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Topics - The Pixel Artist

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1
Porting and API / Corona for Sketchup Discussion
« on: 2014-12-20, 19:37:41 »
Hi all!

I've mentioned to KM that I'm interested in helping to develop a "Corona for Sketchup".  I am not much of a programmer myself, so I'm looking to find someone with the right programming skillset to help me make this happen.

I was hoping to start a discussion in these regards to see if anyone was interested in helping and also to hear some general opinions/wishes for it's development.

Thanks,
TPA

2
Gallery / The Pixel Artist Galleries
« on: 2014-12-18, 18:27:46 »
Hi everyone!  I've actually been using Corona quite a bit this year but haven't really put up much of this work here in the Gallery yet.  Thought it would probably be easier to just make one big gallery post to show all my current and past Corona work.

I've been moving more and more full-time with Corona over the last few months and have officially decided I'm done with the other renderers (mostly Vray, Thea, or Maxwell).  I've really been "on the fence" this year trying to decide which engine to move our production work to.  Was kind of a toss up between Thea and Corona, but the latest Thea update (1.4) is still not quite where I wish it could be, so I'm going to finally put my full hopes and support behind Corona! (Can't wait for 1.0!)

Anyhow, comments and critiques are welcome (creative criticism is certainly helpful for improving ones work!) and I'm more the happy to answer any questions.  Thanks!

P.S. Did I mention I LOVE corona render!  It's been such an enjoyable and (mostly) pain free engine to use, certainly compared everything else currently out there!
A big "Thank You!" to Ondra, Adam, Jaroslav, and everyone else helping to build this fantastic piece of software!


Full TPA Corona Images Gallery (Link)


Updates

Nov 2014 - Wang Residence (Link)


July 2014 - Brugsteeg Condos (Link)


Dec 2014 - 7th Street Terrace (Link)


Dec 2014 - Telluride Home Design (Link)


Dec 2014-2012 - Greystone Homes (Link)


Nov 2014 - Fontana Townhomes (Link)


Oct 2014 - Mack Townhomes (Link)


Aug 2014 - Westend Harbor Condos (Link)


June-Mar 2014 - ITW Shakeproof (Link)


May 2014 - McHenry Co Proposed Landscaping (Link)


Mar 2014 - Catalyst Highrise Apartments (Link)


Feb 2014 - Westland Bunker Datacenter (Link)


Misc Images & Corona Tests (Link)


3
Gallery / TPA - Westland Bunker VR Tour
« on: 2014-04-16, 13:30:33 »
Hi everyone!

I actually rendered this one back in January with one of the V6 daily builds, but wasn't able to show it at the time due to confidentially reasons. :(

Would have loved to had the new spherical cam from the latest daily build as it would certainly have my things a lot easier!!

Is was a really fast turnaround project (3 weeks to help building design, model/render the full exterior/site/interior, 8 view VR Tour, and 3+ minute animation) so I wasn't able to let the interior views render as long as I would have preferred, so they're still a bit noisy.  With the new spherical cam and the huge improvements in noise reduction in the final V6 alpha I bet these would have rendered much cleaner now for the same time!

Here's the VR Tour: http://thepixelartist.com/vrtours/westland/

Also had to do a 3 minute animation.  Ended up using Vray RT for the exterior portions, but the interior segments where done using the same 360 spherical Corona images used in the vr tour.  Used them as backgrounds in After Effects with an animated camera.  Really saved me a lot of time!!

Animation:

Thanks for viewing!

4
I've noticed that when using the "Rounded corners" option on metallic materials (highly reflective/glossy/etc) it will produce a lot of glossy noise or fireflies that just won't clean up, even after a few hundred passes.

Not sure if there's a way to fix this or if it's just a bug.  Any ideas?

5
OK, here's another FP/Corona issue I've seen in the last few builds (1/16, 1/17, 1/24). I've done my best to try to figure out what the issue is or if it was something I was doing wrong, but alas, I does things it is.

Basically, the plants in this scene are FP scatters using the custom edit option.  When I try to render this view (still need to test other angles) either some, none, or all of the FP object will render, quite randomly.

The attached images below were all render one, after the next, and all show different plant rendering or not.  This last one shows how it show look once they all render at the same time.  However, that image also shows a bit of the other "leaking" FP object issue mentioned in my other bug post.

6
There seems to be an issue with TIFF (and I think PNG/TGA/ETC) images that have alpha mask channels and being use in the opacity slot not rendering correctly, either in the preview window or when rendered.  Seems like the alpha channels is being flipped, but inverting the texture does not help.

Example image attached.

7
Been seeing this issue on a few scenes that have Forest Pack scattered tree/plant objects.  The FP objects are "leaking" though other foreground objects.  Finally isolated the issue down and found that it was only the scatter objects that used opacity masks in the materials.

Below are a few images to hopefully demonstrate better.
Also, here a panoramic image I rendered that shows the problem as well.
http://www.thepixelartist.com/images/corona/20140126_opacity_bugs/index.html


This has been an issue for at least the last three builds (1/16, 1/17, 1/24), haven't tested it with V5 though.


I'll also mention that I've seen another issue where some forest pack objects will not render at all, even though it's visible (and on) in the viewpoint.  It seems to be intermittent, as after starting the render again that FP object might now render fine, but other FP object might not.  I've been trying to duplicated the issue without luck and may have been fixed in the 1/24, as I havent' noticed it yet.

8
2014-01-14 Wood Shake Siding (displaced)
Download Link: www.thepixelartist.com/images/corona/20140114/corona_mat-shake_siding1.zip




9
Gallery / TPA's Gallery
« on: 2014-01-15, 01:17:51 »
Hi everyone!  Here's my first real image with Corona.  Truly enjoying this engine!

2014-01-14: Wheaton 121 Kitchen


Original Vray version for comparison
http://www.thepixelartist.com/c2012005/p2012014/gallery/Interiors/slides/p2012014-Unit_N1-Kitchen_View-20130214-2.html

2014-01-14: Displacement Material Test
TPA's Corona Materials Download Thread: http://forum.corona-renderer.com/index.php/topic,2485.0.html

10
Work in Progress/Tests / TPA's wips & tests
« on: 2014-01-13, 23:27:27 »
Hi Everyone!  I'm a little late to the Corona party, but boy am I excite now that I'm here!

I remember seeing a little about Corona... maybe a year or so ago, but it has somehow flown completely under my radar since then.  Now that I've found it, and gotten to try it out, I can't believe what a fantastic render engine it truly is!

I've probably used or tested nearly every engine out there over the last 15-20 years, from Accurender to Mitsuba to Thea.  Like most here I typically use Vray as my main production tools.  However, I've been desperately trying to move away from 3dsMax/Vray for many years now, always hoping to get to that next level of realism/quality, along with a more stable, simplified workflow.  Probably starting with the first Maxwell beta, then as one of the first Fryrender testers, and most currently with Thea (which I actually do like... and still have a lot of hope for), but sadly they all have their various shortcomings and technical issues that keeps me stuck with Vray.

That said, I'm really excite to say that Corona might just be "The One"!  It's like the very best of Vray and Thea (and maybe a little Indigo) got together and had a love child, and it was named Corona!!

To Keymaster (Ondra, right?) congratulations on all your hard work!  It will no doubt pay off for you greatly in the long run!  You clearly seem to understand what us rendering artists truly need.  So, thank you for producing a terrific piece of software!!

I've been doing a lot of technical testing of Corona V5 over the last couple weeks and so far it's handled nearly everything I've thrown at it!!  And I've been try hard to break it too, but it seems to be rock solid!  Plus it's fast as hell and has many of the favorite features from Vray that I still can't get in Thea/Maxwell! (like edge beveling, AO/Dirt, handling xref/forestpack without issue).

I haven't really had time to fully finish anything yet, but here's a comparison test I did with an older Vray project converted to Corona.  Big thanks to DeadClown for providing his vray converter, it really work awesome and made converting this scene so easy!!  The grass was Vrayfur and the plants Vrayproxies, so wasn't able to convert those and not enough time to replace them yet.

Anyhow, the Corona image really looks fantastic!  While subtle, it really shows that next level of quality/realism I've been looking for!

Corona Version


Vray Original

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