[adamwade]

I must start by saying that I think Maxwell is an awesome product I that I have been truly amazed at its performance since using it in Beta.

That said, I have been monitoring work created by all us users out there and frankly have been a bit disapointed that RC5 images just don't seem to have the rich depth and realism that the Beta version created. IMO, only about 20% of the RC5 images seem to match Beta.

Maybe this is emitters, materials, SSS, or ??, but in any case I hate to give up hoping for that look to come back. I am curious to hear from others and what you all think out there. Is it just my eyes, or do other users feel the same?

[Maximus3D]

Interesting.. but i think this has more to do with the fact that alot of us normal users still don't quite got a grip on how the new materials work so we can make the most outta them, and that would make sense since you think that about 20% matches the beta's quality. That'd be about say 80% of the users who still don't quite got their head wrapped around the new materials and what you can do with those.

That's what i think..

[Edit] : I forgot to say one thing, also let's not forget the human error we run across in a situation like this. The problem with habits and getting used to certain things. We all got so used to the beta for a very long time now, and when the RC's stepped in the door then we had to try to change from our habit which we had for this long time. That transition could be difficult and take time.

/ Max

[blueplanetdesign]

I agree with Maximus.
Additionally, I've noticed a great deal of difference in the luminance values;
i.e; the imported light sources don't quite match the levels of the beta.
They require some tweeking to match the output levels I'd grown
accustomed to in the beta engine.
To be sure, I have had to rethink the material properties and essentially
start over in some cases. That's okay.
All things considered, the new RC is a welcome improvement on the path to final release.

[Thomas An.]

The beta was using a few factory default materials.
The RCs do not have such defaults and we have to do materials manually. Once material "presets" are available with the RC engine (with predetermined complex IOR data) then the realism of the renders should increase as well.

[adamwade]

I do agree with what is being said so far in that the material presets are not complete with the realism and IOR data of the Beta. Same goes with emitters perhaps as well (the new emitter interface looks promising though).

The user error brings up a good point, but in a different way I think. With beta I found most images to look pretty real - even if the lighting was way off (or excusing someones texture mapping and scale)- it seemed to look real, but with a terrible photographer or something. With RC5 the WIP still looks more CG to me. Again about an 80/20% hit ratio.

So far I enjoy working in MWStudio, and yes its a big leap forward. I just wanted to see if others are noticing what I am noticing. Maxwell's main point was to easily get a photorealistic render without a lot of messing about. I think until the final V1.0 is out we all are stuck messing about. Although some of it is kind of fun with Maxwell's unique features.

[Tim Ellis]

The thing is, in my opinion, that anyone could pick up M~R beta and with four or five mouse clicks have an amazing result.

Studio however, needs more input from the user. Agreed that certain things look different, but RC5 has a very different engine to the beta, as N~L found certain things were not going to be possible with the Beta render core.

Some of the renders that are now being produced and any that will be produced in the future, are getting better and better. More so than the beta, albeit for a few light distribution differences etc.

By the time V1 is released I think that the days of beta comparisons will be over and the results will surpass those made with M~RB.

Tim.

[lllab]

i prefer RC quality, for me i get better qualiyt in RC5 than with beta. but istarted to test it with RC really and not so deep with beta.

i think this is veery relativ

cheers
stefan

[adamwade]

I like what you said Tim. That's what I am getting at. The simple beauty of a few mouse clicks and BAM ! wow - nice rendering.

I'm glad you brought up the difference in rendering engines as well. That's an important point. I just don't want the MW team to forget the simplicity of the beta and get stuck compiling an endless list of new features and plugins. Let's have a good set of standard IOR materials with all the SSS, mapping controls and CLIPMAPS.

There are so many different users with unique requirements. No one is to say what features are a priority I guess (although I just said mine). However, I believe that what brought all of us to Maxwell was the amazing realistic rendering quality and quick set up time. Let's not loose sight of that.