Denoise renders and save a LOT of time! (Nvidia not Reqd)

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  • Matt_CastleMatt_Castle Posts: 2,571
    Taoz said:

    Well I'Il see if I can make it work for both, apparently it already works partially for the Intel version also.

    Having tried both, I'm actually more impressed with the Intel one.

    Trying them out on something deliberately a bit challenging (a freckled character that was only rendered to about 250 samples), the Intel version seems to keep far more of the actual detail than the Nvidia one (although it does still get a bit smudgy).

  • 3dOutlaw3dOutlaw Posts: 2,471

    I agree with this,slightly better, but it was also faster for me with the Intel version...

  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    edited March 2019

    OK, been cleaning things up a bit. Here's the NVidia version of the DragNDrop app, same code, just different file names etc..

    NET 4: https://taosoft.dk/software/freeware/dnd_nvd/DnD_For_NVidia_Denoiser_1.000_NET4.zip

    NET3.5 if anyone should need it: https://taosoft.dk/software/freeware/dnd_nvd/DnD_For_NVidia_Denoiser_1.000_NET3.5.zip

    It works OK (at least in Windows 10) with the NVidia Denoiser 2.2 that can be downloaded here: https://github.com/DeclanRussell/NvidiaAIDenoiser/releases

    Just remember that it requires a compatible NVidia card to work (tested on a GTX 1070 with 419.67 driver).


    Some seem to be able to make it work with the Intel version also, but so far I haven't had any luck in Windows 10. Will do some more experiments when I get the time. In any case, since the command line parameters seem to be the same, it may (and seem to) work on other systems than mine, more or less.

    More later.

    Post edited by Taoz on
  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    wiz said:
    Taoz said:

    Can you do that with any pictures, or does it have to be renders (I imagine they may have a particular noise pattern)?

    Denoisers are generally "tuned" to a particular domain (digital camera sensor, physics based renderer, digital x-ray, etc) so you'd have to change some parameters to get a good denoise of something other than a render.

    Yes, I thought so. Thanks.

  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    edited March 2019
    Error - deleted
    Post edited by Taoz on
  • AllenArtAllenArt Posts: 7,169

    I think the OP's original point was that the Intel Denoiser could be used by anyone, even those without an Nvdia gfx card. For those folks, there has been no way to denoise their images until now, even tho we Nvidia  users have had it in the beta (well, at least while our graphics card memory holds out anyway...lol). Therefore, even tho the drag and drop is welcome, Nvidia DS users don't need it nearly as much as the non-Nvidia folks need the Intel one. LOL. As long as they can use the command line one tho, it's all good ;).

    Laurie

  • 3dOutlaw3dOutlaw Posts: 2,471

    That's true...though I am an Nvidia user, and a driver upgrade killed my ability to use the denoiser.

    It's all good.  The point is there is a denoiser for anyone, Nvidia or Intel  :)  Woohoo!

  • MattymanxMattymanx Posts: 6,908
    edited March 2019
    Taoz said:

    OK, been cleaning things up a bit. Here's the NVidia version of the DragNDrop app, same code, just different file names etc..

    NET 4: https://taosoft.dk/software/freeware/dnd_nvd/DnD_For_NVidia_Denoiser_1.000_NET4.zip

    NET3.5 if anyone should need it: https://taosoft.dk/software/freeware/dnd_nvd/DnD_For_NVidia_Denoiser_1.000_NET3.5.zip

    It works OK (at least in Windows 10) with the NVidia Denoiser 2.2 that can be downloaded here: https://github.com/DeclanRussell/NvidiaAIDenoiser/releases

    Just remember that it requires a compatible NVidia card to work (tested on a GTX 1070 with 419.67 driver).


    Some seem to be able to make it work with the Intel version also, but so far I haven't had any luck in Windows 10. Will do some more experiments when I get the time. In any case, since the command line parameters seem to be the same, it may (and seem to) work on other systems than mine, more or less.

    More later.

    FYI,

    I am using the Intel denoiser with the original DnD you posted and it works just fine on Win10 Pro.  I also already had .net 4.7.2 installed as well.  You named the first one DnD for Intel Denoiser so . . .

     

    EDIT:

    Just wanted to add that I can drag and drop directly from XnView MP directly to the DnD window.  Very handy

    Post edited by Mattymanx on
  • I love the denoiser filter, it is a time saver! Two thumbs up!

  • Matt_CastleMatt_Castle Posts: 2,571

    I've been experimenting with this more extensively, and I have to reiterate my earlier thoughts - I'm far more impressed with the Intel version than the Nvidia version.

    I'll try to upload the examples for others to have a look at later (once I've renamed the files to something others might actually understand), but after running off more tests of the freckled character I'd used before, variously at 900x1200 at 128, 256, 512 and 1024 samples, and a master downscaled from 2048 samples @ 1800x2400 (for absolutely minimal noise), the Intel version seems much better at retaining the intended detail regardless of the initial level of noise.
    (As an experiment, I also fed them the master copy, to see if they might ever be detrimental - Intel basically decides it doesn't need to do anything, nVidia still slightly softens all the freckles).

    Admittedly, even the best denoising of the best test image is still a visual step down from the quality of the master version (with its greater samples and downscaling), but it does get rid of enough noise that it's actually possible to run it through a light Unsharp Mask in Photoshop, after which the quality does get surprisingly close - that's no mean feat, given it rendered in about an eighth of the time.

    I guess I need to try them on other examples, but the use of a freckled character was deliberately a difficult test, and it did pretty well.

  • Leonides02Leonides02 Posts: 1,379
    edited March 2019

    I concur that this denoiser may be superior to Nvidia's. I also need to conduct more tests!

    What I really like to use the denoiser for is the background of my renders. Then I used the Spot Render Tool to focus on the areas of my image I want to see all the juicy detail. 

    Post edited by Leonides02 on
  • SotoSoto Posts: 1,440

    Trying the Nvidia one. It´s great. I think I will be using it a lot to get rid of rebel fireflies in water or reflections of final renders. But I still hesitate to use a denoiser unless doing animations. :)

  • Matt_CastleMatt_Castle Posts: 2,571

    I extended my test to include a 64 sample render as well, and after renaming the files to something hopefully understandable and adding some notes, I've bundled it into a ZIP download (19 PNG images, 1 TXT file, 15.5MB).
    (So that no one is caught by surprise if they open it, I will point out that the test subject is a freckly redhead elf in her undies because, hey, if I was going to render something six times...)

    As such, a comparison of both denoisers on six different levels of noise (although I accept that the performance of each denoiser may well be dependent on the exact test subject). Denoising isn't a complete substitute for the old "use lots of samples, render large and resize" approach, but these techniques are certainly getting increasingly smart.

     

    DenoiseTest__Master.png
    900 x 1200 - 767K
  • Leonides02Leonides02 Posts: 1,379

    @Matt_Castle Just looking at your attached image, I can't tell it's denoised at all -- probably because I don't have a comparison to scrutinize!

  • Matt_CastleMatt_Castle Posts: 2,571
    edited March 2019

    The attached image is just the master that was rendered at high quality as a "control" comparison - added so that people sort of noticed that I was talking about pictures.

    I couldn't practically attach all the images to the post, as the fact that the forum is automatically converting everything to WEBP images could have messed up the image quality (I hope it would have the sense to use lossless WEBP when converting a PNG image , but I'm not sure) and would definitely make it harder for some people to look at more closely in image editors, so the full collection of test images is in the ZIP file linked in the post.

    Post edited by Matt_Castle on
  • SixDsSixDs Posts: 2,384

    Just a note to say that it is not the forum software nor DAZ3D converting the images to .webp format. That is your browser doing that. Presumably Chrome? The images that are uploaded to the forums remain in their original format on the site. For example, I can see that your last attachment was a .png image. On the previous page, the screen capture of the command prompt windows posted by Ivy was a .jpg, etc. I can see that because I am using a browser other than Chrome. It's a Google thing, designed to free up more bandwidth to make room for even more ads.

  • Matt_CastleMatt_Castle Posts: 2,571
    edited March 2019
    SixDs said:

    For example, I can see that your last attachment was a .png image.

    The file names may be PNG and JPG images, but if you look at image properties, my browser is reporting them as WEBP format, and if you try to save them, they save in WEBP format (and no, changing the file extension does not work), you just get a file with the wrong extension for its type.

    Aside from the fact I'm using Firefox, I'm certain that it's not in-browser, as I don't have the problem on most other sites - and in any case, in-browser conversion would be pointless for saving bandwidth. It has to be done at a server up-stream there to be any saving.

    Regardless, trying to shove 19 images into forum attachments would be a pain for people to keep track of which was which.

    Post edited by Matt_Castle on
  • MattymanxMattymanx Posts: 6,908

    Waterfox shows the image as a PNG and reports it as PNG.

  • Matt_CastleMatt_Castle Posts: 2,571
    edited March 2019
    Mattymanx said:

    Waterfox shows the image as a PNG and reports it as PNG.

    All of the WEBP stuff has its own thread - it's not worth me going into, other than to say that while Daz's site may not be serving WEBP versions to everyone (dependent on their browser settings), I know it is definitely happening for a significant number of people.

    I had to provide downloads for the PNGs anyway to ensure that no-one was getting recompressed version - and given I'd already sorted out that neatly organised download, I didn't fancy trying to also deal with the headache of trying to get 19 nearly identical thumbnails into the post in a correct and sane order. (I suspect most people are going to ignore the actual test images anyway in favour of my earlier summary - the images are really only likely to be of interest to people who want to minutely dissect the results under a microscope, in which case a one-stop download of all of them at once makes sense).

    Post edited by Matt_Castle on
  • PadonePadone Posts: 3,700

    Honestly I can't understand what's the fuss here. Denoising has always been available via Photoshop or GIMP or most video editors for animations. As for Iray denoising it's in the beta. So if you don't have a nVidia card you can anyway use it on the CPU.

    Also I'd like to stress that PBR denoising is old stuff already. Most other engines has it from quite a while. Iray is just late in the game. The today frontier for fast rendering is real-time PBR, possibly via RTX. Again most other engines but Iray are implementing it.

  • SpitSpit Posts: 2,342

    I did the registry thing and it works fine. Just a note to say it looks like denoise uses a more aggressive jpg compression than DAZ. So just be aware of that.

     

  • Takeo.KenseiTakeo.Kensei Posts: 1,303
    Padone said:

    Honestly I can't understand what's the fuss here. Denoising has always been available via Photoshop or GIMP or most video editors for animations. As for Iray denoising it's in the beta. So if you don't have a nVidia card you can anyway use it on the CPU.

    Also I'd like to stress that PBR denoising is old stuff already. Most other engines has it from quite a while. Iray is just late in the game. The today frontier for fast rendering is real-time PBR, possibly via RTX. Again most other engines but Iray are implementing it.

    In fact, no. I use 3delight with custom PBR shaders and denoising is very usefull in this case as I can stop the render early

    Wowie also posted some PBR shaders for 3Delight, so some users may also appreciate it.

    I had these denoiser since a long time but didn't mind testing until this thread, so that was also a good reminder

     

  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    Mattymanx said:
    Taoz said:

    OK, been cleaning things up a bit. Here's the NVidia version of the DragNDrop app, same code, just different file names etc..

    NET 4: https://taosoft.dk/software/freeware/dnd_nvd/DnD_For_NVidia_Denoiser_1.000_NET4.zip

    NET3.5 if anyone should need it: https://taosoft.dk/software/freeware/dnd_nvd/DnD_For_NVidia_Denoiser_1.000_NET3.5.zip

    It works OK (at least in Windows 10) with the NVidia Denoiser 2.2 that can be downloaded here: https://github.com/DeclanRussell/NvidiaAIDenoiser/releases

    Just remember that it requires a compatible NVidia card to work (tested on a GTX 1070 with 419.67 driver).


    Some seem to be able to make it work with the Intel version also, but so far I haven't had any luck in Windows 10. Will do some more experiments when I get the time. In any case, since the command line parameters seem to be the same, it may (and seem to) work on other systems than mine, more or less.

    More later.

    FYI,

    I am using the Intel denoiser with the original DnD you posted and it works just fine on Win10 Pro.  I also already had .net 4.7.2 installed as well.  You named the first one DnD for Intel Denoiser so . . .

     

    EDIT:

    Just wanted to add that I can drag and drop directly from XnView MP directly to the DnD window.  Very handy

    Thanks, that sounds good! Technically it also should work I guess since the DnD app doesn't affect the denoising process in any way, and since they seem to use the same command line parameters. Will look into it...

  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    edited March 2019
    Taoz said:


    Some seem to be able to make it work with the Intel version also, but so far I haven't had any luck in Windows 10. Will do some more experiments when I get the time. In any case, since the command line parameters seem to be the same, it may (and seem to) work on other systems than mine, more or less.

    Well it turns out that the CPU on my programming machine (first generation Core 2 Quad)  is too old and doesn't support SSE4.1, so that's why the Intel version doesn't work for me. My other PCs have the same CPU so I'm currently unable to test the DnD app with Intel denoiser myself.

    Post edited by Taoz on
  • LenioTGLenioTG Posts: 2,118

    This is very interesting, but I'm not understanding how to do that and if I can, is there any guide for noobs like me?

  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    Padone said:

    Honestly I can't understand what's the fuss here. Denoising has always been available via Photoshop or GIMP or most video editors for animations. As for Iray denoising it's in the beta. So if you don't have a nVidia card you can anyway use it on the CPU.

    So you can use the nVidia denoiser without an nVidia card?

  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    edited March 2019
    kameneko said:

    This is very interesting, but I'm not understanding how to do that and if I can, is there any guide for noobs like me?

    You can use either the nVidia or the Intel denoiser:

    Intel - https://github.com/DeclanRussell/IntelOIDenoiser/releases

    Nvidia - https://github.com/DeclanRussell/NvidiaAIDenoiser/releases

    Just extract the zip(s) to your HDD.

    This DragNDrop app makes it easy to use the denoisers and should normally work for both, just unzip it into a folder and run it.

    https://taosoft.dk/software/freeware/dnd_nvd/DnD_For_NVidia_Denoiser_1.000_NET4.zip

    Select the path to one of the denoisers (the folder that contains the Denoiser.exe), then you can just drop your renders from Explorer onto the app and it will create a denoised version of them in the same folder.

     

    Post edited by Taoz on
  • TaozTaoz Posts: 9,941
    edited March 2019
    Taoz said:
    Padone said:

    Honestly I can't understand what's the fuss here. Denoising has always been available via Photoshop or GIMP or most video editors for animations. As for Iray denoising it's in the beta. So if you don't have a nVidia card you can anyway use it on the CPU.

    So you can use the nVidia denoiser without an nVidia card?

    Well, just tried, doesn't work here:


     

    nv_den_error.png
    677 x 295 - 11K
    Post edited by Taoz on
  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 100,946
    Taoz said:
    Taoz said:
    Padone said:

    Honestly I can't understand what's the fuss here. Denoising has always been available via Photoshop or GIMP or most video editors for animations. As for Iray denoising it's in the beta. So if you don't have a nVidia card you can anyway use it on the CPU.

    So you can use the nVidia denoiser without an nVidia card?

    Well, just tried, doesn't work here:


     

    Right, the nVidia denoiser needs a (supported) nVidia card.

  • xmasrosexmasrose Posts: 1,403

    @Taoz  Works fine for me on Win7 and Intel denoiser. Thank you.

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