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it would be so great to be able to merge two or more pictures into one with getting the -ml functionality.

imagine:

i have not enough ram to render an image with -ml, but i could render it three times for 1) the sunlight only 2) for a ceiling light and 3) for a spotlight. after these three .mxis are finished and i have my «merge to -ml» command, i could just combine all info into one .mxi and have the same fun again!

of course, this works only with one light per .mxi, but also multiple -ml files should be combinable:
a list before calculating the newly merged image asks for the elements that should appear in the result:
from image .mxi 1: sun 1) and spot 1)
from image .mxi 2: sun 2) and laser beam
from image .mxi 3: lamp 1 and 2.
so, for the final .mxi i choose from the 3 files: sun2), laser beam and lamp 2.

this should not be too difficult to make... NL?

cool idea ?

cool idea, for sure...but what about ordering some more ram

sure... but my mainboard has only 4 ram slots, as most do and there are not many 2 gb ram sticks around with ddr2 ram... actually i would have bought 8 gigs if there were any available.

just bought my new computer with four gigs pc-8500 1066 which i don't want to throw away now...

Great idea... I think not to difficult!

deadalvs wrote: i have not enough ram to render an image with -ml, but i could render it three times for 1) the sunlight only 2) for a ceiling light and 3) for a spotlight. after these three .mxis are finished and i have my «merge to -ml» command, i could just combine all info into one .mxi and have the same fun again!

of course, this works only with one light per .mxi, but also multiple -ml files should be combinable:
a list before calculating the newly merged image asks for the elements that should appear in the result:
from image .mxi 1: sun 1) and spot 1)
from image .mxi 2: sun 2) and laser beam
from image .mxi 3: lamp 1 and 2.
so, for the final .mxi i choose from the 3 files: sun2), laser beam and lamp 2.

this should not be too difficult to make... NL?

cool idea ?

I also love the idea, it would realy come in handy with the setups I am currently using.

Is this a real problem? or only an "Imagine if:" problem?

If this is a real problem, I have a couple of thoughts:
Maybe rendering each then bringing them into Photoshop as individual layers. Playing with opacity alpha, channels, layer types etc.

Since you just bought a NEW computer, I am assuming that it has a 64 bit processor and a 64bit OS. you should be able to use at least 3gb of your 4gb of ram to render the image.
I am using a 1-1/2 year old 32bit processor with 4gb of ram 3.5 available to windows (/3gb switch for 32 bit Windows XP).
I am rendering files with over 8.6 million faces with 14 lights, multilight ON, with no problems. The only problem I have is creating the MXS file from MAX, (to many polys).
I discovered that if I trim down my .max file to only include what I want to render, (no hidden items etc.) and set the max memory in the maxwell plugin to 2048 and turn on the HD switch (I know, it says it dosen't work with ML but...) things seem to render like a champ.
The resulting MXI file, with 14 box lights is rather large, 1.25GB vs 275MB for 2 box lights and environment lighting, but I have no problem reopening and playing with the multilight sliders.

Finaly, since Maxwell is still a 32bit app, I thought that maxwell could only access a max of 4gb of ram anyway then it pages out to the hard drive with the HD switch. - But, I could be wrong.

Dan

even though i use win xp 64 [m~w still 32 bit], i can address 3.5 gigs or little more [OS itself] for maxwell.

me personally, i did have too much respect of stability [see issues tween -ml and -hd] because my renderings had exactly one try for success because i was right before DEATH-line...

the other issue You mention is of course the size of the .mxi file which leads me to the resolution.

i render mostly final images @ 3450 x 2400 px for DIN A0 [118.8 x 84 cm]. a single-layer .mxi file is around 880 mb alone, so i think it would be a little risky to try that the first time with -ml right before a deadline...

the other thing, very important, was mentioned i think in an other thread by Tom [a-team Tom] that FAT32 formatted harddrives can handle only files to a size of 2 gigs. now i work with win xp 32 on a MacBookPro with bootcamp that was formatted FAT32. so basically, when i will coop-render later with more than my new 64 bit baby i can forget to use this laptop... this is an other reason...

* * *

of course maxwell is developing and getting more stable so one day it will become irrelevant to render a single image three times just for the multilight option and then merge them, which is the sense of this thread.

it would just be a handy feature, especially when thinking about people sending renderings with different seed values to a farm this could also incorporate different lighting schemes which could be combinex/mixed in the end to evaluate multiple versions in «one file» ...

i'll try -ml again !

* * *

by the way. is there any significant difference about ram use when rendering with or without -ml option ?

does the -hd option still slow down the rendering?

does the -hd option affect render times when there is enough ram around?

Don't misunderstand, I think that merging multiple MXI files would be awesome.
Maybe each MXI file could be a seperate layer with individual multilight controls for each MXI (or layer). That would give us the same kind of control with the final images that we now have with the material editor.

With the projects I am currently working on, multilight is a MUST and the primary reason for using Maxwell. When I'm done the photographers take over and go nuts changing the lighting.

My current experiments are rendering at 1054 x 843 but need to be 6514x5211 on the final. I'll try to post some results when I have them.

I hope you made your deadline. I have another experimental rendering done for Mon. so I know how it goes.

Dan

nooo, no misunderstanding ...

yep, i did reach the DL ... ! yay !