[mverta]

This conversation reminds me, indirectly, of a thing a few of us testers were talking about recently, which was: what was the single image that - more than any other - sold you on Maxwell? I think for all of us, there were a lot of great ones, but probably one in particular that you saw it, and it just had that "thing" where you were so impressed you had to try it for yourself. I remember mine. Though I don't remember how I came to the Maxwell site in the first place... but I'm just reminded of how inspiring a great render truly is.

_Mike

[VisualImpact]

Maxwell = unbiased
Fryrender = unbiased
Mverta = biased, wrong and proud of it

sooo true

[Hybaj]

Mike : Maybe you should try to explain why was the picture so good. What are the quality factors?? What are to look factors??

edit : I'm not saying that the picture didn't look cool. I would surely love it too

[mverta]

Well at the time, and still, it's all about the light quality... I had been struggling with Final Gather and GI in mental ray for long enough, and I was looking at a quality of indirect lighting I just hadn't seen before, on top of which were caustics, etc. Plus, the physical sky really impressed me. Again, light quality. I think it starts and ends there, and the material model then takes advantage of that inherent nature. Once I actually bought Maxwell, then I fell in love with the philosophy, because it was about a real-world approach, and not a cheats approach. The idea that f-stop and ISO actually meant something, and worked, was amazing to me.

If you're looking for possibly something specific that differentiates Fry and Maxwell, I can absolutely say it's in the light quality, and while I wouldn't bet the jewels on it, I'm in the high-90th percentile sure the number of indirect bounces is clipped way below ours to help with speed. There are evidences of it in tons of shots. There are other things, too, but what's interesting is that even if you know nothing about rendering, you can see it. I haven't seen any usage of custom ior curves, which I use on most materials, and would be crippled without them. Couldn't do R2-D2's paint, for example. So to me, personally, Fry has the exact same opportunity and challenge facing it that Maxwell did. Maxwell showed me the goods, and I jumped at it. Haven't regretted it a day since. If Fry honestly showed me Maxwell-killing work, why the hell wouldn't I go use it? I'm in the camp of "Best images possible, please," and honestly I don't care who brings it.

_Mike

[ivox3]

It was Tora and I know he also inspired many others .... he should have a check from NL.

So where are the Tora renders ?

Edit: Add Andretto to the short list.

[dd_]

my wow came from this piccy and also his gallery. this is what made me buy maxwell. so thank you thomas

[insomnia3d]

I think i was way to overwelmed to remember my WOW. Like mike i was also looking for an alternative, Brazil in my case.

[ivox3]

Still I say ......What the f *** ! !

[Hybaj]

Mverta : Now we're at the core of the problem. I personally think with the same input data the light quality is almost the same when given enough time to clean. The less bounces thing to acheive speed is a highly speculative assumption which is hard to evaluate just from pictures. So there is no definite evidence. You're right on the IOR thing but fry should have something like controllable curves so the same effect might be possible. Also you're right on the "don't know anything but looks really better". But still that doesn't mean that the quality is flawed. It's just the look that counts and talking about quality is a bit misleading since there are so many different variables which can make the same scene look ugly or great. And yes I agree that the Maxwell look is more universal than Fry's. So again it's not the quality.

Btw I haven't seen a discussion on this but the Maxwell's sun is not as correct as it should be. It's nicely visible in the shadow of a tree.

[mverta]

Wait.. is this semantics... when I say "quality" I'm talking about what you end up with, however you end up with it. In other words, what's possible at the bottom line. There are some decent artists testing Fry, and I'm not seeing images as potent as I saw in the hands of amateurs, with Maxwell. Maxwell in the hands of experts seems a pretty lethal combination. So the question comes that if Fry has the same input-output capabilities as Maxwell, where is the proof? Surely we can't say all Fry renders simply haven't had enough computation time, and I don't think it's true to say that there aren't good enough people testing it. As for my speculations, you're right, though the things I've seen actually don't take a lot of detective work to see, especially when you're looking for them, like we're usually doing in testing all day. That aside, there still is that brass-tacks bottom line: if it's in there, show it, you know? Also, it seems you and I characterize the visible differences very differently. Where you say they're very close, to my eye it's night and day.

_Mike

P.S. What's nicely visible in the shadow of a tree?

[acquiesse]

wow...

[Hybaj]

I beleive the sky system's sun is not projecting itself through the leaves as it does in the real world. Even through different cracks and small openings it's not acting like I think it should. If you use an emitter with a correct size then everything looks ok.

I spoted that a year and a half ago. I'll certainly do a topic about it later after the 1.2 is out. It's only a minor prob... nothing too serious.

[mverta]

Is this with explicit geometry or clipmap cheats, or...?

_Mike

[Tea_Bag]

This is going to be seriously embarrassing

A couple of years ago when I tried using "rendering" It was in AutoCAD 2000 I drew my first 3D Model a Light Bulb! I've always wondered how people created a "real" looking image? So I played around in AutoCAD and found the render button and materials! WOW that is fantastic and got this:



Yeah I know!

So I pushed myself to improve this or any other Image! Believe this or not but I for some reason thought it was the graphics card that did the quality rendering!? E.g Better Graphics card better game graphic quality! I really though this would apply to still images too!

I bought an Quadro Graphics card not the best but mid range 750 and I was exited cause my images would be much better improved! I was wrong a waste of time and money! So I did some research and found that rendering engines were the cause for good quality images!

My first demo renderer was Final render Stage from Cebas and bought 3D Max 7 student edition to see how this all worked! Well first of all there was so much to learn it was all new and scary! But hacked at it and it was really good and created my Final Render Image (will post it when I find it)

I felt that the realism was still not good enough! Even when looking at Pro Images! Vray still didnt impress me enough to part with my money! There were other renders out there but was also not to my expectation! (I could be picky as I was a student and didnt have any rendering jobs or commitments) BUT seeing an add for Maxwell Render on Evermotion with sample images SOLD! Fantastic no doubt! I purchase Maxwell render and now wont look back!

The point I'm trying to make is that I had no experience but could tell what look real to me and what looked OK and maybe pass as "realism". As for Fry render, yes the images have a quality of "realism" BUT not as Realistic and attractive as Maxwell! IMHO

Hope I didnt Bore you guys!

[VisualImpact]

That's about as grown-up as I can be, I'm afraid.

exactly why you should be a bit more humble sometimes mate