FAQ - Loading and converting DAZ Studio materials to OctaneRender plugin materials

linvanchene

When browsing the DAZ Forum I noticed that there still seems to be some confusion when it comes to the importance of the size of the VRAM when working with GPU based render engines like OctaneRender standalone or the OctaneRender plugin for DAZ Studio.

You can use the integrated functions of the OctaneRender plugin for DAZ Studio to load only those textures that are actually visible in the viewport.
You can use the option to reduce the size of textures that are only visible in the background with the click of a button.
With some effort it is possible to fit most standard DS scenes into workstations with limited VRAM size.

You mostly need very large VRAM sizes if you only want to use the one click autoconversion of the plugin that will convert all materials in the scene and are not willing at all to do some manual work.

I provide some of the most important information here.
You will find links to a more detailed FAQ with a lot of images guiding you trough the process on the OctaneRender forum and on DeviantArt at the end of this post.

I would have created a version of the FAQ for the DAZ studio forum but I could not figure out a way to place images "inline".
I am afraid not many are enjoying reading through walls of text with the images only at the end.

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In the future there will also be other solutions available. You will be able to load textures also from RAM and you will be able to rent GPU and render scenes in OctaneRender Cloud Edition. Nevertheless in this small summary on this forum and the more detailed FAQ on the OctaneRender forum and DeviantArt I concentrate on what is currently working with OctaneRender plugin for DAZ Studio V1.2

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@ VRAM usage of DAZ scenes

In general it is true that a lot of DAZ scenes will consume more than 2 GB VRAM very quickly.
Nevertheless there are huge differences between scenes from different PA depending on the size of the textures they use.
Note that the geometry actually uses only a small amount of VRAM.

Examples:
The numbers are estimates for autoconverted complete scenes without reducing the size of textures.

- Jack Tomalin Scenes will consume between 2-3 GB VRAM.
- Most Stonemason scenes will use less than 2 GB VRAM.

If you want to render a scene with one character 3GB VRAM may be enough.
If you are rendering scenes with 2 or more characters you may need 4GB VRAM.
If you are adding Zbrush Fiber Mesh Hair to one character you may need 5-6 GB VRAM

I only encountered one case in which I would have hoped to have more than 6GB VRAM and this was when I tried to render a scene with one figure and one animal both with Zbrush Fiber Mesh hair. In the future it will also be possible to convert fiber mesh hair into OctaneRender hair. It was allready announced on the DS forum that the OctaneRender plugin and LAMH developers will provide a solution for Look at my hair products as well...

@ VRAM management
Most render engines that use GPU offer tools to manage the VRAM to lower the size of scenes.

The OctaneRender plugin for DAZ Studio has a built in tool to manage the texture sizes.
All textures loaded in the scene are displayed in an overview.
With the click of one button you can choose to reduze the size of each texture.

A smart workflow when working with GPU render engines is
- to load only those textures that are actually visible in the render window.
- reduce the size of the textures that are only visible in the background.

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FAQ - Loading and converting DAZ Studio materials to OctaneRender materials with the OctaneRender plugin for DAZ Studio.

When loading materials from DAZ Studio and converting them to OctaneRender materials for the OCDS plugin you are facing two options:

- Either you let the OCDS plugin load all materials and convert them automatically.

or

- You manually select which materials are loaded to manage the texture space needed in your VRAM.

I put together a more detailed FAQ going into the details of those options and published it on the OctaneRender Forum and DeviantArt.
The intention of the FAQ is to cover most of the questions related to the conversion of DAZ Studio materials to OctaneRender materials:

OctaneRender Forum version:

http://render.otoy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=44&t=41543

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edited: removed outdated link

SimonWM

Very valuable post. Thanks for taking the time to put these out.