Definition in Iray renders

rogerjhardy100

This is more of a general observation but I've found that many Iray renders are a bit soft, almost fuzzy, compared to 3Delight. Recently I downloaded some high-res HDRIs (50 megapixels) and tried those and was amazed at the crisp definition. It seems that the definition depends on the quality of the light that is used in the picture (HDRIs are basically lights). Has anyone else had similar experiences?

SpottedKitty

Yes, that's the way the new rendering engine works — getting a good lighting setup is very different from the way we're all used to doing it in 3Delight, and render quality is even more dependent on lighting quality (not just if you're using an HDRI). We've all got a lot of relearning to do, but the test renders I've had so far can be mindbogglingly good.

rogerjhardy100

....and I've read that Iray rendering is better the more lights you have. My experience would seem to back this up. Normally, if I'm doing the lighting setup it's three spots but the results are a little fuzzy. Funnily enough, I get sharper results from no lights at all, just relying on the headlamp.

DustRider

Iray (or any unbiased renderer) is capable of incredible definition. I would guess that most of the images you have seen that don't show crisp definition were either stopped before they were actually finished (which would look somewhat grainy) or have been post processed to have a softer look. Depending on your setup, even on single light with a reflector or two (like a studio set up) or a single light in a soft box can make very detailed renders.

The atached image was rendered using Iray, the scene is lit with two mesh lights and one spotlight. be sure to zoom to full resolution wo see the intricate detail of the pattern on the kimono. - See more at: http://www.daz3d.com/gallery/#images/75513

mjc1016

dustrider said:

be sure to zoom to full resolution wo see the intricate detail of the pattern on the kimono.

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I think if one is going by images viewed on the forums, that the 'squash'/'fuzz' effect of the forum software has a more noticeable effect on the images...more 'larger', higher detailed images are being posted, so there are more details to 'squash'. I noticed that there seems to be a much bigger difference between the gallery posted images and the forum posted images than there used to be. So I'm not entirely sure that forum pics are an accurate representation...gallery images are somewhat better.

Another area where things become more noticeable...if the backdrop/background is blurry/fuzzy or just not sharp, the whole image suffers, and it's not just due to lighting. It's almost as if the whole image is using a 'soft focus', because a large part of it IS not as 'in focus', as it could be...and lo-res images used for backdrops are almost the same as applying heavy DoF...

Jimbow

The Mitchell antialiasing filter helps as well.