Render 1 plane with video texture faster than rendering multiple animated planes?

Artistic Support Lighting and Rendering
1

I have a layered background that is composed of multiple panes, some of which rotate, others which pan, and others still that otherwise move around in layers. The look is going to be quite 2D - quite flat, with only one camera angle - and it occurred to me that the background could quite easily be rendered separately and then mapped as a video onto a single plane.

The only point of this would be to simplify my scene and improve rendering time.

Do you think that a video mapped onto a single plane would render faster than all those separate (12-15) planes with their individual animations?

Can you forsee any potential problems with this idea (light not affecting it properly, etc.) that I may not have considered?

2

I don’t know about faster. I would do some testing.

About “light not affecting it properly”. Unless you’re going for some sort of effect shading is usually purposely turned off on image planes so lighting and shadows will not affect them. Properties > Material > Shading > Shadeless.

Welcome to BA Forums.

-LP

Edit: Now that I thunk about it (ugg… too much eggnog tonight), rendering out backgrounds is another rendering step but done for faster final render with the rest of your scene. So yeah it can save time overall… unless you decide the background needs changed later on. Plan your shots well. :slight_smile: