@Fluss
You said it yourself:
So photorealism really isn't that simple to define as there is a whole lot of intricacies. The key is to use references and observe the world around you. I often look at light interactions around me and a lot of these observations are making me think "If I'd see this in one of my renders, i'd probably think this is a bug".
It would be really interesting to make a thread with great images and review them to highlight why it works well.
The reason for showing renderings and also photos is to observe.
You can do all the tests you want being methodical and practical, but in the end there's also a perception component that we can learn from looking at different images.
So I disagree. It's not garbage. It's learning. Isn't AI based on this?
If I may add my two cents, this discussion can be boiled down to braking bad's quote: "after all, how pure can pure be?"
For most people 96% purity is more than enough and for some people difference between 96 and 99 is not just noticeable it is like tremendous gulf.
and finally get conclusion "fstorm is 18% more photorealistic" who cares?
The whole discussion, I think, it's because we strive to make more compelling images. Images that sell.
Clients will "buy" faster (18%? :)) an image if they FEEL they
like it.
Some Fstorm images have a feeling that is very attractive.
We're trying to pin-point it, right?
Original contrast destroys blacks, oversaturates colours to a point that you are no longer able to see the original texture used which is really annoying when working with product design or anything that requires more than just a punchy-candy picture.
How do you guys know that this is the cause? A bad tone mapping...
Could it be that the shadows are wrongly represented by the engine in the first place, making them more bland with a gradient that makes contrast to flatten them?
That's what I'm trying to do with the black and white noisy tests:
I want to discard tone mapping, sharpening, LUT, bloom, DOF, color, textures, contrast; and I want to compare the core of the engine: How it resolves light and shadows, antialiasing, BRDF and sampling of small objects and details.