07 Mar 2012

Low Level Noise Be Damned

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“LWF, Gamma, 2.2, what the hell is with all this noise in my shadows?”

Allow me to shed even MORE “light” on this subject.  I’m not going to go over the whole 2.2 vs 1.0 thing yet again.  There are plenty of places that can explain it in a far more scientific way than I’m capable of.  What I can do is tell you what I consider the “Best Damn Gamma Practices for V-Ray in 3ds Max 2012″.

The Illusion of LWF

Autodesk would have you believe that they have it all figured out in a neat little package within your preferences (and to some extent they do).  While the options in this menu are useful, they are only skin deep.  They are, in fact, applying a LUT (Look Up Table) to Max entirely.  To put it another way, when you follow the ordinary 2.2 workflow in 3ds Max 2012, you open up your gamma (and LUT) settings, change it from 1.0 to 2.2, you set your materials and bitmaps to 1.0 (you like to inverse it yourself, it’s way more diy), you hit apply and whalla!  Max looks a little bit brighter overall and a bit washed out.  It is correct though.  You are working in a 2.2 space.  You scratch your head inquisitively and sigh. That is because it simply applied the gamma to Max overall. Don’t be fooled, this is just how you are SEEING Max.  When you hit render, it’s not thinking about things any differently than if you had not fiddled with the gamma settings at all.

Low Level Noise Be Damned!

Have you ever worked in Vray using the Max LWF and noticed an annoying noisy grain in your shadows? Annoying grain that no matter how hard you try, no amount of sampling will smooth it.  You end up driving yourself mad and cranking down your thresholds till your buckets cry out for mercy.  The reason that noise is there, is because it’s ALWAYS been there, it’s just that your old 1.0 gamma hid it from you. Darkened away, lurking in the shadows. Your 2.2 gamma put a spotlight on that pesky noise but because your gamma settings are only skin deep, V-Ray still cant see it.  V-Ray is still happily sampling away in a 1.0 color space and is blissfully unaware of that menacing grain. We need to change that.  We need to lift the blinders and let V-Ray’s superior sampler eradicate that noise!

Let V-Ray do the Heavy Lifting

First off, enter Max preferences>Gamma and LUT enable Gamma/LUT correction and change the gamma to 1.0.  Why you ask?  Why not disable it altogether if we are truly letting V-Ray do all the work?  The answer is simple.  If you disable gamma altogether, you lose the ability to change any bitmaps incoming gamma within the bitmap import dialog and THAT is a hell of a lot easier than making gamma color correction nodes and setting the inverse .4545  for every texture map in your scene.  On board so far?  Good.  Ok, so now let’s go ahead and set up all your Bitmap input and output gamma’s to 1.0 too.  Also be sure to leave affect color selectors and Affect Material Editor checked on.  So really what we’ve done is castrated our gamma preferences without turning them off. Strange, I know. Bear with me.

One more step. Enter the V-Ray Color Mapping tab in your render globals , change the “Type” to Linear Multiply. Then change the Gamma to 2.2.  BOOM!  The earth just shook.  Now V-Ray is gonna sample at 2.2 and not at 1.0! Watch out noise!

The Downside…boooo (don’t be sad, see update at bottom)

Ok so, it’s not perfect. Your unable to work in your max viewport or slate material editor in the desired 2.2 color space. That is, until Autodesk understands that LWF needs more settings (like the ability to choose what viewports, framebuffers it gets applied to).  You may ask, “why not use the V-Ray framebuffer and keep Max Gamma at 2.2, just don’t enable the “srgb” button.  To that I say, yes.  You CAN work like that BUT, there are problems with that method.  We currently render out our animations as multi-channel exr’s using Thinkbox Deadline to manage our renderfarm.  We’ve found that rendering to Deadline with the V-Ray framebuffer and writing multi-channel exr’s, you often get errors. So, we tend to play it safe and stick to the Max framebuffer.

In summary…

Hey, I don’t have all the answers but I can tell you that this method works.  If you have an even better LWF for V-Ray and Max, please do share it. I’m always open to suggestions.

UPDATE!!!

Thanks to Simone Nastasi for this tip!  If you turn on “Don’t Affect Colors (adaption only)” in your V-Ray color mapping tab, you can turn on Max’s 2.2 Gamma and have the best of both worlds!  Thanks Simone!

 

11 Sep 2011

Foundry Launches Hiero

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The Foundry announced it’s VFX collaboration tool called Hiero this past week. I assume that this is good news for smaller VFX shops who haven’t already written their own. If anyone has an idea of the pricing point, please let us know.

I’m now anxious to see how Eyeon reacts with it’s latest version of Generation. Look for more on this soon.

Hiero Press Release HERE.

20 Mar 2011

3DSpeedy.com Launches!

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A couple friends of mine launched a new site called 3DSpeedy.com. It’s soul purpose is to deliver bite size tips for 3d artists. So far, they are accepting tips for 3ds Max and C4D, but who knows how it will spread! Go there now and post your tips and maybe someone out there will benefit!

02 Mar 2011

Autodesk Announces 2012 Lineup

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I must say there are a significant amount of updates to ALL the Autodesk 3d products.  Quite a few are impressive.  Maya 2012 has some cool new features and updates.  I’d love to say that I could now use it in production, but i’ve become too dependant on the mod stack, pflow, and all my lovely plugins.  XSI continues to intrigue me.  It is still the most under-utilized and under-marketed 3d app.  It’s the only app in Autodesk’s lineup that has a fairly new core and they are definitely using it.  ICE has got me VERY interested.  Of course then there is the Max update.  I’ll hold off on talking about it until I actually use it in production but I must say I wish they were moving faster with XBR.

25 Feb 2011

3dsmax to ICE and Back!

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Shane has given us a sneak peak to what looks like a way to one button export pcached scenes into XSI, apply some ICE particles and get them back into Max as a point cloud.  AWESOME!  Will XSI be included with the purchase of Max? Doubtful, but one can hope ;)

21 Feb 2011

Eric Mootz releases emFlock2 (version 2.0) and emFluid4

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I think I’m in love with XSI lately. I’ve seen AMAZING stuff with the Lagoa Physics Engine and now these amazing videos for emFlock and emFluids!  As a 3ds Max user, this makes me very jealous.  Now if they can only release VRay for XSI, I may take a serious look at it.

Another video Here.

emFlock Link Here.
emFluid Link Here.

06 Jan 2011

Interview with Mark Theriault of Prime Focus

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I first met Mark Theriault (pronounced Terry-O) when he came to Optimus in Chicago as an intern. He mentioned that he came to Optimus after seeing our 3d work and assumed he’d be interning with a big, bustling cg team. Imagine his disappointment when he got there and found out that I alone WAS the 3d department. Still, eager as ever, Mark hung out in my office and soaked up all the knowledge he could (3ds Max).

Not too long after he started his internship at Optimus, I received an offer to build a cg department from scratch at Somersault. Mark, being the loyal intern came with me and became my first hire there. He was Somersault’s first and only TD. After some time with us, he decided to spread his wings and move to Canada of all places. I guess Chicago wasn’t cold enough for him. I thought Mark would make a great interview as he has worked in TVC and Film, has a background in design, and is a super nice guy. Enjoy. Read more

01 Jan 2011

Columbia Lab Helps Un-Tangle Tangled.

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Great article in NYTimes.com by Patricia Cohen about how scientists at a Columbia lab helped Disney solve the difficult hair problem in Tangled.  Read it here.

30 Dec 2010

Cafefx to be Auctioned Off.

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We are all saddened by the fact that Cafefx has closed it’s doors.  What really makes it feel real is the fact that it is now being auctioned off by Joeseph Finn and Company.  This post hits close to home for me, as I saw a studio worked at auctioned off by this same company.  It’s very hard to watch your entire pipe-line get broken up and sold.  It’s a bit of solemn closure for a studio that has done some amazing work over the years.

For any of you thinking of attending the auction, I’ve included a link below to the auction site.  You will be able to bid online, but as I have been through this, your better off being there in person.  A bit of advice for those thinking about buying computers, be prepared to overpay and be sure to attend the inspection.  Auctions are designed to drive up prices.

See the auction listing here.

29 Dec 2010

Lucasfilm sued by Feds

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In 2005, Lucasfilm and Pixar came to an agreement to screw the VFX artist.  They decided that when poaching eachothers artists, they would agree not to get into a bidding war. This would ensure that  sought after artists would not be compensated accordingly for thier talent.  SHACKLE ME NOT!

Lee Stranahan is at it again (thank god).  Read this stunning article that sheds new light on the growing labor problem in the VFX industry.

Read it here.