sebkaine Posted March 2, 2015 Share Posted March 2, 2015 (edited) Hi guys, I was playing with mantra PBR to compare how it behave against Maxwell. The render looks good but i have small artefact in certain area (square area), and i can't suppress them i have try : - polydoctor - bias along normal - facet node - modify raytracing bias value up/down without success my settings are : - PBR - pixel sample 4*4 - min sample 1 - max sample 64 - noise level 0.001 - sample lock on Thanks for your lights or any useful input ! Cheers E Edited March 2, 2015 by sebkaine Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pezetko Posted March 2, 2015 Share Posted March 2, 2015 Hard to tell in that jpg compression. Could you upload some uncompressed png? Or better could you isolate that part of the geo in the scene and upload hip file? Blind guess would be geometry tangents www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_forum&Itemid=172&page=viewtopic&t=21333 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 2, 2015 Author Share Posted March 2, 2015 Thanks Petr ! sorry you are right the img is compress after upload ! Here is a new attachment with a zoom on the black mark. i think you are right i would also bet on a problem with the normals. but i have check your link and the Mantra Shader already use the Geometric Tangent style. So pb still not solve at the moment ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jkunz07 Posted March 2, 2015 Share Posted March 2, 2015 That looks like errors in the ray variance antialiasing, I'm not sure the best way to fix it without brute forcing the pixel samples but I see this error quite often when trying to chase noise out of shadows/darker areas by lowering the noise threshold 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pezetko Posted March 2, 2015 Share Posted March 2, 2015 (edited) I got similar square pattern on dense random point cloud in vops today (with H13) when rand(@P) was set to "Clamp Position to Integer". Same think could be forgotten somewhere in the shading/render pipeline (sampling area (as this option is on by default for rand() vopspo)). Btw.: I would definitely try to submit to support that file+render with pointing to that vex: rand(@P) "Clamp Position to Integer" hint (could be just error as this is on by default) Did you tried to rise up Min Reflection Ration (on the Mantra ROP)? What's your Houdini build version? Did you tried different shader (more simple one)? What's your lighting setup? Only Env Light? Is there HDR image in Env light? If do, does it have enough quality to serve as HDR light source (floating point, big enough resolution, without artefacts)? Does the size of that square artefact match the bucket size? Did you tried different pixel filter? Edited March 2, 2015 by pezetko Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SreckoM Posted March 2, 2015 Share Posted March 2, 2015 (edited) What is value of Diffuse Limit? At Ray Limit is it set to use Black or Direct lighting as Background? Try to use Photon Mapping? Edited March 2, 2015 by SreckoM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest tar Posted March 2, 2015 Share Posted March 2, 2015 Also try Mantra's Diagnostic Image planes - i.e. Shading Samples and Pixel Samples. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pezetko Posted March 2, 2015 Share Posted March 2, 2015 Are you rendering with IPR (Render View - Preview On)? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 2, 2015 Author Share Posted March 2, 2015 (edited) Thanks a lot for all those great suggestion. I think we are getting closer. It looks that john is right one of the possibility is error done in ray varriance antialiasing when i go up to pixel sample 8*8 max sample 64 the problem is reduced but some black mark are still there. i have - reflection limit = 4 - diffuse limit = 2 - min reflection ratio = 0.01 - use direct lighting as background color - i am not in IPR mode - the setup is very simple a hdr + portal geometry - the hdr is fine and come with maxwell 3 - i use houdini 14 - the artefact are smaller than my bucket size Photon Mapping could be the way to go. In this regards mantra can't compet with maxwell, which doesn't give any flicking and maxwell is i would say a little faster. but using photon map could give the edge to mantra ... I'm gonna try this way now ! Hope that brute forcing the scene is not the only alternative to this ? Cheers E Edited March 2, 2015 by sebkaine Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 3, 2015 Author Share Posted March 3, 2015 (edited) Yep i can confirm that the problem of black mark in dark area is coming from errors in the ray variance antialiasing. By using a pixel sample of 6*6 and a constant ray sample of 36 the problem disapear completely So now the question is to know if it's possible to avoid those mark with ray variance activated. I am not sure that ray variance is a such good idea as - it introduce the possibility of flicking area and glitch, and after 2h per frame of computation you don't want flicking ... - pixel sample 6*6 with fix sample at 64 is pretty good with few noise + no black mark, and faster than 8*8 with ray variance beetween 1-64 on my scene Maybe i'm telling total bullshit but i have find quite the same thing with volumetrics where i always disable stochastic sample, while it's slower it give me a no flicking warranty. But maybe those problem are more coming from my ignorance, than from mantra ... Edited March 3, 2015 by sebkaine Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pezetko Posted March 3, 2015 Share Posted March 3, 2015 (edited) I managed to got that square artefacts with IPR and "Preview" set to "On" quite easily on this simple scene, when I turned Preview off they were gone. The second way to eliminated them the was to rise up only the "Min Ray Samples" at least to 3. Hope it helps. BUG_mantra_IPR_preview_on_artefacts.hipnc Edited March 3, 2015 by pezetko 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jkunz07 Posted March 3, 2015 Share Posted March 3, 2015 I tried a quick test and increasing the 'min reflection ratio' from 0 to 1 seemed to help quite a bit Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 3, 2015 Author Share Posted March 3, 2015 (edited) Thanks a lot for your help Petr, i think that you give me the answer. if i augment min ray sample the black mark disappear. i am trying a 5*5 with ray variance (25-50) and it's pretty fast and no black mark. increase min sample is good enough solution imo, far better than pushing pixel sample EDIT : Thanks John i'm gonna investigate the min reflection ratio also ! Edited March 3, 2015 by sebkaine Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 3, 2015 Author Share Posted March 3, 2015 (edited) so with : - PBR mode - pixel sample :5 *5 - min sample : 25 - max sample :50 - noise : 0.001 - reflect limit : 2 - diffuse limit : 2 - min reflectio ratio : 0.001 i get an image with very few noise and no artefacts. i only have fireflies on the floor but it could be because of my use of GGX instead of blinn. But in 1080P i am already at 2hours 40minutes of rendering time, and there are nearly no shading. I think Maxwell with only diffuse / glossy surface would make a cleaner / faster job with a warranty of 0 flick. So i would have an other question for you guys - i want exactly this quality. - but i want it with render time divide by 4, around 40minutes per frame in 1080p. - and i want a free flicking warranty technics. What are the best tool in mantra to achieve this ? - Bake diffuse irradiance into a Photon Map ? - Bake diffuse irradiance into a Point Cloud ? - Bake difffuse irradiance into a Voxel Grid like brickmap ? - other obscur houdini magic tricks ? Thanks for your input, i will try to post the scene without breaking the 16mb limit ... OpenVDB and brickmaps have this similar concept of volume tree structure. But OpenVDB looks far more advanced than Brickmap structure. Would it be possible to imagine a way to store all data at a reference frame in a VDB volume in order to get some sort of Voxel approach like Maxwell Do. It could be a stupid idea , but does anybody here have try to use openVDB to store irrradiance or other lighting info ? just some reading .... http://renderman.pixar.com/view/brickmapgprim http://renderman.pixar.com/view/DP23986 http://renderman.pixar.com/view/baking3d You can dowwnload the complete scene here https://www.dropbox.com/s/gbtnvlksfz3fp2c/museum.rar?dl=0 Cheers E Edited March 3, 2015 by sebkaine Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 3, 2015 Author Share Posted March 3, 2015 With Photon Map + Portal i am now able to speed up things. I have try to push optimisation of render time as much as i can. now in 720P i can render the image in 32min, so basically 1h10min in 1080P. Photon Map allow to cut the rendertime by 2.3. Some little detail were lost but the outpout is good enough imo. mantra give very solid outpout but i would say that if you compare the time it take to setup everything and the fact that the outpout is prone to flicking etc ... i would say that Maxwell has the edge on this case. I will try to investigate if there are better way to bake stuff than photon map ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mzigaib Posted March 3, 2015 Share Posted March 3, 2015 (edited) Awesome post! I am not very experienced with portal lights but I would suggest, if you didn't try it yet, to decrease pixel samples by 1 and increase just the light sample quality to see what happens. Recently I am having the same experience with Mantra vs "other renders" but in my case is Mantra and Corona which guys here use it a lot at work it has a very fast preview for starters so figuring out how to get an edge with mantra with speed and setup, which imho is still overall more flexible and robust, is a really great exercise. Keep the tips coming! Edited March 3, 2015 by Mzigaib Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 3, 2015 Author Share Posted March 3, 2015 (edited) Thanks for the tips Michel , i'm curious about corona ...looks very cool ! I am missing the now old school workflow were, - you take all your diffuse component - you compute a brute force GI pass with ultra high quality - you bake the result of this computation into the medium the most efficient (ptc / brickmap ...) ? - then for all the rest of your anim you are just making a read for all diffuse of non moving object - your rendertime in 1080P is around 2 minutes ... for diffuse / indirect diffuse Something like Panta-Ray on avatar http://www.fxguide.com/featured/the-science-of-spherical-harmonics-at-weta-digital/ When i was using prman, the R&D guy had figure a way to access vray GI cache. he was able to convert those in an efficient .ptc and rendertime were just blazing fast. this was extremely cool ! I don't like photon map, i have always bad experience with them they are long to setup , prone to flicking and often inaccurate. so sending a scene into mantra in PBR mode for 4 hours and store the result of this somewhere and just read it would be great ! I am pretty new to mantra so i am sure that it must exist a houdini nerds that have already achieve this on odForce ? i think mantra get all his interest from the fantastic flexibility it offer, i'm quite sure that SYmek / eetu / Mario ... should have their idea on how to do this i post the maxwell pass in 720p with 1hour of computation , the result is better than mantra and the setup time is 15seconds Edited March 3, 2015 by sebkaine Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest tar Posted March 3, 2015 Share Posted March 3, 2015 Sounds a bit like Mike Wong's Escher for Nuke - Uses Spherical Harmonics as a 2.5D Shader: http://www.artixels.com/axj/index.php/products/escher http://www.nukepedia.com/interviews/interview-with-artixels Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sebkaine Posted March 4, 2015 Author Share Posted March 4, 2015 (edited) I have make a last try by decreasing pixel sample and augmenting light sample quality , and i gain a little sharpness. Here is a new render in 1080P => 1h14 of computation - pixel sample 4*4 - min sample 20 - max sample 60 - noise level 0.004 - PBR + Env Direct Lighting (sample quality 1.5) + Portal Geo + PhotonMap (filter sample 1 / Distance Threshold 1) I think i a have reach the max i could do for reducing render time without affecting quality too much. Now to go around 45 min per frame i would see 2 way ... - replace direct lighting by ambient occlusion - find a better way to cache GI ( ptc ? voxel tree ? other ? ) At the end Mantra is very solid, and the flexibility it offer is still very cool. In this regards better than Maxwell Edited March 4, 2015 by sebkaine 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tinyparticle Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 I did this exact same test with exact same scene about 3 years ago Houdini vs Maxwell vs Arnold and I have gone pretty extensive pretty crazy with the tests. And almost every test, Maxwell came on top. I did not cut any corners and did not use any bias like photon mapping. Mantra was a little ahead of Arnold by then. I did a similar test using a different scene recently and I saw that Maxwell again came on top but this time Arnold was pretty close to it and Mantra was lagging behind. I have also experienced the same errors with ray variance. I am not sure about the source of the issue but I believe there is a lot of room for improvement for Mantra. Especially now there is tougher competition from Solidangle and Pixar's RIS is really good, Mantra has some catching up to do. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.