Author Topic: Cannot render my animation project using Corona C4d!  (Read 4114 times)

2021-04-06, 07:25:02

Elias2019

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Hi friends,
Is there any any correct detailed workaround / tutorial for rendering Animation using Corona in Cinema 4D? I cannot find any resources and seems people do it by experiment. The UHD stuff is very confusing... how many frames? how many passes?

2021-04-06, 14:51:14
Reply #1

TomG

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There are no tutorials as it's just like rendering a still. So how many passes / what noise level - you can decide based on rendering a still (as a note, best to use noise level, because different frames will show different things and so may need more passes / time, and noise level accounts for that).

The only change is setting UHD Cache to animation rather than still image, and that's really all you need to think about. Everything will then work.

Once you are confident in doing that, and you want to look into saving some time, you can look into whether you can save some time by precomputing the UHD Cache - the when you can and how to do it is at https://help.c4d.corona-renderer.com/support/solutions/articles/12000005458-how-to-use-uhd-cache-in-corona-renderer-for-c4d-

If you are going to precompute it throughout an animation (e.g. you are moving between rooms so the first frame won't be a good UHD Cache for the whole animation), how many frames to skip can't really be given - it all depends on how fast your animation is. If things move slowly, you can skip more frames (because they will essentially be the same), if things move quickly, you'd have to recalculate and append skipping less frames. No hard and fast rule though since it all depends on the scene and how quickly it gets into seeing something different.
Tom Grimes | chaos-corona.com
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2021-04-07, 17:31:01
Reply #2

Elias2019

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Hi Tom,

Thanks man for your descriptions, honestly speaking I have studied those pages about UHD Cache but couldn't figure it out how they work in Cinema 4D. In Max, I used the option every Nth frame for precomputing but in C4d I cannot find such thing. The animation is also long and it's not really possible for me to make test on 1000 frames!

My animation is in an office, the camera starts moving from the beginning of the office, it reaches one of the desks and starts turning around that desk and then moves toward the ceiling, all is 30 seconds. I don't know how to deal with this scene, can you give me more specific workaround?
Thanks,

2021-04-07, 17:42:48
Reply #3

TomG

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Best thing is just set it to use UHD Cache, recalculate every frame (the default), and set to Animation Flicker Free rather than Still Image. No more is needed, and it's always the safest option.
Tom Grimes | chaos-corona.com
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2021-04-07, 19:29:16
Reply #4

Elias2019

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Thanks Tom! Just to clarify: When I launch the interactive render it becomes clean after 10 or 15 passes but when rendering even 150 or 200 passes are not enough for one frame, so I am still confused between different unknown stuff to my knowledge. Do you have any idea about this? If it wanna take that much it means 250 hours of rendering for 30 seconds?

In your method you meant I do so as precomputing for all frames and then use the Cache file for rendering the whole animation again? If so then how many passes actually? Or you meant I start the final rendering straightforward with your mentioned method? Sorry buddy, this stuff is totally unclear for me...

2021-04-07, 19:58:34
Reply #5

TomG

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Passes and UHD Cache are completely different things. Saving and reusing the UHD Cache does not change render time, required passes etc. (at best, it just avoids having the UHD Cache calculation time for each frame, but comes with various risks and complexities so let's just ignore it for now and render where the Cache is recalculated every frame). So no calculating and saving, just leave the default of recalculating every frame.

Without seeing the results from IR and final render, I can't say - do you have Fast Preview enabled in IR, but no Denoising enabled for Final perhaps? That way IR would be getting denoised, but final would not. Usual target is something like say 5% noise with High Quality Denoising set to around 0.65. Also, are there differences in resolution in your IR and final render? If you are rendering a 4K image but looking at a small IR, naturally the IR will clean up faster being smaller.
Tom Grimes | chaos-corona.com
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2021-04-07, 20:01:05
Reply #6

TomG

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(BTW yes, animations can take a long time to render, I am doing a 5 second animation 150 frames at test quality test resolution, and it takes 3 hours on two older machines working together :) 1 to 4 minutes a frame sure stacks up fast!)
Tom Grimes | chaos-corona.com
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2021-04-07, 21:32:56
Reply #7

Elias2019

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Thanks friend for complete descriptions, everything is clear now, then I will leave the noise on something around 5% and the UHD Cache on animation mode.

Fortunately I am familiar with the stuff you mentioned in your 2nd paragraph, yeah the fast preview is enabled for the IR, I cannot even look at the non-denoised IR. You know, honestly speaking I like the IR more than final render in Corona. IR is extremely smooth and artistic, I have attached an example of my work here which I published the IR as my final render! Final render is or looks very mechanical to me. It either removes all the details in the scene or keeps it in absolute chaos. After 3 years of working with Corona I am still unsatisfied about this... Even for the animation I am currently working on, I am sure I won't like the final render but I don't know what to do honestly speaking...

You are right about the render times though, now I am making this animation for a client and I am in a dilemma, if I render it with my machine (that's actually a good machine) then I won't be able to work on other projects. If I send it to rebusfarm and use my those few render points I am afraid I get an undesired results that just spares my render points. It's really hard situation! On the other hand we cannot force the client to pay more and more for just a simple animation, he pays if I ask but I morally don't feel good of doing so. You know, I think economically it's sort of hard or unreliable for 1 person to do animations. Rebusfarm is really a good solution based on what I see currently, just if I could become sure what I will get after putting a long animation on task...

2021-04-07, 23:03:53
Reply #8

BigAl3D

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You should provide details such as your version of C4D and Corona.

Is there a chance your Denoiser setting is too high? That could definitely take out too much grain and make things look plastic. The IR should also show the Denoiser however. Curious.

2021-04-08, 10:48:55
Reply #9

Nejc Kilar

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...

Fortunately I am familiar with the stuff you mentioned in your 2nd paragraph, yeah the fast preview is enabled for the IR, I cannot even look at the non-denoised IR. You know, honestly speaking I like the IR more than final render in Corona. IR is extremely smooth and artistic, I have attached an example of my work here which I published the IR as my final render! Final render is or looks very mechanical to me. It either removes all the details in the scene or keeps it in absolute chaos. After 3 years of working with Corona I am still unsatisfied about this... Even for the animation I am currently working on, I am sure I won't like the final render but I don't know what to do honestly speaking...

...

By the way, if you like the slightly more "artistic" look the IR denoiser gives you (which is the Nvidia one) then you can always use it for final renders too :) Alternatively, you can also render final and then in PS (or whatever else) denoise it there and tick the "remove JPG artifacts" option. That'll make it look a bit more "smooth" in some ways :)
Nejc Kilar | chaos-corona.com
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2021-04-08, 14:22:25
Reply #10

TomG

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And a quick note to say that for animations, either the cost of having no access to your machine because it is rendering, or the cost of sending to a render farm, is perfectly fine to add in to what you charge the client. Of course, that should be stated up front, so in this case you may have your hands tied, but for future projects I would always factor that in, either just in the overall price, or broken out separately if you want to make sure the client understands just how much that actually costs.
Tom Grimes | chaos-corona.com
Product Manager | contact us

2021-04-08, 18:32:23
Reply #11

Elias2019

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Thanks Tom!
Yeah you are right man, however this client is really decent and generous guy, for this project I will do it by my cost but for the next projects I will discuss it in advance. Thanks for clarification man.


2021-04-08, 18:33:15
Reply #12

Elias2019

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...

Fortunately I am familiar with the stuff you mentioned in your 2nd paragraph, yeah the fast preview is enabled for the IR, I cannot even look at the non-denoised IR. You know, honestly speaking I like the IR more than final render in Corona. IR is extremely smooth and artistic, I have attached an example of my work here which I published the IR as my final render! Final render is or looks very mechanical to me. It either removes all the details in the scene or keeps it in absolute chaos. After 3 years of working with Corona I am still unsatisfied about this... Even for the animation I am currently working on, I am sure I won't like the final render but I don't know what to do honestly speaking...


...

By the way, if you like the slightly more "artistic" look the IR denoiser gives you (which is the Nvidia one) then you can always use it for final renders too :) Alternatively, you can also render final and then in PS (or whatever else) denoise it there and tick the "remove JPG artifacts" option. That'll make it look a bit more "smooth" in some ways :)

Very informative indeed! Thanks for the knowledge man, it was exactly what I wanted!

2021-04-10, 04:12:48
Reply #13

jojorender

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Hi Elias2019,
I was wondering about the timing of your animation. Is there a reason it needs to be 30s long?
It sound like you have a very simple camera move, fly through an office, around a desk…
30s is a eternity for one continuous shot.

I don’t know anything about your setup, but often I find arch-viz animations too slow, as if the creator wants to give the viewer time to admire their hard work… good luck!
Think about this, commercials tell an entire story in 30 seconds. Is your story so complex that it needs 30s to be told and understood? Don’t get me wrong, I love slow motion, but there needs to be a rhythm, a story that develops.
Try to see this animation through the eyes of someone with no emotional attachment to the work. Crawling through an office towards a desk… 5s in - Ok, I get it, now what?
Less is definitely more.

Judging from your frame crop, you nailed the details. If you need to fill 30s, render a 10-12s fly through and maybe intercut with AE dolly shots of stills. That’ll cut your render time down and probably makes the work more interesting.
If that’s not an option, you could still make the animation faster and slow it down in AE to get back to 30s.
If things don’t drastically change between frames, a AE plugin like Twixtor does a pretty good job creating in-between frames to slow down the animation. Saves a lot of render time.
Good luck!

2021-04-10, 12:10:45
Reply #14

Elias2019

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Hi Jojorender!

Haha I am pretty surprised man! because I am on your side about everything you mentioned. From the time I can remember I've been the enemy of the so-called intellectual cinema (specially the European and Russian one) and those meaningless slow long sequence-plans! As these are the lazy parts of the middle class who wanna achieve fame and money by serving the authority and pretending the role of a complicated creature that they are Not! These are meaningless people, and nothing comes of nothing. At the same time that they're politically correct, they pretend the role of a rebel! While in reality, their boring videos (not even movies) are in fact an indian movie with adult taste because of the lack of meaning!

What you said about Archviz artists and their show-off for their masterpiece is also correct. I have myself studied cinema and I cannot tolerate those long meaningless shots as well. But my case is different, it's an industrial product that the client wanna show the correct usage of it, that's a sort of ceiling dispenser. He has made the outline for the animation and wanna remain inside that structure. I could make it faster but I was also afraid of not being able to show the product work correctly.
« Last Edit: 2021-04-10, 12:37:55 by Elias2019 »