I was wondering if people have been experimenting with Renderman too. I have, check the “New feature tests” topic in Finished Projects. (Yes, they are ugly, but it was about exporting, not showcasing my horrible artistic “skills”. ;))
If you would like to experiment, here are some links:
Blenderman. A Python script which exports RIBs, shows the render progress, and allows you to tweak material and object settings for the renderer. It’s very elegant and quite stable, aimed at more Renderman renderers than just Aqsis, and I find it to give more attractive results than the Tuhopuu. Unlike the Readme says, it does work with the latest Blender and Python releases. http://www.geocities.com/gkocov/blenderman/
Please share your results, problems and solutions with me in the Feature tests topic
Eh. I spent forever and a damned half trying to get the .rib exporter to work, but with no luck. OS X 10.3.4 seems to hate Blender scripts. Oh well. I can hardly ever get that to work.
Yep, Aqsis is renderman compliant, but I don’t have seen any impressive render about Aqsis you know… (I’ve visited official Aqsis gallery). All pics I’ve seen let me think that YAFRay is a better renderer as Aqsis…
So, WHY SHOULD I USE AQSIS RENDERER ?? (please argue guys ! ) What are the strong points of it ? And the weak ones ? %|
One argument I remember was that they needed gallery submissions
and “good” artists using it. Most of the gallery examples where
made by coders and not actual-3d-artists…
…so It might just come around if you guys start using it
Because it’s Renderman! The main reasons why I’m interested in it, is because it’s faster than Yafray, and very tweakable. The programmable shader system allows you to do so much more than standard renderers. Make anisotropic highlights, fur, or your own sketch- and toon effects. I have read it’s very stable, and memory-efficient too.
Aqsis may not be the most feature-rich (or fastest) renderer out there, so I’m now messing around with Pixie more.
On the other hand it has a con too. Like many stand-alone renderers, Renderman renderers often come as a simple command line tool. But where with Yafray you only have to dive in the “source” when you want to use a feature both the modeller and exporter don’t support, like HDRI lighting used to in Blender, I think the fun with Renderman can only begin when you go to the source. The biggest, and most attractive feature of Renderman is the programmable shader system. As far as I know, you can’t just put that in a simple plug-in. Blenderman tries that with an object- and a shader editor, but it would require some mix between Shaderman (a GUI for Renderman shaders) and POV-Ray to really catch the power of the renderer in a GUI. I don’t think most people are willing to learn a whole new language for “just some fancy materials”. You actually have to learn a whole new way of rendering, and not everyone is comfortable with the learning process, or that new way.(But everyone does like Finding Nemo :))
I just started to (try to) learn Renderman, and I like the idea behind it, my results, and results I have seen elsewhere.
@JoOngle: The same is probably the case with Pixie. The pictures in the gallery are more feature tests than artworks. I think that only when a renderer is really used (and ready) for artworks or production you’ll get high-quality images in the gallery.
@Monkeyboi: Much faster. Atleast, with the very basic features I tested. DOF took quite a while.
yafray and aqsis are somehow at the same level!
yafray has gi photons but aqsis does not
but aqsis has true displacement and other render
options yafray does not have.
nothing against yafray but it lacks many important
things and special for complex animations it cannot
compet with a reyes renderer.
the only weak is it is not perfect with polygones and
you need to code shaders. but there are many source
codes free and you can tweak them a bit to get good
results in few steps.
Basically the main differences between Aqsis and Yafray are that Aqsis is a Renderman compliant renderer, can’t raytrace, and is a lot faster. Pixie can raytrace and is even faster than Aqsis. (I didn’t test to see how, with certain features enabled or disabled, the speed differences between the renderers would change though.)
I don’t see the possibility to code shaders as a weak but as a huge pro for the people willing to learn it. With every Renderman renderer there are a lot of precompiled, ready to use shaders. And indeed, there are many to download too: http://www.renderman.org/
If you can’t get the exporters to work, please share your problems. Maybe we can work them out together.
) What are the strong points of it ? And the weak ones ? %|
With every Renderman renderer there are a lot of precompiled, ready to use shaders. And indeed, there are many to download too: