A cabin in the woods eating memory for breakfast?

mats76

I just tried out the new "A cabin in the woods" and its light set, with the result that my computer almost stopped working. I noticed that in iray mode  the "A cabin in the woods" uses 11gb of my ssd and slowing the computer down like nothing else and I have to restart the computer to get the ssd space back.

I never noticed that with any scenery before. 

using a:

i5 3570

8gb ram

Gtx670 2gb 

JUJU

Similar here. Slow down everything and long Rendering... I used the scene that comes with it, some probs and 3 G8....

Gator

For Iray, a GTX 670 with 2 GB RAM is pretty light, did it drop to CPU rendering?  When you're using 100% CPU, everything will get pretty sluggish, but it sounds like it was paging too.

FSMCDesigns

That is the biggest problem with lots of newer items, they go overboard on details, textures and polycount that once you add the figures and other props, many scenes become unusable. It's pretty sad when you need more horsepower to render a scene than play a state of the art game.

Taoz

mats76 said:

I just tried out the new "A cabin in the woods" and its light set, with the result that my computer almost stopped working. I noticed that in iray mode  the "A cabin in the woods" uses 11gb of my ssd and slowing the computer down like nothing else and I have to restart the computer to get the ssd space back.

I never noticed that with any scenery before. 

using a:

i5 3570

8gb ram

Gtx670 2gb 

With only 8 GB RAM it's quite limited what you can render without it runs out of RAM and starts swapping to disk, and when it does that everything slows to a crawl. Last time it happened to me it took an hour before it started rendering. And with only 2 GB VRAM it will probably also drop to CPU rendering. All in all a slow affair.  

 

 

mats76

It is an old Graphic card with very little memory that will be uppgraded very soon.

But I have not noticed any product so far using that much memory from the ssd when switching to Iray in viewpoint. Since my ssd already have very little space left since the daz shopping spree those 11gb taken when using Iray is not ideal.

Not even previewing a whole city block "Urban city 3" in iray causes this kind of stress to the computer.   

  

Slartibartfast

I had similar problems with Mage Tower Iray, which (with a character in the scene) used over 28 GB of RAM when I tested it. The solution was to use Scene Optimizer to easily reduce the size of textures. Most newer environment props have enormous texture maps (often 4096x4096), and unless you're rendering at very high resolutions or zoom extremely close to objects, this isn't something you'll need. I was struggling with many scenes until I started optimizing. You can do it manually, but Scene Optimizer is a real time saver.

Gator

FSMCDesigns said:

That is the biggest problem with lots of newer items, they go overboard on details, textures and polycount that once you add the figures and other props, many scenes become unusable. It's pretty sad when you need more horsepower to render a scene than play a state of the art game.

Honestly, it's about time that happened.

Computer graphics have come a long ways.  I can play modern PBR games at 4k getting 60 FPS real time, some with textures that put lots of Daz content to shame.  Granted, I have a powerful computer but 4K will be coming to consoles this year IIRC.

Of course if you're going for comic book look, you don't care, but even the new cartoon animated movies have pretty darn nice looking textures, especially for the environment.

 

I'm still occaisionally disappointed with stuff.  I hate getting sets and asking myself "what, was this made in the 90's?"  I thought I finally left crappy graphics behind. 

 

Oso3D

The thing is, you can often cut texture load by careful repeat use of textures and thinking 'do I really need this metallicity map?'

But that takes a lot of extra work.

Taoz

scott762_948aec318a said:

FSMCDesigns said:

That is the biggest problem with lots of newer items, they go overboard on details, textures and polycount that once you add the figures and other props, many scenes become unusable. It's pretty sad when you need more horsepower to render a scene than play a state of the art game.

Honestly, it's about time that happened.

Computer graphics have come a long ways.  I can play modern PBR games at 4k getting 60 FPS real time, some with textures that put lots of Daz content to shame.  Granted, I have a powerful computer but 4K will be coming to consoles this year IIRC.

Of course if you're going for comic book look, you don't care, but even the new cartoon animated movies have pretty darn nice looking textures, especially for the environment.

 

I'm still occaisionally disappointed with stuff.  I hate getting sets and asking myself "what, was this made in the 90's?"  I thought I finally left crappy graphics behind. 

I agree. You can always reduce the texture quality if you like, but you can never improve it (unless you make your own from scratch).

Oso3D

And by work I mean for PAs; I get a little frustrated when I have some big environment and very little item has a unique Metallicity map and glossy weight and color and bump and normal and...

 

agent unawares

scott762_948aec318a said:

FSMCDesigns said:

That is the biggest problem with lots of newer items, they go overboard on details, textures and polycount that once you add the figures and other props, many scenes become unusable. It's pretty sad when you need more horsepower to render a scene than play a state of the art game.

Honestly, it's about time that happened.

Computer graphics have come a long ways.  I can play modern PBR games at 4k getting 60 FPS real time, some with textures that put lots of Daz content to shame.  Granted, I have a powerful computer but 4K will be coming to consoles this year IIRC.

Of course if you're going for comic book look, you don't care, but even the new cartoon animated movies have pretty darn nice looking textures, especially for the environment.

 

I'm still occaisionally disappointed with stuff.  I hate getting sets and asking myself "what, was this made in the 90's?"  I thought I finally left crappy graphics behind. 

 

It needs to happen but can it happen where we skip the "throw polygons everywhere" stage and go directly to best practices now?

mjc1016

agent unawares said:

scott762_948aec318a said:

FSMCDesigns said:

That is the biggest problem with lots of newer items, they go overboard on details, textures and polycount that once you add the figures and other props, many scenes become unusable. It's pretty sad when you need more horsepower to render a scene than play a state of the art game.

Honestly, it's about time that happened.

Computer graphics have come a long ways.  I can play modern PBR games at 4k getting 60 FPS real time, some with textures that put lots of Daz content to shame.  Granted, I have a powerful computer but 4K will be coming to consoles this year IIRC.

Of course if you're going for comic book look, you don't care, but even the new cartoon animated movies have pretty darn nice looking textures, especially for the environment.

 

I'm still occaisionally disappointed with stuff.  I hate getting sets and asking myself "what, was this made in the 90's?"  I thought I finally left crappy graphics behind. 

 

 

It needs to happen but can it happen where we skip the "throw polygons everywhere" stage and go directly to best practices now?

Polygons are minor memory users....

Textures, on the other hand are the major users. 

A million polys, untextured are going to be well bellow 100 MB (probably under 50), but a couple of high res maps can easily be 100+ MB each...and do 4 or more maps per item...

Gator

timmins.william said:

The thing is, you can often cut texture load by careful repeat use of textures and thinking 'do I really need this metallicity map?'

But that takes a lot of extra work.

But a metallicity map should be grayscale, that shouldn't be too large of an image, right?

Gator

agent unawares said:

scott762_948aec318a said:

FSMCDesigns said:

That is the biggest problem with lots of newer items, they go overboard on details, textures and polycount that once you add the figures and other props, many scenes become unusable. It's pretty sad when you need more horsepower to render a scene than play a state of the art game.

Honestly, it's about time that happened.

Computer graphics have come a long ways.  I can play modern PBR games at 4k getting 60 FPS real time, some with textures that put lots of Daz content to shame.  Granted, I have a powerful computer but 4K will be coming to consoles this year IIRC.

Of course if you're going for comic book look, you don't care, but even the new cartoon animated movies have pretty darn nice looking textures, especially for the environment.

 

I'm still occaisionally disappointed with stuff.  I hate getting sets and asking myself "what, was this made in the 90's?"  I thought I finally left crappy graphics behind. 

 

 

It needs to happen but can it happen where we skip the "throw polygons everywhere" stage and go directly to best practices now?

It's textures really, which I mentioned.  Sometimes the textures are far too low res, or once in a while a sufficient resolution but just plain bad.  As mjc1016 mentioned, polys don't take up much memory.

Oso3D

Scott: Sure, but if you have 50 of them... ;)

 

AntMan

I hear what you guys are saying! I always try and shave off everything I can without having it show. But when it comes to textures, I do use large maps. But that's because if I do a 4 story building someone does a render of a fly on a brick in the wall and complains about a loss of detail. It really did happen but it was a butterfly. Tiled textures work but when you pull out the pattern becomes an eye sore. PBR, or Iray renders look great with high res maps and creators want their work to look the best it can but there has to be the right balance for certain. If I add a lower res version it would add to the package size but would give some who do not own Photoshop the option, when the object is in the mid ground or background. Would that be helpful? I'm want the product to work well for the user so let me know.

Gator

@timmins.william - I supppose, but it sounds like if the metallicity map is tipping you over the edge, you were really close to start with.  I'm not a texturing expert, but it seems like using a metallicity map simplifies things regarding the shader.

agent unawares

mjc1016 said:

agent unawares said:

scott762_948aec318a said:

FSMCDesigns said:

That is the biggest problem with lots of newer items, they go overboard on details, textures and polycount that once you add the figures and other props, many scenes become unusable. It's pretty sad when you need more horsepower to render a scene than play a state of the art game.

Honestly, it's about time that happened.

Computer graphics have come a long ways.  I can play modern PBR games at 4k getting 60 FPS real time, some with textures that put lots of Daz content to shame.  Granted, I have a powerful computer but 4K will be coming to consoles this year IIRC.

Of course if you're going for comic book look, you don't care, but even the new cartoon animated movies have pretty darn nice looking textures, especially for the environment.

 

I'm still occaisionally disappointed with stuff.  I hate getting sets and asking myself "what, was this made in the 90's?"  I thought I finally left crappy graphics behind. 

 

 

It needs to happen but can it happen where we skip the "throw polygons everywhere" stage and go directly to best practices now?

Polygons are minor memory users....

Textures, on the other hand are the major users. 

A million polys, untextured are going to be well bellow 100 MB (probably under 50), but a couple of high res maps can easily be 100+ MB each...and do 4 or more maps per item...

Polygons can WRECK viewport performance.

Gator

AntMan said:

I hear what you guys are saying! I always try and shave off everything I can without having it show. But when it comes to textures, I do use large maps. But that's because if I do a 4 story building someone does a render of a fly on a brick in the wall and complains about a loss of detail. It really did happen but it was a butterfly. Tiled textures work but when you pull out the pattern becomes an eye sore. PBR, or Iray renders look great with high res maps and creators want their work to look the best it can but there has to be the right balance for certain. If I add a lower res version it would add to the package size but would give some who do not own Photoshop the option, when the object is in the mid ground or background. Would that be helpful? I'm want the product to work well for the user so let me know.

Good question, and I'm not sure about the answer really.  To include both maps will obviously make the whole package larger.

I suppose what would be ideal, would be if the next version of Studio had a texture decimator.  I know games do use different textures for distant objects, but I don't know if it's automatically downsized or if there are separate maps.  Seems it wouldn't be too hard to simply downsize the image sent to the render engine at least on a global scale.

AntMan

That's a great Idea! I will ask the Daz guys what they think/know.

 

nemesis10

You would have to have something in place to so that updates don't overwrite the decimated textures.

FSMCDesigns

scott762_948aec318a said:

AntMan said:

I hear what you guys are saying! I always try and shave off everything I can without having it show. But when it comes to textures, I do use large maps. But that's because if I do a 4 story building someone does a render of a fly on a brick in the wall and complains about a loss of detail. It really did happen but it was a butterfly. Tiled textures work but when you pull out the pattern becomes an eye sore. PBR, or Iray renders look great with high res maps and creators want their work to look the best it can but there has to be the right balance for certain. If I add a lower res version it would add to the package size but would give some who do not own Photoshop the option, when the object is in the mid ground or background. Would that be helpful? I'm want the product to work well for the user so let me know.

Good question, and I'm not sure about the answer really.  To include both maps will obviously make the whole package larger.

I suppose what would be ideal, would be if the next version of Studio had a texture decimator.  I know games do use different textures for distant objects, but I don't know if it's automatically downsized or if there are separate maps.  Seems it wouldn't be too hard to simply downsize the image sent to the render engine at least on a global scale.

Been in DS for awhile now. It's called texture Atlas. Allows for combining multiple textures onto one sheet. You can also use the free script from Esemwy in the freebie section that will resize textures on the fly. I use it often. Thread is here https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/137161/reduce-texture-sizes-easily-with-this-script/p1

 

Griffin Avid

AntFarm get outta here....I have no idea how you get your counts so low. I'm using the Floating office right now and I'm throwing everything but the kithcen sink at it- no problems...

Your models are always very conservative. I don't know how you do it, but well done.....

You need to do a tutorial for some of the other vendors...

Help us all out.

Figures are a different thing and they EAT TONS of resources....

So far, the only help has been Scene Optimizer and turning off Smoothing....in the parameters pane for all the bits of clothing....

Silent Winter

FSMCDesigns said:

scott762_948aec318a said:

AntMan said:

I hear what you guys are saying! I always try and shave off everything I can without having it show. But when it comes to textures, I do use large maps. But that's because if I do a 4 story building someone does a render of a fly on a brick in the wall and complains about a loss of detail. It really did happen but it was a butterfly. Tiled textures work but when you pull out the pattern becomes an eye sore. PBR, or Iray renders look great with high res maps and creators want their work to look the best it can but there has to be the right balance for certain. If I add a lower res version it would add to the package size but would give some who do not own Photoshop the option, when the object is in the mid ground or background. Would that be helpful? I'm want the product to work well for the user so let me know.

Good question, and I'm not sure about the answer really.  To include both maps will obviously make the whole package larger.

I suppose what would be ideal, would be if the next version of Studio had a texture decimator.  I know games do use different textures for distant objects, but I don't know if it's automatically downsized or if there are separate maps.  Seems it wouldn't be too hard to simply downsize the image sent to the render engine at least on a global scale.

Been in DS for awhile now. It's called texture Atlas. Allows for combining multiple textures onto one sheet. You can also use the free script from Esemwy in the freebie section that will resize textures on the fly. I use it often. Thread is here https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/137161/reduce-texture-sizes-easily-with-this-script/p1

 

^That script is a life-saver (or a great memory-saver anyway).  I use it all the time.  Just need to remember NOT to save the scene after using it (as it creates new textures in a temp-folder that aren't there anymore on re-starting DS).

Frinkky

I've just had a colleague ask me what was wrong when they tried using this set (Cabin in the Woods). It quickly became apparent that all the unique textures were crazy! Looks great, but unless you've got a 12gb gpu, say goodbye to the idea of using it with a character (or, heaven forbid, 2!). So, I suggested she replace some of the textures with repeating patterns - no go. The uv layouts are completely illogical. Can't change the glass, because the window frames are included. Can't change the skirting boards because the light switches are affected (as well as a swing?!?). I wished her a pleasant weekend re-uvmapping the entire thing.

Roll on out-of-core memory usage and sane uv mapping practices! Perhaps Daz should also show memory requirements on the product page...

JOdel

Probably not a bad idea, considering that what is becomming *possible* in the program does not mean it is *accessible* to any specific user. And there is no such thing as an "average" user's system to really use as a benchmark.

Trigger_31

Jesus Christ! Whoever made this should really read up on scene and texture optimisation. This choked my machine 8GB RAM but my with a GTX 1060 with 6GB VRAM

Sven Dullah

It's funny, I use an IMac with 8Gb RAM and render in 3DL and I very rarely have any major problems rendering complex scenes like this

That's M4's with 4k textures, no scene optimization. Seems like IRay uses resources very differently to 3DL?

Trigger_31

Sven Dullah said:

It's funny, I use an IMac with 8Gb RAM and render in 3DL and I very rarely have any major problems rendering complex scenes like this

That's M4's with 4k textures, no scene optimization. Seems like IRay uses resources very differently to 3DL?

Of course. 3DL is purely CPU and RAM based while IRAY is meant to use GPUs and VRAM  but can use  CPUSs too.  But that's no excuse for selling badly or not all optimised products. But since it's the cabin in the woods maybe there's a hidden Lovecraftian dimension in the render...

Sven Dullah

vtx32_5a16989487 said:

Sven Dullah said:

It's funny, I use an IMac with 8Gb RAM and render in 3DL and I very rarely have any major problems rendering complex scenes like this

That's M4's with 4k textures, no scene optimization. Seems like IRay uses resources very differently to 3DL?

Of course. 3DL is purely CPU and RAM based while IRAY is meant to use GPUs and VRAM  but can use  CPUSs too.  But that's no excuse for selling badly or not all optimised products.

Well agreed! Can't argue!

But since it's the cabin in the woods maybe there's a hidden Lovecraftian dimension in the render...