not 'double rendering' expensive items and helps with the 'teapot in a stadium problem'- where rendering one small thing in a large scene loads the entire scene with it. Basically you can exclude the background from affecting the foreground and vice-versa, to avoid double calculating expensive things... like gilga's skin shaders, and to avoid bouncing extra light rays in the scene, especially if those will have minimal affect on the result.
 # Material (override): Override object materials with a 'default' shader, try to keep this shader fairly simple, but also dark (reflect or albedo only about .3 to .4 of the incoming light). This is a good setting to start with when placing lights, before tweaking.

@@ Line 65: / Line 65: @@
 ==== Render Layers ====
-[[File:settings_renderlayers.jpg|thumb|right|Render Settings]]Render layers are not strictly optimization tools, but they have several features which aid in optimizing scenes for fast lighting.
+[[File:settings_renderlayers.jpg|182px|thumb|right|Render Settings]]Render layers are not strictly optimization tools, but they have several features which aid in optimizing scenes for fast lighting.
 # Exclude: Along with the Layer settings, helps not 'double rendering' expensive items and helps with the 'teapot in a stadium problem'- where rendering one small thing in a large scene loads the entire scene with it. Basically you can exclude the background from affecting the foreground and vice-versa, to avoid double calculating expensive things... like gilga's skin shaders, and to avoid bouncing extra light rays in the scene, especially if those will have minimal affect on the result.
 # Material (override): Override object materials with a 'default' shader, try to keep this shader fairly simple, but also dark (reflect or albedo only about .3 to .4 of the incoming light). This is a good setting to start with when placing lights, before tweaking.
 # Samples: You can override samples per layer, thus allowing more samples to layers that need it, less to layers that will be blurred, etc.
 # Use Environment/Surfaces/Hair: If you don't need environment light or hair in a renderlayer, it will go faster if you turn it off.
 ==== Scene Properties ====
 The only helpful setting here is Simplify, which allows dropping subdivision level and child particle percentage for the entire scene '''including linked data'''. A real lifesaver for everyone including lighters! Once again, our render scripts turn this off, so it is render-farm safe.

@@ Line 52: / Line 52: @@
 === Settings ===
 ==== Render Properties ====
-[[File:settings_render.jpg|thumb|right|Render Settings]]Beyond the typical resolution settings, cycles has specific things that affect accuracy/speed and helps limit fireflies (stray bright pixels) and nose.
+[[File:settings_render.jpg|180px|thumb|right|Render Settings]]Beyond the typical resolution settings, cycles has specific things that affect accuracy/speed and helps limit fireflies (stray bright pixels) and nose.
 # Clamp: Very dangerous! Clamp limits the brightness an individual pixel can recieve to a given value (0.00 means clamp is off) This can help with fireflies that are typically overbright, and from over-lit diffuse surfaces from scattering too much light into the scene. However too agressive settings can result in a weirdly clamped 'burned out grey' unattractive render. Probably try to find a setting that either leaves the final look unaffected (but cuts down fireflies) or barely affects it.
 # Bounces: how many times a ray bounces around: in practice, after one or two bounces, contribution is greatly minimized (especially in tube shots) we don't typically need more than 2 here. This number overrides the bounce settings for diffuse/glossy/transmission, so if you want more glossy bounces, turn down Diffuse and Transmission, and turn up Glossy.
@@ Line 63: / Line 63: @@
 ===== Branched Path Tracing =====
 Can speed up some scenes with complex node trees, also allows fine tuning sampling between different shader types and also for each light. Much more fiddly and note: values are multiplied, so if you have 4 AA and 10 Diffuse you get 40 Diffuse samples, etc.
 ==== Render Layers ====
 [[File:settings_renderlayers.jpg|thumb|right|Render Settings]]Render layers are not strictly optimization tools, but they have several features which aid in optimizing scenes for fast lighting.

@@ Line 63: / Line 63: @@
 ===== Branched Path Tracing =====
 Can speed up some scenes with complex node trees, also allows fine tuning sampling between different shader types and also for each light. Much more fiddly and note: values are multiplied, so if you have 4 AA and 10 Diffuse you get 40 Diffuse samples, etc.
 === Tools ===

@@ Line 52: / Line 52: @@
 === Settings ===
 ==== Render Properties ====
-Beyond the typical resolution settings, cycles has specific things that affect accuracy/speed and helps limit fireflies (stray bright pixels) and nose.
+[[File:settings_render.jpg|thumb|right|Render Settings]]Beyond the typical resolution settings, cycles has specific things that affect accuracy/speed and helps limit fireflies (stray bright pixels) and nose.
 # Clamp: Very dangerous! Clamp limits the brightness an individual pixel can recieve to a given value (0.00 means clamp is off) This can help with fireflies that are typically overbright, and from over-lit diffuse surfaces from scattering too much light into the scene. However too agressive settings can result in a weirdly clamped 'burned out grey' unattractive render. Probably try to find a setting that either leaves the final look unaffected (but cuts down fireflies) or barely affects it.
 # Bounces: how many times a ray bounces around: in practice, after one or two bounces, contribution is greatly minimized (especially in tube shots) we don't typically need more than 2 here. This number overrides the bounce settings for diffuse/glossy/transmission, so if you want more glossy bounces, turn down Diffuse and Transmission, and turn up Glossy.
@@ Line 62: / Line 62: @@
 '''NOTE''': save buffers is handy if you have a comp: it will keep the rendered buffers in the tmp folder: if you crash while rendering, hit shift R in the compositor to reload them.
 ===== Branched Path Tracing =====
-Can speed up some scenes with complex node trees, also allows fine tuning sampling between different shader types and also for each light. Much more fiddly and note: values are multiplied, so if you have 4 AA and 10 Diffuse you get 40 Diffuse samples, etc. [[File:settings_render.jpg|thumb|right|Render Settings]]
+Can speed up some scenes with complex node trees, also allows fine tuning sampling between different shader types and also for each light. Much more fiddly and note: values are multiplied, so if you have 4 AA and 10 Diffuse you get 40 Diffuse samples, etc.
 === Tools ===

@@ Line 51: / Line 51: @@
 === Settings ===
 === Tools ===
 # layernames
 # reference desk
 # image_resolution

@@ Line 29: / Line 29: @@
 # exclude lighting and shading between renderlayers (there are no light groups in cycles yet)
 # Prepare for compositing/think about it in advance
-=== Workflow ===
+=== Lighting Workflow ===
-Ok here is a preliminary step by step workflow:
+Ok here is a preliminary step by step workflow for speeding up.
 ==== Speed settings ====
 See settings below for some hints at speeding up rendering
@@ Line 41: / Line 41: @@
 ==== Materials On ====
 Once we get into relative brightness, color, precise tweaking of lights we need to have materials/shaders and eventually textures. We have no current good way to break this down, but I propose here a tool (which should tie into our shader and texture nodes):
-This tool provides a selector:
+This tool will/provides a selector:
 # No Images: replace image inputs with single colors/values. requires shader tree support
 # Low Resolution: switches to the lowest resolution

@@ Line 39: / Line 39: @@
 ==== Placing Lights ====
 Now start adding lights. Follow naming conventions above, and place them into their own scene layers (and add  those to the appropriate renderlayers. You are focusing here on the placement, focus and spread of the lights , softness of the shadows etc. Intensity you can tweak later, but here you can arrive at basic lighting direction.
 === Settings ===
 === Tools ===