# Rendering Tests



## Kent Whitten

I was working on a small bath project and thought it would be handy to know these results. I strictly use Revit for the design, but usually export a .dxf file to SketchUp for sending to clients. I don't usually like to send the pretty stuff, but I have always been hooked on the possibility of photo realistic renderings and what the potential could imply.

I have workflow options to other rendering programs, but for some reason, they have been very glitchy lately and crash the programs, so I have been looking for quick alternatives. I have always wanted something that looks nice, but can be rendered quickly and the workflow to other programs is just a weak crutch at best. It drives me batty.

The standard rendering options were selected in this test. You can obviously see how pixelated the first drafts were, but came together decent somewhere around Medium to High. Revit has always been notorious for faceted surfaces, meaning...if you look at the toilet on the best setting, you can still see flat sections. Instead of a perfect mesh (which is not really there in ANY program), the program decides on the best "look". Circles really aren't circles....just a bunch of flat segments.

Anywho...

These are the rendering times. You can see where one really needs to say "good enough" and when one says "ok....overnight render" :laughing:

Draft - 31 seconds
Low - 48 seconds
Medium - 2:12
High - 7:07
Best - 25:40

You can see that "best" should not be used in production mode, only for final render. The best option IMO would be Low while still in production mode.

If anyone else wants to contribute their findings in CA or anything else, don't be afraid to post. I am going to render some more in SketchUp using VRay and post.

Draft










Low










Medium










High










Best


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## Kent Whitten

Here are my standard render presets using SketchUp and VRay. You can see why I like this renderer better than the standard Revit rendering program. Times are much better too.

The problem with this workflow is that I must export using a .dwg or .dwf format and re-apply the maps to make the textures. This can be quite tedious. And any type of design edits and I must start all over. You can see the dilemma. Stay in Revit with mediocre renders, or take a chance and get much better renders with better times.

What one might not see is that when you export a file and open it into a non native program, the conversion might not be so hot. The example is the recessed panels on the cabinet doors. Not until you get to the Very High setting does the splotchy shadows cede. Even so, the low setting on SketchUp w/VRay is much better IMO than any of the renders from Revit. 

Very Low - 1:11
Low - 1:23
Medium - 2:42
High - 5:04
Very High - 13:17


Very Low








Low








Medium








High








Very High


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## hdavis

Kent, it would be helpful to know what your system is, particularly what video card you're using.


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## Solar Control

Kent Whitten said:


> ... stuff deleted ...
> 
> The problem with this workflow is that I must export using a .dwg or .dwf format and re-apply the maps to make the textures. This can be quite tedious. And any type of design edits and I must start all over. You can see the dilemma. Stay in Revit with mediocre renders, or take a chance and get much better renders with better times.
> 
> ... stuff deleted ...


Kent, can you script your workflow? Also, can you set up a render farm? We used these for visualizations all through the 90s and they improved our production volume a lot.

I have not worked in this area for a long time so the above questions may not even be applicable to your current situation.

By the way, nice work.


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## redwood

These are completely different renders. One has shadows and sky and the other doesn't. I would expect the Vray to be much less time.

Andy, can you whip this up on CA.


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## Kent Whitten

redwood said:


> These are completely different renders.


I was wondering if anyone was going to notice :laughing:

Honestly, I have not played much with the rendering engine in Revit because I always found it just awful. And this was a major improvement in the last few years. Plus these are the standard OOTB settings. I'm sure if I spent oh...a few months tweaking it would be just right :laughing:

I used to have a render farm a few years back but now I'm not sure if Revit supports this. Not even sure if the VRay in SketchUp does, I have not played with rendering much lately to be honest and I am quite rusty.

They have cloud based rendering now. Not sure how that even works. Probably should try it sometime.


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## Kent Whitten

Actually, on Revit, the rendering dialog box lists "sun" and "sun and artificial". There is no global illumination that I can see, which is what the second testing is with VRay. I think it looks more natural. 

If I was to go with artificial lighting, then I would have to strategically place can lights or similar. Just not in the mood for that.


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## Kent Whitten

This is what I get with artificial lighting renders in Revit


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## bconley

> These are completely different renders. One has shadows and sky and the other doesn't. I would expect the Vray to be much less time.
> 
> Andy, can you whip this up on CA.
> __________________


Not Andy but ......
Here is CA out of the box materials no lighting rendered for 9 minutes


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## Texas Wax

Kent

I do not use Revit, though I have done similar workflows/pipelines from Autodesk Products to many other applications for archviz....

Does revit allow for exporting mesh by material? That might speed the process. 

Will revit export .obj and Sketchup import it? OBJ carries material assignments native to it's format.

< Cynical Tag > Autodesk uses lesser renderers in thier AEC products, always has. And makes the pipeline to their products such as 3dmax, design 20XX, totally compatible. Anything else it's a crap shoot</end tag>

Understanding you use it on a limited basis and are not really interested in becoming a professional CG artist...
Vray's presets are very user friendly and the rest of the settings can be a mind. It 'can' be worth your time to learn what the deeper settings do, as it is with any render engine. IMHO it's worth tinkering with as time and inclination are permitting. Using presets is kind of like having a Ferrari and just driving up and down residential streets doing 25mph. 


Faceting - Flat segments (Chords of arcs) can be smoothed using the 'smoothing' setting in Vray materials. The number in the setting is an angle. for example you have two facets that are adjacent by 22.5 degrees. If the number is less that 22.5 these will render as flat surfaces. If the number is greater they will be blended / smoothed to look like they are rounded. As will the specular highlights and all other light/reflective properties related to the material and mesh (object).

Respectfully take all this with a grain of salt... I am no beginner and just trying to offer some helpful advice/understanding gained from years of bumping up against all these same problems.


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## ScipioAfricanus

Here is one in Chief at about 4:30 min.
Three light sources,
I have 14 Gig of RAM and an AMD 8 core processor.

The 8 core makes rendering wicked fast.

I really don't do much in the rendering and raytracing departments, mostly con. docs.

Andy.


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## Kent Whitten

Texas Wax said:


> Kent
> 
> I do not use Revit, though I have done similar workflows/pipelines from Autodesk Products to many other applications for archviz....
> 
> Does revit allow for exporting mesh by material? That might speed the process.
> 
> Will revit export .obj and Sketchup import it? OBJ carries material assignments native to it's format.
> 
> < Cynical Tag > Autodesk uses lesser renderers in thier AEC products, always has. And makes the pipeline to their products such as 3dmax, design 20XX, totally compatible. Anything else it's a crap shoot</end tag>
> 
> Understanding you use it on a limited basis and are not really interested in becoming a professional CG artist...
> Vray's presets are very user friendly and the rest of the settings can be a mind. It 'can' be worth your time to learn what the deeper settings do, as it is with any render engine. IMHO it's worth tinkering with as time and inclination are permitting. Using presets is kind of like having a Ferrari and just driving up and down residential streets doing 25mph.
> 
> 
> Faceting - Flat segments (Chords of arcs) can be smoothed using the 'smoothing' setting in Vray materials. The number in the setting is an angle. for example you have two facets that are adjacent by 22.5 degrees. If the number is less that 22.5 these will render as flat surfaces. If the number is greater they will be blended / smoothed to look like they are rounded. As will the specular highlights and all other light/reflective properties related to the material and mesh (object).
> 
> Respectfully take all this with a grain of salt... I am no beginner and just trying to offer some helpful advice/understanding gained from years of bumping up against all these same problems.


DGN, SAT, FBX and the standard DWG/DXF....that's it. Revit doesn't do much for export and SketchUp, not much for import. I haven't looked 3rd party. All I ever wanted was something decent in the native program. Revit has always had faceted surfaces. Not going to get around that. There's no setting to bypass that. There is also no setting for exporting mesh materials.

Not really intending to be a CG artist, but I am awed by what they can do. 

Plus my computer is outdated pretty good. It was top of the line when I built it, but it's years behind now. Maybe Santa will bring me something.

I have come closest with this render.


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## Texas Wax

That is a good render.

You Model that scene?
Those default materials or did you have to tweak em?

Be careful of that "awe". It can be a time sponge - right?

Lead me down a wild and winding path only to conclude working in a CG Studio (Sweat shop) sucks -add expletives-

Clock ran out on that journey


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## Kent Whitten

Texas Wax said:


> That is a good render.
> 
> You Model that scene?
> Those default materials or did you have to tweak em?
> 
> Be careful of that "awe". It can be a time sponge - right?
> 
> Lead me down a wild and winding path only to conclude working in a CG Studio (Sweat shop) sucks -add expletives-
> 
> Clock ran out on that journey


I found out quick....that it does not pay. The small, bright shiny spots in the industry....taken....with a million more talented people right behind. 

I was thinking "this is way cool" but found out the reality quite quick. Luckily. 

Did not model, only the seat. Simple sweep. Some fillets....pretty simple. Did that in Rhino. 

Imported that into a scene with presets. Cheated, but works.


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## BoGoCo

Hey Kent, have you tried Kerkythea? Not sure how it compares to Vray.
But I think they're similar. 
When I get something custom to draw, I normally use Sketchup, and then send to Kerkythea to render. It's free and fairly easy to use, like anything, once you get used to it. 
I haven't had a chance to use CA yet, my normal job requires me to use 20/20 for kitchen design/layout on a daily basis, which runs an integral rendering engine, doesn't compare to Kthea.IMO

I use a plugin in SU, "SU2Kerkythea" , which allows you to add lighting, materials inside of SU, and then import to Kthea. The import/render process is all very quick, and easy. 
Dave Richards over at Design, Click, Build wrote an interesting blog post on this subject. 
http://www.finewoodworking.com/item/57824/adding-some-realism-to-your-models

The small table rendered in less than 3 min.
The kitchen, in 20/20 took about 10 min.
I really enjoy doing this type of work, when there is a call for it, and when it pays well. I would rather model in SU all day compared to placing cabinets with 20/20.


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## hdavis

ScipioAfricanus said:


> I have 14 Gig of RAM and an AMD 8 core processor.


I'm guessing you have a workstation class video card to go along with that?


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## bconley

Just playing around some, here is the same render as above, CA to Sketchup


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## ScipioAfricanus

hdavis said:


> I'm guessing you have a workstation class video card to go along with that?


Just an NVIDIA GeForce GTS 450, 1Gig of RAM.

The CPU does the raytrace processing.

Andy.


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## J F

I hafta take a crap now, thanks guys.


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## ScipioAfricanus

J F said:


> I hafta take a crap now, thanks guys.


No worries J, I hope everything comes out alright.








Ewwwwwwww.



Andy.


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## J F

:laughing:


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## hdavis

I guess ray tracing on a GPGPU is a ways from mainstream. Life changes when it can be done routinely and SSDs are used as well.


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## ScipioAfricanus

hdavis said:


> I guess ray tracing on a GPGPU is a ways from mainstream. Life changes when it can be done routinely and SSDs are used as well.



GPG...whaaa??

Andy.


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## Kent Whitten

OK....so how many frikken nerds in this thread did NOT build their own computer? :laughing:


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## J F

me, me, me, me...I do have an orange, predator 'puter though. If I was 14, it would be kewel as hell.


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## Kent Whitten

You're not part of the klub any more Jay. Sorry :laughing:


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## J F




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## hdavis

ScipioAfricanus said:


> GPG...whaaa??
> 
> Andy.


General Purpose Graphics Processing Unit. It allows physical simulation and ray tracing to be done by the GPU instead of the CPU. Here's an example of what you can do, but it isn't the latest and greatest:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEXeTXmCfdE


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## J F

Hey mon, can you place a comma in your tag line?


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## Kent Whitten

bconley said:


> Just playing around some, here is the same render as above, CA to Sketchup
> 
> 
> 
> 
> View attachment 81786


It looks like CA has some decent maps included....if that is what it is. I have always made mine, or found some nice ones others have made. Very few OOTB are decent...at least Adesk products....IMO.


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## Kent Whitten

hdavis said:


> General Purpose Graphics Processing Unit. It allows physical simulation and ray tracing to be done by the GPU instead of the CPU. Here's an example of what you can do, but it isn't the latest and greatest:
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEXeTXmCfdE


I am feeling pretty stupid all of a sudden :laughing:


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## J F

All of a sudden? :whistling


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## bconley

It was modeled in chief I added in the materials in sketchup.

My first post was straight Chief Architect


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## ohiohomedoctor

There's the Jay we all know.. You feeling better today? :laughing:


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## J F

Why yes, thank you Matt. :thumbup:

:laughing:


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## Kent Whitten

J F said:


> All of a sudden? :whistling


Yes...so stupid I accidentally hit this ban button riiiiight next to your name :laughing:


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## J F

bastid... :laughing:

So I should start calling you joassis?


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## ohiohomedoctor

Ouch..


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## Kent Whitten

Or Master...it's up to you :laughing:


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## hdavis

J F said:


> Hey mon, can you place a comma in your tag line?


Whatcha gimme?


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## J F

hmmmm


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## Kent Whitten

J F said:


> hmmmm


:laughing::laughing:


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## hdavis

J F said:


> hmmmm


I already have one of those...


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## J F

:blink:


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## Kent Whitten

Actually...I like the ellipsis better. That should get Jay worked up some. :laughing:


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## J F

Don't start with that shiite... :laughing:


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## Kent Whitten

Anyone interested in rendering still? I'm tweaking


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## J F

Fvkn showoff. :laughing: _Very _nice. :thumbup:


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## Texas Wax

Kent Whitten said:


> Anyone interested in rendering still? I'm tweaking


If you'd be so inclined....
Zip the 3d file up after export to .obj or .fbx or .xsi and I'll take a crack at it in Modo for sure. Be interested in comparisons and adjusted render times.


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## Roger Manning

This is really basic but I have a panel job coming up and did this test








Still have a long way to go as far as rendering.


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## J.C.

Kent Whitten said:


> DGN, SAT, FBX and the standard DWG/DXF....that's it. Revit doesn't do much for export and SketchUp, not much for import. I haven't looked 3rd party. All I ever wanted was something decent in the native program. Revit has always had faceted surfaces. Not going to get around that. There's no setting to bypass that. There is also no setting for exporting mesh materials.
> 
> Not really intending to be a CG artist, but I am awed by what they can do.
> 
> Plus my computer is outdated pretty good. It was top of the line when I built it, but it's years behind now. Maybe Santa will bring me something.
> 
> I have come closest with this render.


That is truly incredible. You have a gift that I know I don't have. :thumbsup: I can't get anything I draw to look anything at all like that. :laughing:


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## bconley

Playing around a little more, I knew I recognized that brick map


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## Texas Wax

Would like to Thank Kent  for starting this... once get started it ropes ya in and will net let go. This CG rendering stuff is an evil temptress .P

A couple variations on a 'newel'.


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## J F

There should be zombies, definitely need some zombies....:whistling


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## hdavis

ScipioAfricanus said:


> The CPU does the raytrace processing.
> 
> Andy.


I confirmed this for CA and Sketchup. Ray trace capable GPUs were announced in 2008, and today they're pretty affordable. Seemes the software doesn't take advantage of them yet.


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## Texas Wax

hdavis said:


> I confirmed this for CA and Sketchup. Ray trace capable GPUs were announced in 2008, and today they're pretty affordable. Seemes the software doesn't take advantage of them yet.


Some Software will use them for real time rendering. Render Preview window type stuff is starting to be common in the heaftier 3D apps. Luxology's Modo uses it the working windows when slected and render preview window... flippin awsome though still not as good as a raytraced render with the regular cpu/hardware.


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## ScipioAfricanus

Kent Whitten said:


> Anyone interested in rendering still? I'm tweaking
> 
> Somehow I can not imagine Kent as a tweaker but here it is in his own words.
> 
> Andy.


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## hdavis

Texas Wax said:


> Some Software will use them for real time rendering. Render Preview window type stuff is starting to be common in the heaftier 3D apps. Luxology's Modo uses it the working windows when slected and render preview window... flippin awsome though still not as good as a raytraced render with the regular cpu/hardware.


Just checked Vray RT and it supports it.


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## VinylHanger

Kent Whitten said:


> Yes...so stupid I accidentally hit this ban button riiiiight next to your name :laughing:


:whistling


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## blackbear

nice stuff. been here 4 years and had no idea this is whats going on in these parts. Gets me excited. Might have to start messing around with this stuff. It could be what takes it over the top!!! :laughing:


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