I know 2.8 is still under development, so maybe this will be better when the official 2.8 is released later this year. But right now, glass materials rendered with Eevee look terrible. They sort of look like glass, but nowhere near the realism that Cycles will produce. I watched two tutorials using 2.8, and they didn’t look much better than my attempts. Anyone have good results for glass in 2.8?
Eevee <> Cycles
Eevee is a real time renderer and was never designed to compete with or replace Cycles which is a production renderer. They are very different beasts. What you gain in terms of speed with eevee - you necessarily lose in terms of realism.
From what I’ve read from the developers, Eevee is an alternative, and it’s true that some quality is sacrificed for speed compared to Cycles. But I didn’t think there would be such an obvious difference, Eevee being inferior. But again, it may get better with the final release. I do like the speed, and being able to see a render view in the 3D viewport.
It is an alternative - just like Blender internal is. What it’s not is a replacement or equivalent.
Each renderer has its advantages and disadvantages. Eevee may get better over time - but I wouldnt expect Cycles like quality especially on particularly difficult like glass (even Cycles struggles with some aspects of glass/refractive materials).
You can’t judge an incomplete piece of software – 2.8 isn’t even in beta yet.
Safetyman, I know it’s not complete, as I said in the very first line of my post. And also, not judging, but just asking if anyone has found some way to make glass look better. I also said it might have to wait until the official release later this year.
What specifically is bad about it. Looking at this video - it’s pretty passable I would say
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Reflections and refraction seem OK. But I don’t see light passing through objects, such as a magnifying glass produces a bright, small spot on a surface below it. I have a .blend file with a glass ball on a wooden floor. With Cycles, it looks good, and the ball reflects and refracts, but also shows a very bright spot on the floor below it, the way a real glass ball would do. I can get the reflection and refraction to look pretty good in Eevee, but the light transmission, even set to 1.00, doesn’t give the effect.
You are talking about caustics - even Cycles doesn’t do this very well.
There are some videos demonstrating research in real time caustics - but I don’t know if these are an active part of the Eevee development.
@bill2reg – I meant no offense, but I just think it’s a bit too early to be trying to find answers to problems in 2.8. It’s there for you to see what is available now and potentially what’s coming, but I don’t think you can expect to get a lot of help with it at this point.