I haven't use 3DSMax yet, so I'm not sure about this...
but my understanding is that 3DSMax is not actually
a raytracer.  Supposedly it's something called a
scanline renderer?  Anyone know the difference?
Would that account for the difference in rendering
times between it and POV?

--
Doug Eichenberg
http://www.nls.net/douge
dou### [at] nlsnet

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In article <398f4dc7@news.povray.org>, "Doug Eichenberg" 
<dou### [at] nlsnet> wrote:

> I haven't use 3DSMax yet, so I'm not sure about this...
> but my understanding is that 3DSMax is not actually
> a raytracer.  Supposedly it's something called a
> scanline renderer?  Anyone know the difference?

As far as I know, it is a hybrid renderer. It uses scanline techniques 
for basic rendering, but can use raytracing to get accurate reflection 
and refraction.


> Would that account for the difference in rendering
> times between it and POV?

Yes.

-- 
Christopher James Huff - Personal e-mail: chr### [at] maccom
TAG(Technical Assistance Group) e-mail: chr### [at] tagpovrayorg
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I have had the opportunity to put my hands on it.
It uses raytracing when it comes to reflection and refraction *IF* you
apply real raytracing properties to the objects in the scene.
Like 3DS, it can fake reflection and thus becomes a mere scanliner.
As for the render times, 3DSMAX is slower to POV when refracting. If you
avoid raytracing features, it can be very fast.
One thing though, it is a memory hog. Don't expect to make it work
properly with 64 Mo.

You can model easily virtually anything you like with it, but in my
opinion the 3DSMAX renders do not match the quality of POV.

Fabien


Doug Eichenberg a écrit :

> I haven't use 3DSMax yet, so I'm not sure about this...
> but my understanding is that 3DSMax is not actually
> a raytracer.  Supposedly it's something called a
> scanline renderer?  Anyone know the difference?
> Would that account for the difference in rendering
> times between it and POV?
>
> --
> Doug Eichenberg
> http://www.nls.net/douge
> dou### [at] nlsnet

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> You can model easily virtually anything you like with it, but in my
> opinion the 3DSMAX renders do not match the quality of POV.

That's a bold statement Fabien!  I've seen some very impressive stuff
from 3DSMax (and it better be good for what they charge).  Of course,
I've seen some great POV stuff too...

--
Doug Eichenberg
http://www.nls.net/douge
dou### [at] nlsnet

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Doug Eichenberg wrote:
> 
> I haven't use 3DSMax yet, so I'm not sure about this...
> but my understanding is that 3DSMax is not actually
> a raytracer.  Supposedly it's something called a
> scanline renderer?  Anyone know the difference?
> Would that account for the difference in rendering
> times between it and POV?
> 

Like the others said, it's a hybrid renderer. It is pretty handy to have a fast
scanline engine for rendering animations, but an option to use the slower
raytracing engine for some effects.
There are also other renderers that plug in to Max, if you can deal out the
extra $$$. I have seen very little of them in action, though.

-- 
Margus Ramst

Personal e-mail: mar### [at] peakeduee
TAG (Team Assistance Group) e-mail: mar### [at] tagpovrayorg

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Doug Eichenberg wrote:
> 
> That's a bold statement Fabien!  I've seen some very impressive stuff
> from 3DSMax (and it better be good for what they charge).

Bear in mind that Max offers modelling facilities very few POVers have access
to. I'm sure that in *most* cases POV has the potential to outmatch 3DSMax, in
terms of overall rendering quality and accuracy.
Also, the majority Max images you find on the net are created by handsomely-paid
professional artists, while POV users are predominantly amateur enthusiasts with
limited time and resources.

-- 
Margus Ramst

Personal e-mail: mar### [at] peakeduee
TAG (Team Assistance Group) e-mail: mar### [at] tagpovrayorg

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> to. I'm sure that in *most* cases POV has the potential to outmatch
3DSMax, in
> terms of overall rendering quality and accuracy.

Another very bold statement.  I think you'd be very surprised with the
results if you used MAX, its scanline renderer produces amazing results,
especially with the new types of surface shaders and antialiasing effects
(such as alias-soften).

Its raytracer, while usually being a lot slower than POV-Ray (in R2.5
anyway, MAX R3 is a lot better) easily equals the quality of output of
POV-Ray.  It's really the user that makes the difference, i.e. there are
some very bad MAX users (who usually aren't that serious and don't own the
product) but there are also some very good and skilled users.  A little like
with Maya.

--
Lance

The Zone
http://come.to/the.zone

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It's main rendering engine is a scanline renderer, but the shaders have
raytracing engines built into them.  For example, you can have several
objects that don't have reflections in the scene and they'll render
lightning fast, but you can just change one object's material to one that
uses raytracing (either by adding a full Raytrace material, or by adding a
material that has a Raytrace slot in the reflection or refraction map
slots).  The advantage of this is that you don't have to use a full raytrace
material if you don't want to, you can use any material type and just add
the raytracing to the reflection or refraction slot of that material (or any
other slot for that matter, such as diffuse color, or even shininess).

--
Lance

The Zone
http://come.to/the.zone

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Doug Eichenberg wrote:

> > You can model easily virtually anything you like with it, but in my
> > opinion the 3DSMAX renders do not match the quality of POV.
>
> That's a bold statement Fabien!  I've seen some very impressive stuff
> from 3DSMax (and it better be good for what they charge).  Of course,
> I've seen some great POV stuff too...

Interesting... all 6 winners of the March-April 2000 IRTC (The City) were
made wiht POV! "Eat my dust, 3DSMax users!" POV-Ray probably has a much
worse learning curve than 3DSMax, but used properly, POV has the
potential to create much nicer images, especially with MegaPOV and the
hopefully soon coming POV 3.5/4.0. What irks me is the people who pirate
the full-features rendering suites and think they're so great after they
model some dippy object, when the modeller did most of it for them and
they don't even own the thing! Well I'm sorry but any idiot can model
dippy objects in Rhino and then stick in a lighting macro and render it
with 3DS, and make it look like it comes naturally to them...

Hey, wait, it's "Internet Raytracing Competition", not "Internet Scanline
Competetion"! They've been cheating!

--
David Fontaine     <dav### [at] faricynet>     ICQ 55354965
Please visit my website: http://www.faricy.net/~davidf/

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> hopefully soon coming POV 3.5/4.0. What irks me is the people who pirate
> the full-features rendering suites and think they're so great after they
> model some dippy object, when the modeller did most of it for them and
> they don't even own the thing!

Hmm, indeed.  It's also the reason that most MAX renderings are c$*# -
because they're made by people that haven't bought the program and aren't
dedicated...

> Hey, wait, it's "Internet Raytracing Competition", not "Internet Scanline
> Competetion"! They've been cheating!

Read the rules and you'll find otherwise... and besides, MAX has a
raytracer.

--
Lance

The Zone
http://come.to/the.zone

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Hello All,

This is just to remind you that Pov-Ray is very great, moreover
it is free, but don't forget that commercial product are really
really impressive and fast. You can make scene very quickly 
because of the very nice modeler and the rendering time are
really impressive even if you use raytracing and radiosity 
(and for the test you just use scanline so this is very fast).

For those who don't believe me just look the quality of
the images I posted in the images group. This image just
show the quality of the renderer not the modeler. But
anyone know that the modeler of commercial product are
very impressive (just search for site which contain monster
etc.. made with 3ds, there are plenty :)).

Pov-Ray is great this is sure but you don't have the facility 
that you have with commercial soft. So with Pov-Ray you can
sometime create scene which are not simple with commercial
software (you use the properties of scripting) but this is 
rare, and now most of the commercial product have scripting
capabilities so...

Conclusion: Pov-Ray is incredible but only to do some 
particlar things not all things. (everyone know that it 
is impossible to model some particular thing without 
importing mesh). But for rendering quality, the level is closed
to the best commercial one (Mental ray etc...)

Fabian.


Doug Eichenberg a écrit :
> 
> I haven't use 3DSMax yet, so I'm not sure about this...
> but my understanding is that 3DSMax is not actually
> a raytracer.  Supposedly it's something called a
> scanline renderer?  Anyone know the difference?
> Would that account for the difference in rendering
> times between it and POV?
> 
> --
> Doug Eichenberg
> http://www.nls.net/douge
> dou### [at] nlsnet

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Fabian BRAU wrote:
> 
[Snip]
> For those who don't believe me just look the quality of
> the images I posted in the images group. This image just
> show the quality of the renderer not the modeler. But
> anyone know that the modeler of commercial product are
> very impressive (just search for site which contain monster
> etc.. made with 3ds, there are plenty :)).
> 
I think that from certain level up there is no difference really, which
engine is used for rendering, it comes more to artistical skill. POV-Ray
has reached this level, so are other commercial applications. For
example of other renderer's output look to this TrueSpace picture:
http://www.caligari.com/gallery/images/images99/october99/winner.html
or 
http://www.caligari.com/gallery/images/images99/october99/image03.html

I'm sure, that such picture could be done in other renderers as well, so
there should be just good idea and it's all up to user. Discussion a la
"XXX renderer's output is not as good as YYY's one" sounds more like
holy war.

Just my 0.02

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Lance Birch <-> wrote:
: Read the rules and you'll find otherwise... and besides, MAX has a
: raytracer.

  So if the software HAS a raytracer, although no raytracing is used to
create the image, then it's ok?

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):_;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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Warp wrote:
> 
> Lance Birch <-> wrote:
> : Read the rules and you'll find otherwise... and besides, MAX has a
> : raytracer.
> 
>   So if the software HAS a raytracer, although no raytracing is used to
> create the image, then it's ok?

 Yes.  You should think of IRTC as a RENDERING competition.  While
it was first aimed at raytracers, the rules clearly states that
ANY 3D rendering process is allowed.
 Even OpenGL rendering will be allowed (though don't expext a high
score !!).

Fabien.

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Fabien Mosen <fab### [at] skynetbe> wrote:
:  Even OpenGL rendering will be allowed (though don't expext a high
: score !!).

  Why not? Almost any snapshot of Quake3 looks a lot better than most
renderings submitted to the irtc (and Quake3 uses OpenGL).

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):_;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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>Conclusion: Pov-Ray is incredible but only to do some
>particlar things not all things. (everyone know that it
>is impossible to model some particular thing without
>importing mesh). But for rendering quality, the level is closed
>to the best commercial one (Mental ray etc...)

well, i've considered povray as a good rendering engine, *not*
as a modeller or an animator.
btw. just wondering why there aren't any povray modellers around.
(at least i haven't seen any)
and i don't mean software which is just trying to emulate some
commercial modelling apps, i mean a *povray* modeller with
integrated modellers (mesh/surface/csg) and made in a way
that you could all the time see the actual code, wireframe
representing it and even edit that code directly and see the
effects of that editing in realtime.

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Vahur Krouverk a écrit :
> 
> Fabian BRAU wrote:
> >
> [Snip]
> > For those who don't believe me just look the quality of
> > the images I posted in the images group. This image just
> > show the quality of the renderer not the modeler. But
> > anyone know that the modeler of commercial product are
> > very impressive (just search for site which contain monster
> > etc.. made with 3ds, there are plenty :)).
> >
> I think that from certain level up there is no difference really, which
> engine is used for rendering, it comes more to artistical skill. 

I totally agree :).

Fabian.

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Because it's generally thought by the judges that not enough effort was put
in to produce the result.  A little like the way people using Maya and
rendering on Origin 2000 servers are thought to have an unfair advantage.

The IRTC is simply a rendering competition, or so the rules state; you don't
*have* to use a raytracer, you can just use a scanline renderer if you want.

--
Lance

The Zone
http://come.to/the.zone

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Lance Birch <-> wrote:
: Because it's generally thought by the judges that not enough effort was put
: in to produce the result.  A little like the way people using Maya and
: rendering on Origin 2000 servers are thought to have an unfair advantage.

  Let me assure you that it's a LOT more difficult to get a good image with
pure OpenGL (without using any modeller) than with povray (without using
any modeller).

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):_;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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Fabian BRAU wrote:

>This image just
>show the quality of the renderer not the modeler.

I always wonder, so I ask it here, what are objective (measurable?) 
criteria to determine the quality of a renderer/tracer/.. 


Ingo

-- 
Photography: http://members.home.nl/ingoogni/
Pov-Ray    : http://members.home.nl/seed7/

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Lance Birch wrote:

> > Hey, wait, it's "Internet Raytracing Competition", not "Internet Scanline
> > Competetion"! They've been cheating!
>
> Read the rules and you'll find otherwise... and besides, MAX has a
> raytracer.

I know, it was a joke

--
David Fontaine     <dav### [at] faricynet>     ICQ 55354965
Please visit my website: http://www.faricy.net/~davidf/

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In article <3990051b@news.povray.org>, Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> 
wrote:

>   Let me assure you that it's a LOT more difficult to get a good image 
> with pure OpenGL (without using any modeller) than with povray 
> (without using any modeller).

As someone just learning OpenGL, I can agree with that...OpenGL is a 
low-level graphics API, not a scene description or scripting language. 
:-)
If you want things like realistic lighting, reflections and refraction, 
you have to implement it yourself. Even simple transparence takes some 
extra effort.

Currently, the most complex thing I have done is a particle system 
simulating a bunch of skyrockets.

-- 
Christopher James Huff - Personal e-mail: chr### [at] maccom
TAG(Technical Assistance Group) e-mail: chr### [at] tagpovrayorg
Personal Web page: http://homepage.mac.com/chrishuff/
TAG Web page: http://tag.povray.org/

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I've yet to see POV used for television.  3DS MAX is used quite frequently
by Hollywood.  The animated series "Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd century" was
created with 3DS MAX.

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I knew that this statement would start quick answers.
The great thing about 3DSMAX is that its modelling capabilities allow
almost anything.
In my opinion ( and that's mine only), only Rhino does better.
Of course it's all a question of how well you know the deepest recesses
of the modeller/software.
Maya is said to be good as well, but it's a lot harder to master.

But when it comes to render quality, I still think that POV ( and Megapov
with its new features : photons & isosurfaces ~~shaders a la BMRT) is
better for still pictures.
3DSMAX is great for animation.




Doug Eichenberg a écrit :

> > You can model easily virtually anything you like with it, but in my
> > opinion the 3DSMAX renders do not match the quality of POV.
>
> That's a bold statement Fabien!  I've seen some very impressive stuff
> from 3DSMax (and it better be good for what they charge).  Of course,
> I've seen some great POV stuff too...
>
> --
> Doug Eichenberg
> http://www.nls.net/douge
> dou### [at] nlsnet

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Warp wrote:
> Lance Birch <-> wrote:
> : Because it's generally thought by the judges that not enough effort was
put
> : in to produce the result.  A little like the way people using Maya and
> : rendering on Origin 2000 servers are thought to have an unfair
advantage.
>
>   Let me assure you that it's a LOT more difficult to get a good image
with
> pure OpenGL (without using any modeller) than with povray (without using
> any modeller).

I didn't say anything about OpenGL, I was talking about Maya and the way
higher end graphics solutions weren't as favourably marked in a lot of cases
in comparison to cheaper solutions.

--
Lance

The Zone
http://come.to/the.zone

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POV-Ray makes pictures by shooting rays from the camera into the scene
but how do scanline renderers create images?
Brendan

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They work usually, from my limited understanding, by building a Z-Buffer of
the scene and then sampling the Z-Buffer for each pixel to determine the
object and normal of the pixel (well, normal of the surface of the object in
the pixel) and then using standard lighting techniques to figure out how the
surface is lit and then passing the information over to the shader which
determines the correct color at that point (in MAX all information such as
surface normal is also sent so the shader can make use of that information
too, for example, a normal-dependant texture such as X-Ray).

The nice thing about scanline renderers is it's possible to save the
Z-Buffer for use as a depth map for a SIS (stereogram).  In MAX it allows
you to do a lot of things post-render as it also allows direct access to the
Object channel, Effects ID channel, Normal channel and un-scaled color
channel.  An example would be using the Object channel to apply a Video Post
effect such as Glow to just one object.

--
Lance

The Zone
http://come.to/the.zone

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I think this is really difficult. The only example I know
is the Cornell box: you try to reproduce a very basic scene,
(esay to model and reproduce exactly, with simple texture (only color))
and you take the photo and the 3d image, you subtract them:
if the result is perfect you get a really black image if not,
you can measure the proportion of non-black pixel and the
gap between each non-black pixel and the black color.

But to do this with "real" scene, this is not easy.
Model object can be done really precisely (one can
even use 3d scanner). But put texture exactly as there
are on the object, this is not easy even if you use image
map from this object. But this is feasible I think.
But I don't know any example.

For commercial software, I suppose this is less "scientific".
But for them, rapidity of rendering and the feeling of reality
(which is not reality) are really important. Moreover there
are also the modeler which play a crucial role in the development.

For now one of the best renderer for commercial product is Mentalray
(http://www.mental.com). It is used in Softimage and now in 3DS Max.
With it you have photon, radiosity, global illumination and 
the time for rendering are rather good.

Fabian.

ingo a écrit :
> 
> Fabian BRAU wrote:
> 
> >This image just
> >show the quality of the renderer not the modeler.
> 
> I always wonder, so I ask it here, what are objective (measurable?)
> criteria to determine the quality of a renderer/tracer/..
> 
> Ingo
> 
> --
> Photography: http://members.home.nl/ingoogni/
> Pov-Ray    : http://members.home.nl/seed7/

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Andrea Ryan <ary### [at] global2000net> wrote:
: POV-Ray makes pictures by shooting rays from the camera into the scene
: but how do scanline renderers create images?

  Put in a very simple way:

  Scanline renderers project the polygons on screen, ie. they take all the
3D vertices of the polygon, project them on screen, thus converting them to
regular 2D polygons and then they draw that polygon as if it was just a
2D one.
  Of course if the polygon has texturing, it has to be done with perspective
correction for it to be right.

  There are several methods for hidden surface removal. The best one of them
is using a Z-buffer which makes a perfect removal and allows things like
space cutting (ie. two polygons intersecting).

  You can easily imagine how fast this is.
  This is the technique used by 3D accelerator cards.

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):_;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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Warp wrote:
> 
> Andrea Ryan <ary### [at] global2000net> wrote:
> : POV-Ray makes pictures by shooting rays from the camera into the scene
> : but how do scanline renderers create images?
> 
>   Put in a very simple way:
> 
>   Scanline renderers project the polygons on screen, ie. they take all the
> 3D vertices of the polygon, project them on screen, thus converting them to
> regular 2D polygons and then they draw that polygon as if it was just a
> 2D one.
>   Of course if the polygon has texturing, it has to be done with perspective
> correction for it to be right.
> 
>   There are several methods for hidden surface removal. The best one of them
> is using a Z-buffer which makes a perfect removal and allows things like
> space cutting (ie. two polygons intersecting).
> 
>   You can easily imagine how fast this is.
>   This is the technique used by 3D accelerator cards.

Finally!

Someone explained what scanline rendering is, instead of just saying:
"it's crap! raytracing is better".

-- 
Francois Labreque | Unfortunately, there's no such thing as a snooze
     flabreq      | button on a cat who wants breakfast.
        @         |      - Unattributed quote from rec.humor.funny
  attglobal.net

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>ingo a écrit :
>> I always wonder, so I ask it here, what are objective (measurable?)
>> criteria to determine the quality of a renderer/tracer/..

Fabian BRAU wrote:

>I think this is really difficult. The only example I know
>is the Cornell box: [snip]

The level of "photorealism" that can be achieved with a certain renderer. 
But what if I want to do cartoonish stuff, or render my latest LSD-trip?

>
>For commercial software, I suppose this is less "scientific".
>But for them, rapidity of rendering and the feeling of reality
>(which is not reality) are really important.

This, I think, comes close: "costumer satisfaction" And it can very well 
be measured with questionaires.

Ingo

-- 
Photography: http://members.home.nl/ingoogni/
Pov-Ray    : http://members.home.nl/seed7/

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