Photo maps

[Staglaitor]

Hi

I was admired my 3ds max’s photom maps and gor now when i started to learn Blender 3 в - i wanted to find out does whether blender have photon maps?

Thansk

[J_the_Ninja]

Cycles (the only part of Blender that would use photon mapping) does not use photon maps. Photon mapping is largely outdated for diffuse GI, most engines that used to use it have switched to a mix of path tracing and irradiance caching. (Cycles just uses path tracing, which is higher quality and potentially less fussy, but slower)

It’s occasionally used for caustics in some render engines (vray, which has a blender plugin, has an option for this), as irradiance caching and its cousins do not perform well for this.

[Staglaitor]

@J_the_Ninja

Cycles (the only part of Blender that would use photon mapping) does not use photon maps. Photon mapping is largely outdated for diffuse GI, most engines that used to use it have switched to a mix of path tracing and irradiance caching. (Cycles just uses path tracing, which is higher quality and potentially less fussy, but slower)

Thanks to your reply

From words themselvse i can understand what path tracing is but what is irradiance caching?