Grass to look real when rendered

Raylectron (https://Raylectron.com) is a 3D rendering engine for Trimble Sketchup (https://sketchup.com)
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

Here is another video Nick...
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Thanks Michael, that was quite helpful also, and thanks again for pointing out the glass face on the interior issue. I'll correct the glass and the ceiling next time. You said you were going to show/talk about "Fog" setting, but I guess it would be another video.
Thanks so much again,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

oh yes, the fog settings. Well, if you turn it on in Sketchup, it'll also be on in Raylectron. You can either adjust the fog settings in Sketchup using the Sketchup Fog Settings window, or in Raylectron in the Render settings window. Beside that, there isn't much to say. Just make it look the way you want in Sketchup, and it'll look just about the same in the render.
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Hi Michael,
I modified the model a bit and did everything as far as reversing all faces to proper orientation and when rendered still get this awful reflection/shading and I can't figure out what it is causing this. I am pretty sure I've made a mistake somewhere but I checked all the glasses, frames, walls and everything. What am i missing here. attached are the skp file and a 3 minute rendering. the red line shows the extent of the floor area and the corner line in the back. The arrow shows where this strange shading occurs.
Thanks Michael,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

The problem Nick is that the faces of your corner window are not correct. One of them on the inside has glass on the front face and transparent (not glass) on the back face. The other one facing outside has glass on the front face and nothing on the back face.

The little windows have no material for the back face, only the front face is set to glass.

You should remove all materials from all the faces since you has it already set as glass for the group because the face it self will override the setting for the group.

Here is a video to explain all this and point out some other stuff...
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Thanks so much again.I was under the assumption that not only I must assign glass material to the group, but also to its faces. Now I know that I should assign all faces of a glass group or component the default material and just assign the glass to the group or the component itself, and also remove the unnecessary faces.
On another note, somehow when I select a group or component and I go to View>Component edit>Hide Rest of the Model, nothing happens and the rest of the model is still there. Do you have a setting somewhere for that?
I also tried bringing in some environment maps, but somehow my Dual Xeon is not doing its job and I cannot orbit easily around the model. I like your environment maps though and of course you computer is a new one.
I'll fix all and post an image later.
Thanks Michael,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

For the "Hide rest of model" to work, you have to double click on the group or component to open it, only then, the rest of the model will be hidden.

The env map I used is the one from the link I posted. It's normal that the map is slow to rotate because it is very large. But once you have it in place, rending should be fast. Have you tried to render with a map? Have you download them from the link I posted?
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

thanks Michael, all worked out well as you can see in this 4 hour rendering. Had to go to lunch and the rendering was doing its job. I think double clicking a component or a group would be the same thing as a single click and then selecting to edit a group or a component. But I'll try that one too. When I went on the environment site, there were two files right on the page and I downloaded the first one and its not as nice as the one you have. Which one is yours? Of course I can watch the video again and find that out. I did try it and it looks nice and good and the rendering is relatively fast, but it is a bit slow on my computer to turn the environment around. At any rate I'll render couple of more scenes and post them later.
Thanks again,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

WOW, it's really awesome Nick!

I found one more thing that I would do differently. Let me make a video of it and also which maps to get. Be right back...
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Thanks Michael,
You are an awesome teacher. Just rendered the same model with another renderer and applied a darker environment to see the effects of the lights. This is a 20 minutes(350 Passes) render and this company usually recommends minimum of 500 passes. I Like the effects of lights on this better and the setting here for all the emissive material is 2. In Raylectron I applied 2 and then 3 and the rendering didn't show much of a soft glow. I had to set it to 4 and then the glow showed up, but even after 4 hours of rendering doesn't have the softness in the glow. If I set it to more than 4 it would be too bright. Maybe it is because I rendered with the sun and sky setting!
Michael, how would you go about showing the sun reflections through the window panes on the floor inside the room? Do I need to turn on the shadows in Sketchup? Because I already clicked the "enable shadow" under the path tracing mode.
Thanks again,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

Here is the video...
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

No two render uses the same settings Nick. If you want the scene darker. change the color of the sky/groud and set the sky intensity to much less, or make your light brither or something, then you can get the same effect by also adjusting the BR value or any others like Brightness, Intensity etc.
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Sergio »

@Nick, nice design, you're a much better designer than I am, congrat, (I pick from the 3D warehouse) :D

BTW, I think your dark render you did using another render looks fake. Lights that close to a wall got to illuminate that area big time and that one ain't. Don't wanna take sides, but Raylectron does a much better job. So to prove my point, I did some modif on your model to get it as close as possible to what you have (I think you are using 20 as a FOV instead of 35), and here's what it looks like. I think it's way more natural looking. Another thing, your's don't have the glass corner seam refraction, Raylectron does it right.

My settings are 3 for the light power, sky intensity to 0.01, the background color in sketchp 26,26,24 (rgb), path tracing with artificial lights and sky + direct illumination, BR = -2. Render time on my quad core 2.8ghz was 25 mins 800 passes at 927x484
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Sergio »

Here's one more Raylectron render, same settings, except Raytarced. 4 mins, 104 passes. Incredible!
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Hi Michael,
Thanks for the video and pointing out about my light fixtures and the bottom surface. There is always something there . I'll fix those ones too and render it again. I was only talking about the lights glowing effect, not to compare their rendering engine. I am sure I can get it to look much better after I fix the light fixtures.
Thanks again,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Hi Sergio,
Thanks much for the compliment. As I mentioned in my post to Michael, my intention was not to compare rendering softwares. I wanted a soft glow on the walls and now I can see that I had some issues with my geometry so I have to fix it and render it once more. I like what you did with your settings and I know the fact that fixture so close to wall with make the whole thing bright, but my personal preference would be even a softer glow with the number set to 3. You are absolutely right about the corner refraction that you got with Raylectron. That would definitely make it look much more real. I will follow your settings with both modes and hope to get that refraction with the number set to 2.
Thank you for your suggestions,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Sergio »

Hey Nick, I got it, you don't want that big glow correct? All you got to do is set your light power to 0.5 or even 0.1

Hey Michael, am I taking your job away :mrgreen:
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

Nick, I didn't think your were trying to accomplish that light effect. So I followed Segio's way and indeed it worked. Here is a 1 hour render, light power at 0.3 just to have a little bit of a glow on the wall.

Sergio, thanks for helping, nice call. You're not taking my job, I have a lot to do anyway so any help is great, thanks!
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Thanks guys. I followed per Michael's instructions and corrected my light fixtures. Then I rendered per Sergio's suggestions with light settings of 3,2, and finally 1. Even with light setting of 1, it is still too bright. So I thought I should try with 0.5, but didn't have time. So thank you both for suggesting to lower the light intensity and thanks Michael for showing me the rendering with 0.3 setting. Looks great with a soft glow. I'll try it myself later. Here are two images, one a night shot with light setting to 1, and the other one, lights are off and the Sun is shining into the building. The night shot rendered for 12 minutes (100 passes) and the day shot rendered for 12 minutes also(205 passes).
Thank you both again,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

You're welcome Nick. Can't wait to see more designed from you. As Sergio pointed out, you have great artistic imagination! I like the corners lights, never seen this before, very cool!
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by agrass0o12 »

Hi Michael, thank you for your guide. Now I know to use direct illumination.
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

agrass0o12 wrote:Hi Michael, thank you for your guide. Now I know to use direct illumination.
You are welcome. If you need more assistance on something, let me know and I'll make you a video on how it works.
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Hi Michael,
Just mailed a U.S. Post Office International Money order to Diane. Hopefully it'll get there in about couple of days and I shall be a proud official user of Raylectron. Question for you: When i do get my activation code, will all the Raylectron logos on the left sides of the renderings disappear or do I have to do it all over again?
Thanks much,
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Support »

Great Nick, welcome to the world of Raylectron :D

If you have saved the render data to a file, then yes, the logo will be gone of you reload the data. Saving the render data allows you to re-open it later and continue the render, and to make adjustments such as brightness etc and re-save to an image file.

If you did not save the render data, then obviously you need to render the model again since it can not remove the logo directly from the saved image!
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Re: Grass to look real when rendered

Post by Nick1 »

Thanks Michael, I do still have some of the data files but not all of them, so I'll render them again. On another note, I was looking all over net for some Ive Leave surface/ground or wall coverage plants but couldn't find any nice free ones online, so I decided to model my own and so far its not bad. I have to modify it a bit more specially the lower leaves are all the same direction so I have to change that. I don't know how but it would be a blessing if Raylectron can come up with a way to make wall/ground/surface covering 3D plants or some sort of an algorithm that when gets rendered, they would show as wall covering plants or so on.
Have a great weekend,
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