Animating the sample settings in Cycles

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Blender 2.79

A quick Cycles rendering tip:

There are situations in which we need to render an animation with changing lighting complexity, and as a result, parts of the animation need more samples than others to be effectively rendered.
For example when the camera starts it’s movement on the outside in an exterior scene, and moves into an interior space like house or a cave, or a vehicle, in many cases, the exterior part of the animation can be rendered with much less samples than the interior part.

In such cases, rendering the whole animation with the higher sample settings will demand unneeded render time in the simpler parts of the animation.

One possible solution would be to simply render the animation in two separated render jobs with different sampling settings, one for the less demanding part and another for the more complex part and than append the two parts in an editing / compositing software. but that requires more work on the shot, more management etc.

A simple solution is to animate the sample settings in Cycles.
Make tests at different times along the animation to determine how many samples are needed at each part, and key-frame the settings accordingly.

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Simple Toon shader setup in Maya & Arnold

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Maya 2018

Use a Surface Luminance node as a V coordinate input value for a Ramp (V Ramp) node containing the toon colors.

* Note that the Clamp node is important so results will be ass expected, it clamps the Surface Luminance values to 0.99 so the V coordinate will nor cycle back to the beginning of the Ramp.

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Related:
Toon Shading in V-Ray for Maya

Exporting 3D camera data from After Effects to 3ds max

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
After Effects 2020

  1. Download the AE3D_Export script here:
    http://www.urbanspaceman.net/shared/AEscripts/AE3Dexport/AE3D_Export.jsx
  2. Perform 3D tracking on the footage if necessary.
  3. Select the 3D Camera layer and also Null layers if available.
  4. Choose File > Scripts > Run Script File and locate the AE3D_Export script.
  5. In the Script parameters highlight 3ds max.
  6. Click Options and set the scale.
    * you might need to try and see the scale in 3ds max to set it right.
  7. Set a name for the exported ms (MaxScript) file.
  8. Click Export.
    The resulting MaxScript file will appear on the desktop named <your after effects project name>.ms
    Note:
    You may be prompted to check the Allow Scripts to Write Files and Access Network option in File > Preferences > Scripts & Expressions.
  9. Drag the generated MaxScript file into the 3ds max viewport.
    The script will run and create an animated Camera and Dummy object, and also set the timeline range to fit the animation.
  10. Create a new Point Helper object.
  11. Align the new Point Helper to the Dummy object in both position and orientation.
  12. Group the Camera and the Dummy objects together, and link the group to a new Point Helper.
    This will allow for easy orientation and scaling.
  13. Set the Point Helper object’s rotation to default (0,0,0) , this will also reset the Dummy + Camera group’s orientation relative to the world.
    Scale the Point Helper object if needed, to scale the whole camera setup.
  14. Display the original video sequence as viewport background to check how the camera motion fits the video.
    The center of your Point Helper should appear “glued” to a specific point in the background video. 
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Related:
After Effects 3D Camera tracking

Creating a 360 VR video sequence in Premiere

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Premiere Pro CC 2018

  1. Right click the Project Window and choose New Item > Sequence to create a new Sequence.
  2. In the new sequence settings, in the VR Tab, set the VR settings.
  3. Use the Toggle VR Video Display in the Program monitor to switch to panoramic display.
    * if the Toggle VR Video Display button doesn’t appear in the toolbar, use the Button Editor to add it.

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Arnold for Maya Motion-Blur

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Maya 2018 | Arnold 5

  1. In the Render Settings window, Arnold Renderer tab, under Motion Blur,
    Check ‘Enable’.
  2. Set the ‘Length’ attribute to set the Motion-Blur size.
    * the default length of 0.5 means the Motion-Blur will be calculated as a result of a photographic exposure duration of half of a frame duration, or 180 degrees in cinema camera terminology.
  3. Raise the number of Keys to accurately simulate Motion-Blur for very fast rotational motion like helicopter propellers and car wheels.

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Note:
To generate a Motion Vector (Velocity) AOV (also referred to as ‘Render Element’ or ‘Pass’), in order to add the Motion-Blur effect in a compositing software:

  1. The ‘motionvector’ AOV must be added to the AOVs list in the AOVs tab of the Render Settings window.
  2. Motion-Blur must be enabled in the Motion-Blur part of the Arnold Renderer tab in the Render Settings window.
    * Otherwise motion vectors will not be calculated.
  3. In the Diagnostics tab of the Render Settings window, under Feature Overrides, check ‘Ignore Motion Blur’, so Motion-Blur will not be rendered.

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Related posts:

Arnold for Maya Depth of Field (DOF)

Saving multi-channel EXR file with Arnold for Maya

 

Saving multi-channel EXR with Arnold for maya

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Maya 2018 | Arnold 5

  1. In the Render Settings > Common tab, choose EXR as the output file format.
  2. In the Render Settings > AOVs tab, open the drop-down menu on the right side of one of the AOVs in the list, and choose Select Driver.
    This will bring up the defaultArnoldDriver node Attributes.
  3. In the defaultArnoldDriver node Attributes, under Advanced Output, check Merge AOVs.

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Clamp Colors in Photoshop 32 bit float Color Depth

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Photoshop CC 2018

Photoshop CC 32 bit float linear workflow is developing nicely but it still lack some needed basic components, and one of them is a Clamp Color Adjustment, equivalent to a node you will find in any 32 bit float HDR capable compositing software.

Clamping the colors means limiting the britest values to set values, usually 1.0 – white and 0.0 – black, so that no pixels will have higher than white or lower than black (negative) values that can create unwanted results in further operations.

* Brighter than white (super-whites) and negative colors are a feature, and part of linear 32 bit float color processing.

* If there is such an option that I didn’t find please let me know..

In order to clamp the layers colors we convert it to a Smart Object, and convert its color depth to 16Bit internally, so the individual layer gets clamped but the main document remains 32Bit float unclamped (HDR).

To clamp the colors of a layer:

  1. Convert the layer or layers to a Smart Object.
  2. Enter the Smart Object for editing.
  3. From the Image > Mode  menu, choose 16Bits/Channel,
    And in the Conversion dialog that opens choose ‘Don’t Merge’, or choose Merge and then in the HDR Toning dialog choose Exposure And Gamma mode to keep the image unchanged.
    The conversion to 16Bit color depth without Merging or Merging using default Exposure and Gamma mode will clamp the colors.
  4. Save the Smart Object.
  5. Return to the main document, the layers colors are now clamped.

 

Blender – quickly clearing multi-materials

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
Blender 2.79

Select one or more objects with multiple materials and another object with just one material as the active object, that will be the Active Object.
In the material list open the v menu and choose ‘Copy Material to Others’
This will copy the material settings to all selected objects.

* Link materials command will not achieve the result, it will still keep unneeded materials on selected objects

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Enable the built in addon: ‘Material Utils Specials’

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This addon will add three extra material operations to the material V menu:

Clean Material Slots:
Deletes unused material from the object

Remove Active Slot:
Same as deleting a material by pressing –

Remove all Slots:
Delete all materials assigned to the object

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3ds max Transform Toolbox

Posted on by Oded Maoz Erell

Software:
3ds max 2017

Edit > Transform Toolbox

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A utility providing handy transform operations like scaling to a set size, quickly setting the pivot point to useful preset positions, ect.

Notes:

1) Scaling works only in system units.

2) Scaling works in local coordinates of the object