"A beginners guide to bitmaps"

"Photorealistic rendering in MentalRay"

Time prediction

It's very difficult (practically impossible) to predict rendering time of the scene.

Colors

• RGB8 - RGB where each color is represented with 8-bits, ie has value from 0 to 255.
• RGBF - RGB + Filter, RGB with transparency filter

File type

• EXR - open HDR image file formax. Pixels are represented as 16-bit (half format) or 32-bit floating-point numbers. http://www.openexr.com/

Renderers

• LuxRender - LuxRender wiki, Website

• Mental Ray - production quality renderer, developed by Nvidia. It supports rendering farm distribution. It is integrated with AutoCAD, Revit, 3ds Max, Maya, Softimage, Catia, Creo, Cinema 4D, FreeForm, Domus 3d, Visoft. Standalone version is available. Data are loaded by API or scene files .mi. "(...) the mental ray renderer renders rectangular blocks called buckets. The order in which the buckets are rendered can vary, depending on the method you choose. By default, mental ray uses the Hilbert method, which picks the next bucket to render based on the cost of switching to the next one. Because objects can be discarded from the memory to render other objects, it’s important to avoid having to reload the same object multiple times."

  • Mental Ray File Formats
  • Mental Ray Documentation
  • Mental Ray Integration Manual
  • Mental Ray Scene Description Language

• PBRT - PBRT Website

• V-Ray - production quality renderer developed by Chaos Group. It is integrated with 3ds Max, Maya, Cinema 4D, Softimage, Sketchup, Blender and Rhinoceros 3D, Clara.io. V-Ray Standalone

Software

• Blender - open source 3D graphics and animation software. More about Blender.
• 3DS MAX - has special script language MAXScript. There is also additional Python API and SDK that allow for creation new plugins (in C++, there is additional Wizard that allows to start Visula Studio projects). Plugins are usually installed by adding new dll-s to plugin directory.
  • [3DS MAX Python API](http://help.autodesk.com/view/3DSMAX/2015/ENU/? guid=__files_GUID_91CB6C3E_A9FB_4DC0_AEDA_03E4D68272A8_htm)
  • 3DS MAX C++ API
  • Command-Line Rendering
  • "Mental Ray Renderer class
  • "Mental Ray Renderer"

Dictionary

• Approximation - in Mental Rayu model object with triangle mesh.
• Bumpmapping - simulating bumps and wrinkles on the surface of an object. The surface geometry is not modified, instead the suface normal is modified as if the surface had been dispaced. The modified surface normal is used for lightning calcluations, giving the apperance of detail instaed of smooth surface.
• Fresnel coefficient - describes the reflection of light when moving between media of differing refractive indices. High fresnel coefficient: silicon.
• IOR (Index of Refraction) - number that describes how light propagagets throught that medium. High refracton index = diamond, glass; low = vacuum, air.
• Normalmapping - technique for faking the lighting of bumps and dents, enhancement of bumpmapping. Used to add more details without using more polygons. The normal map is generated from high polygod model or height map and than used to with polygon models. Normal maps are sotred as regular RGB images.
• Pass - single part of rendering task, eg. shadows, reflection. All together create full scene. Sometimes it may be called "layer".Pass Types
• Phenomen - in Mental Ray a group of cooperating shaders.
• Shader - plugins in Mental Ray, dynamic libraries (DLL, DSO). Called separately on different stages of rendering, correspond to different scene elements, eg. material, texture, photon, light, lens, volume.

Renderfarms

• Rendernation - supports Autodesk 3ds Max, Autodesk Maya, Maxon Cinema4D, Newtek Lightwave, VRay
• RenderRocket - supports 3ds Max, Maya, VRay, Cinema 4D
• RenderFarm - supports 3ds Max, Maya, Vray, Cinema 4D, LuxRender, Blender