Author Topic: General concerns about Corona Renderer for Blender development  (Read 34843 times)

2020-04-28, 19:56:12

quadrays

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To be honest I can see some good and bad things happening with development of Corona export add-on and Blender development (also other known add-ons development)

Let's go.

 / Good things /

- Generally V-Ray for Blender is coming, it would be good to take a research about operability between rendering engine and Blender. V-Ray is going to be interactive.
Octane does have more interesting way - to run rendering inside Blender build, even in interactive mode, is using the licensing server that shoud be runned in the background.
- Things, in general are getting really seriously. I see some known 3ds Max modelers, archviz artists and plug-in developers are considering to move to Blender with their stuff.
- Personally, and not only personally, Blender seems to be stable while doing archviz and modeling is even faster than in 3ds Max. Here even are some people who really are using Blender and then exporting to 3ds Max just cause of Corona Renderer.
-For archviz geometries can be optimized/proxified for viewport display and work. Already. In. Blender.
-New Standalone format. Nothing to add or deduce. Simply - great news, this should improve operability with general 3D softwares.

/ Bad things /
- Many freelancers are using Cycles engine, but Cycles and Octane for Blender are still lacking some necessary features. Rendering speed on CPU, especially when working on single GPU is the huge pain while using those engines. Corona seems to deal with it a lot better. Oh, we can't forget about BlendLuxCore, but this is still not the same like really artist-driven Corona.
- Blender license seems to be an obstacle for Corona development, the stuff have been stucked on "watching the development of Blender". But I am sure here is a way to solve this or by-pass this completely legally. Why not? Really, never say never.
- Economical crisis caused by SARS-CoV-2 panic, which seems to freeze most of economy. I think here Blender is going to be more a way to go as software which features and workflow can be really profitable.
- Lack of proper amount of development funds. I really suggest you to donate the Blender add-on/build for Corona project.
- Blender development seems really ignored, like another Sketchup. I think the time to ignore this and for waiting until Blender will be bigger is a huge mistake.
I think the market of Corona engine between Blender users can look really good. What a surprise it will be when users will just move to Blender cause the engine gives a good speedup if we're saying about CPU calculations. Not to be a Blender evangelist or nazi (lol) but the Max Indie licensing seems unsure, Autodesk's policy became worse, also Maxon's one. Cinema 4D but in Prime versions lacks features that Blender actually does have. Also... C4D Prime is no longer being sold :)
- Optionally, people who are still having Max libraries have to use Max to use or convert them. But I am planning some workaround on this.
Also it will be nice when I would be one of those who inspired or funded the development of Blender Corona support for network rendering and known renderfarms. It's really important.

To be honest, who seriously sticks to Max or C4D for the features and the already owned huge library, still are going to stick here. Bigger studios etc.
But freelancers have to deal with the fact they can change the primary 3D tool. Also Corona with its affordable licensing method, without Blender development seems to really miss the point which is to be authentically affordable for freelancers. Just remember that many of us aren't student license users. And here are still many doubts - you can't use student Max commercially, but Corona rendered images can... :) sounds funny.

If you are really wanting to change the world, I suggest leaving here some ambitious and argumentative comments. More informations can improve whole think-tank and give a proper shape of further decisions.

Thanks,

Adam

2020-04-29, 10:56:23
Reply #1

Zorian

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I love Corona, and I was using it from almost 2 years in Blender 2.78/2.79. After changing to 2.8 Corona, even the free exporter written by Glen is something that I miss really much. Even tried to go back to 2.79, but 2.8 is much better optimized so i stuck with Cycles/Octane.

I'm looking forward for V-ray and Blender, but I am afraid that developing it isn't go so well. They wrote that they made it work, but didn't show any proof, screenshot. Only words. No Nightlies to check how it works.

Many developers were annoyed by changing Blender Api all the time, but currently with long term support it shuldn't be a problem? Right?

I think that Corona for Blender should bring many users from 3dsmax to Blender, because Belnder is becoming much more friendly software than 3dsmax. And if it will be possible to use proxies made in 3dsmax in Blender it shouldnt be so painful witch changing Softwares:)  I miss Corona proxies the most in my workflow  Using Corona Proxies saved me a lot of memory - for example two scenes one made in Corona and proxies and the second Cycles, which was even less complicated than this in Corona.


Everyday i see many people on Blenderartist forum who are making archviz. If Corona developers arent sure if it is a good place for possessing new clients, than you can make an topic there to ask how many of them should be ready to pay for working and official conection between Blender and Corona :)

https://blenderartists.org/

I was paying for license even if it wasn't full supported.


2020-04-29, 12:13:29
Reply #2

quadrays

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2020-04-29, 12:14:58
Reply #3

jarekhell1

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Since I switched from 3ds max to blender, the big downside is the inability to use corona render. I'm waiting for corona render impatiently and I will gladly pay for the license if necessary, so that it can be used :)
Jarek.

2020-04-29, 12:52:01
Reply #4

Magog

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Good morning.
I can only confirm everything Quadrays wrote.
I have been reiterating it for months, which has been discussed on the various forums and groups.
I am an Accredited Trainer of Blender Italia and in recent months we have noticed a not insignificant increase in requests on training and especially in the transition from other sw (especially 3Ds Max and C4D) to Blender.
The only obstacle that opposes a targeted switch, for many profissionists, is precisely the Corona question.
Many well-known Faculty of Architecture have started to include Blender in their laboratory courses.
Cycles are fast, well integrated and stable, but those who work in the ArchiViz area need a more suitable, more powerful tool.
We are many who dream of a future development of Corona focused on Blender.
I hope that our request will be seriously examined and weighted with the right weight it deserves.

2020-04-29, 12:58:05
Reply #5

quadrays

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Even visualization agency that does have many offices in UK, United States or Hungary seems wanting Corona for Blender.

I think something is up...


@Magog If using GPU, maybe Cycles is fast, but not that efficient as Corona. I have dual Xeon E5-2697v3 and RTX 2070.
On CPU-only it's much slower than Corona, but with GPU still needs some improvements. This clearly says that I still need Corona.

2020-04-29, 13:05:43
Reply #6

Magog

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I'm interested in the final result.
If that means investing money to change my WS, I'll do it.
Currently my HW is composed of :
  • Ryzen Threadripper 2950x
  • 2 x Rtx2080
  • and 1 Gtx1050Ti only for the monitor

2020-04-29, 13:33:29
Reply #7

quadrays

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To gather the most of possible information I am making a portal between two things:

This forum thread

and

Blender for Archviz topic on Corona Renderer

https://www.facebook.com/groups/BlenderArchviz/permalink/709075853180088/

You're warmly welcome.

2020-04-29, 13:38:49
Reply #8

Magog

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I replied a little while ago and I'm spinning the links.

2020-04-29, 14:52:34
Reply #9

Ang

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I swiched to blender and I would pay corona. I have bought skatter, archipack, real sky and models libraries specific for blender. Being a blender user does not mean not wanting to pay for software. The price of other 3d programs are prohibitive for freelancers as me actually
2 xeon 2658 / i7 5820K /i7 3770

2020-04-29, 15:32:55
Reply #10

Zorian

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I was using Corona for almost, but last year I was forced to upgrade PC and i wasnt sure what should I buy - decided to buy RTX 2080 TI isntead of new CPU and use Blender native render engine again - Cycles. Using RTX is fast but I saw that clients require Corona quality renders, so I am becoming to lose clients. Tried to go back to 2.79 was disaster. Once 2.8 never go back:p

I've even made a comparison and tried to get Corona look using Cycles, but still, Corona treat lighting much nicer:)

2020-04-29, 16:19:15
Reply #11

GentileArchitetto

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I surely would be glad to use Corona for Blender and I would consider to pay for it!

2020-04-29, 16:21:37
Reply #12

Marcomor

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Hello everyone!
I want to give my thoughts about having Corona for Blender.. I have to say that i'd love to use a stable and official version of this renderer, the way it renders archviz images (this is my main activity with blender) is just.. so real!
From what i see, it has become the standard for Architectural Visualization and it's just sad that it's hard to make it a real thing for blender users. A lot of companies are investing into Blender, and from my humble opinion, it seems the right time to just invest in the development of this engine for Blender. A lot of artists are switching software, but some are still mainly focused on other ones only because of Corona. If it would be possible to make it available for Blender too, i think it would benefit both the blender users and the corona developers.

And with no doubts i would pay for a Corona engine for Blender. If it speeds up my workflow and it gives me better results.. then, why not?

Marco

2020-04-29, 16:35:54
Reply #13

monkriss

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Absolutely love Corona. I use Vray when i work in a studio around the corner, and still love to come back to Corona. If it was fully integrated into Blender I'd be willing to pay for sure.

And on that note, i've been paying for 3 years and have been quite active here over the years. I also sell models that work with Cycles and Corona for Blender so I'm quite invested haha. I just know Corona is the leader and if Corona can get in there just like Octane (which is kicking off big time in Blender), then it could become the Arch-Vis Go-To engine for Blender

2020-04-29, 16:38:02
Reply #14

Gustavo82

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Corona for Blender???? It's my dream!!!!!

2020-04-29, 16:39:25
Reply #15

Gustavo82

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Corona for.Blender??? It's my dream Twitter

2020-04-29, 21:38:59
Reply #16

francesco pretelli

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I hope Corona for Blender will arrive soon !

2020-04-30, 12:48:41
Reply #17

maru

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Hi all,

As usual, thanks for sharing your thoughts and for being so engaged. This means a lot to us.
Unfortunately, it seems there is a strong dissonance here between what the situation looks like from the perspective of users and developers.

Currently (and it’s been like this for years now), the biggest obstacle is the Blender's license:
https://www.blender.org/about/license/

We have two options how Corona for Blender could be developed:
- We (Corona Team) develop Corona for Blender plugin - in this case, we would have to make Corona Renderer fully open source. This is not going to happen.
- The community develops an open-source exporter, while we develop the commercial, non-open-source Corona Renderer software - that's what we have right now.

The previous forum thread "Why there won't be Corona for Blender / Why is Corona Blender exporter developed by community, not by us" is still valid:
https://forum.corona-renderer.com/index.php?topic=792.0

Here are some quotes by Ondra from that forum thread, they still apply:
Quote
It is possible to make commercial plugin for GPL software, I am not saying it is not, its just the speed and quality will be worse and implementation will be much more complicated

Quote
The licensing limitation is usually circumvented by splitting the plugin into the free and commercial part. The free part just by itself is useless, and needs the commercial part.
That being said, the blender community is willing to develop the free part, so we are happy to supply the commercial part, to have blender rendering solution in form of exporter + standalone.


Having said all of the above, IT IS NOT IMPOSSIBLE that we will have a better Blender to Corona Standalone exporter in the future.

Also, please remember that we get lots of requests for which software to add Corona to next, and we will continue to review and consider all of those.



Even visualization agency that does have many offices in UK, United States or Hungary seems wanting Corona for Blender.

Can you explain what exactly you mean by that?


Marcin Miodek | chaos-corona.com
3D Support Team Lead - Corona | contact us

2020-04-30, 13:25:50
Reply #18

Zorian

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Thanks Maru for your effort and answering to this post.

We have an exporter to the Blender version which is currently outdated.  Can you consider of make own exporter with cooperation with Chaos group? They are currently working on exporter for Blender 2.8 and exporter made for previous versions of Blender was faster than this one made by Glen. Many of us already changed Blender to the new one, which are more stable and better optimized than previous versions and I cannot imagine going back to 2.79 when I already used 2.8 for two months.

2020-05-01, 13:21:33
Reply #19

PetrT

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May be its more reasonable to hire someone, who can do addon and collect him money via donations from special service
First collect money and after this hire
« Last Edit: 2020-05-01, 14:38:34 by PetrT »

2020-05-01, 17:23:22
Reply #20

leandro_cs

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We have two options how Corona for Blender could be developed:
- We (Corona Team) develop Corona for Blender plugin - in this case, we would have to make Corona Renderer fully open source. This is not going to happen.
- The community develops an open-source exporter, while we develop the commercial, non-open-source Corona Renderer software - that's what we have right now.

Thanks for your reply Maru. My 2 cents on this:

We all understand that making Corona Renderer fully open source is not an option, I think everyone agree on that.
Main problem I see in the current development model is that there is just an independent developer who dedicates his free time to work in the exporter.
It is certainly an admirable and heroic initiative, but the live keeps going on and bills keep coming so the development naturally slows down.

In this scenario, it's hard for users to guess if will take weeks, months or even years to get it ready to use in production.
This uncertainty ends up pushing away many larger studios from joining/donating to this project.

My guess is that would be nice having the Blender/Corona exporter also being developed/managed officially by Corona Team.
This would bring more credibility and attention to the project, and consequently bigger players as well.

Also, would be nice to have an option for buying just the licence of the Corona Standalone (to use specifically with Blender for example).
Without having to buy the full version integrated with 3ds Max or Cinema 4D versions.


2020-05-02, 13:08:47
Reply #21

Zorian

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IMO even exporter which is using Cycles nodes to create Corona materials should be awesome. Just like Luxrender did and It's allows you to use viewport rendering to set all the lights and composition, which in Cycles is super fast to initiate, and final render make in Corona Standalone.  Nowadays most of the materials are made using PBR so that shouldn't be really hard.

2020-05-03, 09:37:43
Reply #22

boco

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I don't really understand why there would be not a possibility to pay a developer that would make a free exporter for a commercial renderer? It would be the same as hiring a guy who works on the c4d integration except the bridge he makes for corona would be free, that's all.


I think the corona team should consider 3 things:

1. blender is getting serious traction everywhere and will become the go-to 3D tool of the future for every new user working in 3D. Even older 3d users learn it and use it on the side untill they take the step to change completely. It's just a matter of time before the marketshare of blender (even in archviz) will become too big to ignore, so why not anticipate and make a decent exporter now?

2. there is a serious need for a realistic archviz renderer inside blender, cycles is ok but not designed for archviz at today's standards. It's quality is inbetween lumion and vray in terms of renderoutput. The only serious competitor is octane for the moment.

3. until now a lot of blender users where hobbyist and weren't ready to pay for a rendersoftware, but this is changing fast, a lot of compagnies are switching or consider switching. Those will be ready to pay a fair price if the exporter is nice and they can render with the corona-quality.


2020-05-04, 15:22:41
Reply #23

djtartak

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You can see Redshift and Arnold almost coming around the corner for Blender users too.
But just considering how great and popular Corona is for archviz makes the whole Blender/Corona combo worthwhile.
Keeping my fingers crossed for this.
I can see so much more interest in Max-Blender switches lately (propably related to unpredictable shady licence moves by AD)
Blender's licence may be an obstacle for the devs, but at least it's predictable :)

2020-05-07, 22:14:13
Reply #24

Omnimorphic

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We all understand that making Corona Renderer fully open source is not an option, I think everyone agree on that.
Also, would be nice to have an option for buying just the licence of the Corona Standalone (to use specifically with Blender for example).
Without having to buy the full version integrated with 3ds Max or Cinema 4D versions.

I think there would be a substantial amount of interest in this.

2020-05-12, 21:53:15
Reply #25

Binke

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I know the corona team has made comments about the difficulties of the blender license model.

But does anyone know how Redshift is handling it? They are developing a plugin which will not follow the Octane-way of doing a custom blender build that connects to their server, , and apparently they found no issues at all with the licensing thing? I remember people were concerned it would get slower etc, but they seemed to have solved it.

Not much info out there, but there is screenshots and videos on their trello: https://trello.com/b/QASr74yB/redshift
and a video showing the alpha:


2020-05-14, 13:07:25
Reply #26

defipodete

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Hello community and Corona developers.

Id like to add my 2 cents.
I started using 3dsmax as most of guys that started many years ago. Then after lot of frustration I bought c4d. It was great upgrade for my workflow. Then I switched to blender from curiosity. And honeslty, im staying here. For now its better almost at everything, except rendering options. I use mainly Cycles, but octane gives better results. Slowly trying with it. But if corona would get full support and usability with blender - i would pay for it without doubt. It would be great tool for archviz.

2020-06-06, 23:04:17
Reply #27

kbbk

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Dear Corona Team,
seeing what Otoy did with Octane – provide fully integrated commercial renderer with their blender build + licencing app I (and I bet many others) don't understand why couldn't You do this as well, huh? There is a big chunk of blender community who'd love to use Corona because it's a great & fairly priced tool, but cost of 3ds or C4D is just unbearable and those are very unfortunate and only options so far.
Community developed exporter has to little people working on it, and if not integrated with live preview – people won't be interested in it.

2020-09-24, 15:56:06
Reply #28

P3N

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I heard somewhere, that Blender's GPL licence is a restriction of the plugin development. But it's not true, because plugins it's a python library, and therefore use Python license. Also Cycles licensed under Apache, why not to inject Corona code inside Cycles and sell it as Corona-Cycles. For example ECycles, or CyclesC4D sell their products,  Cycles for Rhino also not free.

2020-09-27, 18:14:46
Reply #29

juninholiveira

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The use of Blender for archviz here in Brazil is growing fast. More and more people are using it, including big architecture companies. There's no comparison for me. Blender is better than 3ds max in absolutely everthing. It's faster (viewport speed, modelling speed, etc) and it's free!!! That's the main point. What is missing for it to become production ready is 3 things in my opinion: Better renderers, Bigger and better asset library and better third party plugins. But there is already some really cool plugins appearing, like Scatter, to rival iToo Forest Pack for example. If VRay or Corona appear in Blender too, will be only a matter of time to more and more professional libraries start showing.

Please, hire a guy to develop the free exporter and sell the standalone commercial Corona. We need it, the industry need it. We're tired of Autodesk bulls*** and their expensive licenses.

2020-10-15, 21:19:02
Reply #30

alessandromichelazzi

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A big +1 for Corona for Blender. I've switched from Modo to Blender one year and half ago, and after having used 3ds Max for a period (to use Corona, I even got the Corona Academy certification some years ago!:) ) what I can say is that Blender is a wonderful piece of software. What I love is the spirit of the community, the fast iteration and developing they are doing, the vast knowledge resource you find.
Talking about rendering, Cycles is good and with the new GPU + viewport deonise you got almost clean result in no time. It's just missing a bit of photorealistic result, but a good artist could overcome to it.
I think that Corona with it's excellent materials, ease to use, light mix and photorealistic results can be the final addition for Blender! 
aluxado | render like photography

2020-10-19, 20:35:11
Reply #31

pablobuzarra

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Hi everyone! I'm new to Corona and I'm a blender user so I've trying to make the standalone + addon version work but I find it imposible to achieve.
When I install the blender addon it says that I have to update the blender version to 2.8x. Thing is I'm using the 2.83 LTS version.
So, does anyone know if the addon has been updated to the current version of blender or if the project is no longer working?

Thanks in advance!