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...I've got to get caught up on that thread.
I haven't really followed this thread cuz, well, I have no clue about 3Delight. Never used it. But from what I've researched about renderers (I'm sorta looking at how they're programmed...), I have a few comments....
As others have said, I know we humans love to categorize things into two boxes: Good and Bad. But often the truth is somewhere in between. And with renderers I think a lot has to do with history. Calculating real world light and how it bounces off and passes thru surfaces is incredibly complex. And the early computers couldn't handle anywhere near that complexity, so the software folks took MANY shortcuts. And they developed renderers that weren't "physically based", but rather shortcuts that left out a lot of stuff so it could render in your lifetime. They ignored stuff like Subsurface Scattering (like with real skin), and a ton of other stuff. And as computers progressed, it became more reasonable to include more complex stuff. And now, with really powerful computers, you can make "physically based" renderers, which come very close to modelling how light and surfaces are in the real world.
So yeah, in general earlier renderers and shaders systems were less "realistic". But now anyone can do renders of a human skin, or caustics, or you name it, so that it looks absolutely like a photograph. And since 3D renderers are generally intended to render realistic-looking stuff (otherwise most artists do comic-style and other graphic stuff by hand), there's a big push with renderers for realism.
So is 3Delight different from Iray? Of course. It's a completely different technology. Iray is further down the road in terms of PBR (physically based rendering), and it's easier to make realistic stuff. Is 3Delight faster? That's almost impossible to answer. Because they use two different technologies, and two different internal models for surfaces. They're doing two different things. Now you could probably cut down on what Iray is modelling on a particular surface so that it more closely matches the 3Delight surface model. But can you match exactly how they are calculating light bounces and surface interactions and how they model surfaces? I REALLY doubt it.
And of course, if you include the precise details of surfaces (SSS, Fresnel shading, Normal maps, Glossiness, etc.), it will take longer than if you don't. But if 3Delight doesn't include those things internally, it's as others have said...apples to oranges.
But if you understand the surfaces and how to apply them, it's pretty much guaranteed that Iray can give you a more realistic result if you know what you're looking for. And if you don't want that realism, and don't want to do your images by hand, then 3Delight is probably gonna take more shortcuts and give you non-realism fairly fast.
I suspect everyone secretly knows the return on selling 3DL settings for all the new items will not make up for the purchase price.
All you need is DS 3dl shader settings you don't need to include the texture maps. It use to be done by people for DS in the days when things only had Poser mat settings, should be easier now as 3dl shaders can use Normal maps in the past it couldn't and Poser could.
Removed quote of removed post
Actually, the argument is that the PAs are "losing sales" by ignoring 3Delight users, when those that have dropped support say they need more sales than what they were getting when they supported both to make the time investment pay off, and any older customer that was put off by the lack of 3DL material presets has been offset by new buyers that don't really care about that. Also, the part about realism/believable renders is irrelevant to those that aren't looking for those things in their renders, which is one of the things that 3Delight is good at that Iray isn't as yet.
Ebergerly:
I've done a lot of playing with 3DL and Iray.
My conclusion is that, within the scope of available and easy to use options in both, 3DL and Iray CPU speeds are roughly on par. (And yes, 3DL experts can recode stuff and maybe everything will change in a month, but until any of that is generally available, it won't impact the situation at hand)
3DL starts in a sweet point of 'not very realistic/high quality' and has blistering speeds as a result. But with skill and some available tools you can push it to greater realms of photorealism (if you want).
Iray starts in a sweet point of 'fairly realistic/high quality' and necessarily takes more time. With skill, you can push it DOWN toward simpler, less realistic renders.
A stripped down Iray compares, visually, at least in the same ballpark as 3DL, though probably a different stylistic look. It will render about as fast as 3DL (see my '5 minute renders' series in Show Iray renders thread)
A souped up 3DL render can hold its own with a lot of decent Iray images. It will render WAY slower than usual, at a rate comparable to Iray (in CPU mode).
The advantage with either is if your interests happen to be in the sweet spot it shoots for, so you have to do less work. Also, there are some fiddly specific things each can do that the other can't.
The problem for PAs is that 3DL 'default' doesn't look very appealing. It looks like dated technology. Which might be great for an individual customer, but not for the overall market.
Just to clarify: I'm perfectly happy with my Mac and with 3DL. If I really was interested in Iray I would get myself hardware capable of handling it.
Yeah, I saw that argument. But it seems to me that's an obvious answer. Of course those that don't serve a certain market are losing sales. What's to argue? Just like I'm losing sales not being a PA.
And telling PA's they should serve a certain market seems equally irrelevant. If they don't want to, and it's not the future, and not what the majority want to buy, what do you expect?
I think this is well put, generally but on the other hand it seems like madness to invest in all that technology and super realistic new products for Iray just to strip it down. And the result seems to be very grainy renders that you won't have with 3DL. Just saying:)
But they're are doing two different things. Are you sure you're comparing apples to apples? If one is doing more calculations because the surfaces/materials are more complex internally, and their render engines are different, how do you know they're roughly the same?
That’s the result of the most minimal render. Actually doing a 30 or 60 min render would be a bunch better.
It's a bit like saying "Mary can paint a picture of a flower faster than Joe can". It depends on what actually is being painted, whether the two final images are identical, what tools they're using, and on and on....
It depends. Like I said, we all like to put things into two boxes. This is better than that, this is faster than that, and so on. But sometimes you just can't, IMO.
Exactly! So next step for me would be to make my own models and shaders and so on, so I can continue doing what I love to do. Actually I've started that process by trying to learn the shader mixer outside in. And it's great fun! Also waiting for that Hexagon upgrade not to mention that stuff wowie and others are doing, so the future suddenly looks bright
I'm not understanding why those who aren't looking for realism can't just use Iray shaders, but dial them back, and use post-production stuff to tailor the non-realism to exactly what you want, if necessary?
But unfortunately, many 3Delight users like myself are finding the Iray box closing in around us.
I agree. In fact, earlier in the thread it was suggested that you despeckle a stripped down Iray render to get a good end product. Huh?
A lot has to do with a look people are looking for. Others are looking to use more memory because they have bigger scene requirements than you can fit on a GPU. And on and on...
an older 3delight animation ~ enjoy..lol
Well if you have never used 3DL I can't really expect you to understand, can I?
As I noted earlier in the thread, I'm not a shader mechanic. I want out-of-box functionality that increases my productivity and speeds my workflow. I think some here see me as lazy because I'm not interested in diving into the nuts and bolts, but hey, I pay DAZ and the PAs for these products and I'm willing to pay for the shader presets.
No need to be patronizing. I'm reasonably intelligent, so a simple explanation might suffice.
Sven, that’s a good point. How familiar are you with Iray?
Wow, Ivy, that's an impressive animation. But clearly closer to the "comic book" style and not trying for realism, correct? Now if that was a realistic Iray render it would be amazing.
Sorry mate, that was not my intention! To give you a very short answer: I know 3DL and get my work done, I can render faster on my Mac, I'm not willing to invest a lot of money I don't have on Iray add ons. Iray can't do certain things I'm depending on. I don't have to worry if a scene will fit into my GPU. This discussion doesn't belong in this thread so I will end it here!
I have done a handful of testrenders so basically know only what I've learned on these forums;) I followed a lot of problem solving threads after Iray was introduced, and still do, so although I have very little experience I feel I know the basics.
yes thats was comic style I use 3dl for cartoon draw style renders and iray for photorealistic or as close as I can get with Iray and animation. the Iray render times take days to do scenes where 3dl takes matter of hours big difference in render times
Iray animation using thesame aricraft model
I can see in your profile that you've been here since 2013. I'm sorry if I'm wrong, but I am going to assume it's your first account, which makes you a relative newcomer. This is why what I am going to say next may sound patronising, if you aren't really that much of a newbie. Sorry again.
When you create material presets for an item, these presets do not incorporate actual texture maps. They only link to them.
So, a PA released a product that has maps. Then a freebie provider wants to release a material preset for this specific product, but for an alternative renderer. This freebie provider does NOT need to redistribute the original maps. They just list the product as "required" for their freebie to work. Their DUF files will look for the textures in their original folders.
And no PA can legally stop a freebie provider from releasing any presets that do not infringe on the PA's copyright. Which a mat preset for an alternative renderer does not by definition, since it does not copy a single dial. And, again, the maps remain where they were. People who d/l the free mat preset will NOT receive any texture maps with it.
Because the shaders we have now - both light and surface shaders - are, to put it mildly, inefficient. You will never get your vanilla DS/3Delight materials to match your Iray/LuxRender/Octane/custom!3Delight physically-based materials this way.
The only people who will appreciate these materials are the "oldschool" crowd - those people here who say they prefer "painterly" or "toon" looks.
A PA who would want to cater to these people would need to enjoy these styles themselves. Apparently not many of those people wind up PAs.
this is another iray render animation
This one is older 3edlight render animation ..
You actually do need to buy the item and its textures to make the 3DL material settings. :\