Author Topic: Cryptomatte playground!  (Read 9677 times)

2022-02-03, 13:09:29

GeorgeK

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With the release of the latest daily build of Corona version 8 2022-02-02, Cryptomatte render element has been added.

>>> For this daily, be sure to disable the allow propagation through reflection/refraction from the render elements > cryptomatte rollout, as it might create some issues <<<"

It can be found in the Render Setup (F10) > Render Elements > Add > CMasking_Cryptomatte. You can further customize it by Levels control, where you can determine the number of objects that can be identified by the cryptomatte in a single pixel, and by ID type you can determine the distinction between different objects. It supports motion blur, transparency and depth of field.

Note: Render outputs of this render element need to be saved as .CXR (do not save as OpenEXR) and either be renamed to .EXR when saving, or in the case of .CXR you can always select to open the file with "Open as..." and select which plugin you want to use. 



Please feel free to post your creations here, and offer any valuable feedback, using this new feature for Corona Renderer v8.

« Last Edit: 2022-02-04, 09:06:00 by GeorgeK »
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2022-02-07, 16:03:31
Reply #1

romullus

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I'm not an expert, but it appears that cryptomate works just fine in Affinity Photo, no need to rename, or do anything special. On the other hand, it looks that cryptomate completely ignores volumetrics, will this be improved in the future?
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2022-02-09, 12:03:58
Reply #2

romullus

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Does cryptomate element need to be rendered for multiple passes for antialiasing, or just one pass is enough. The preview shows zero antialiasing, but i suspect it may look very different under the hood.
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2022-02-09, 14:04:48
Reply #3

TomG

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It needs multiple passes - the colored layer visible in the VFB will always look "pixellated" and won't show any changes after the first pass or two, but the actual usable layers will improve with multiple passes. The best advice is to render the scene fully, until the Beauty is clean, then the cryptomatte passes will be clean too.

EDIT - especially true for motion blur and DOF, which is where cryptomatte is most useful. Those need to have cleaned up in the beauty for the matte to be able to be accurate and effective :)
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2022-02-09, 14:32:04
Reply #4

romullus

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Thanks for clarification Tom, it's a pity that there's no proper visual representation in the VFB though - sometimes you just need to render the masking elements alone, without any shading and it's impossible to tell wether cryptomate has enough antialiasing, or not. Not a problem when you're rendering everything in one go, of course.
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2022-02-10, 14:51:37
Reply #5

marchik

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I'm not an expert, but it appears that cryptomate works just fine in Affinity Photo, no need to rename, or do anything special. On the other hand, it looks that cryptomate completely ignores volumetrics, will this be improved in the future?

Could you please explain in more detail how exactly it works in Affinity Photo?

For me the .cxr file opens without any passes, merged
and the renamed .exr has cryptomatte passes similar to corona vfb, but I can’t use them, as it is intended

2022-02-10, 15:13:43
Reply #6

romullus

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I didn't know that there should be separate passes. I opened CXR and sampled colors from the mask. As i said, i'm not an expert, if cryptomate supposed to work somehow differently, i would like to learn that :]
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2022-02-10, 15:25:14
Reply #7

TomG

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Oh, it is supposed to work differently - that colored pass is NOT cryptomatte. For one thing it does not resolve motion blur and depth of field, you will just get solid "on or off" pixels, while the cryptomatte pass for that object will in fact have correct fading of the mask. For example, the first image below is how it would look in that pass, and the second is how it will look in the layer.

When loaded by software that understands cryptomatte data, you will get one greyscale layer for each named object (or layer, or layer + name, etc. depending on the cryptomatte settings in the Render Element), see third image. You can then copy and paste the layer for a particular object into a mask for, say, an Adjustment Layer.
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2022-02-10, 15:30:34
Reply #8

romullus

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Oh crap :[ I wonder if it would be possible to add an option to export separate layers instead of single cxr file? For those that don't have cryptomate compatible software?
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2022-02-10, 23:52:53
Reply #9

shortcirkuit

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im still confused by cryptomatte - with wire color i usually use the magic want tool  in photoshop to select the color i want - is this how we do this in photoshop for cryptomatte?  I usually save out my renders as 16bit tiffs so im not sure if am doing things right - can you please outline how we get these perfect masks as i cant work it out for the minute


Oh, it is supposed to work differently - that colored pass is NOT cryptomatte. For one thing it does not resolve motion blur and depth of field, you will just get solid "on or off" pixels, while the cryptomatte pass for that object will in fact have correct fading of the mask. For example, the first image below is how it would look in that pass, and the second is how it will look in the layer.

When loaded by software that understands cryptomatte data, you will get one greyscale layer for each named object (or layer, or layer + name, etc. depending on the cryptomatte settings in the Render Element), see third image. You can then copy and paste the layer for a particular object into a mask for, say, an Adjustment Layer.

2022-02-11, 04:05:05
Reply #10

TomG

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Unlike other masks, which use a "puzzle matte" approach of a single layer with different colors in them to denote different objects, materials, etc., Cryptomatte places the mask for each item in its own separate layer in the file (the CXR, which you can rename to EXR). The layers will be named after each object, or layer (in the host application), or name and layer, etc. as determined by what options you checked in the cryptomatte render element, and will contain a greyscale mask for that object (or layer, or etc. depending on what you checked in the cryptomatte settings). The fact this color map type layer exists is just a side effect of the calculations, and is not the actual cryptomatte data in usable form, and can be ignored (and deleted, even, once in Photoshop).

To see these layers, the application you use to load it MUST understand cryptomatte data, otherwise you won't see them. For Photoshop, this would mean using Exr-IO, which in the latest version can read and translate cryptomatte data. There is other software out there that has a native understanding of cryptomatte, such as Nuke, but I don't have that so can't comment on the workflow :)

You can check tutorials like https://youtu.be/apk11RaFKo8?t=247 as an example (also see the 5 minute 40 second mark, where they copy and paste the cryptomatte mask for an object into the mask for an adjustment layer, which is how you use it to refine, say, exposure for a particular object, or color tint, or saturation, or whatever adjustment layer you are using).

Hope that helps! Naturally when time allows, we'll be making our own tutorials going through from start to finish too :)
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2022-02-11, 04:07:00
Reply #11

TomG

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PS, as noted at the start of this thread, CXR is the ONLY file format that can save cryptomatte data from Corona at the moment, so you must save to that.
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2022-02-11, 10:34:19
Reply #12

romullus

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Unlike other masks, which use a "puzzle matte" approach of a single layer with different colors in them to denote different objects, materials, etc., Cryptomatte places the mask for each item in its own separate layer in the file (the CXR, which you can rename to EXR). The layers will be named after each object, or layer (in the host application), or name and layer, etc. as determined by what options you checked in the cryptomatte render element, and will contain a greyscale mask for that object (or layer, or etc. depending on what you checked in the cryptomatte settings). The fact this color map type layer exists is just a side effect of the calculations, and is not the actual cryptomatte data in usable form, and can be ignored (and deleted, even, once in Photoshop).

To see these layers, the application you use to load it MUST understand cryptomatte data, otherwise you won't see them. For Photoshop, this would mean using Exr-IO, which in the latest version can read and translate cryptomatte data. There is other software out there that has a native understanding of cryptomatte, such as Nuke, but I don't have that so can't comment on the workflow :)

You can check tutorials like https://youtu.be/apk11RaFKo8?t=247 as an example (also see the 5 minute 40 second mark, where they copy and paste the cryptomatte mask for an object into the mask for an adjustment layer, which is how you use it to refine, say, exposure for a particular object, or color tint, or saturation, or whatever adjustment layer you are using).

Hope that helps! Naturally when time allows, we'll be making our own tutorials going through from start to finish too :)

Just to clarify - does that mean, that information about cryptomatte usage on official Affinity channel is incorrect? https://affinity.serif.com/en-gb/tutorials/photo/desktop/video/365275093/
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2022-02-11, 12:32:10
Reply #13

TomG

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Pretty much, yep. You can use it like that, but it won't work with motion blur and DOF (as can be seen by how pixelated that is in my earlier example of the colored single layer), and really whatever they are doing there with the cryptomatte can be done with other ID matte passes like object, material, etc. The main benefit of cryptomatte is handling DOF and moblur because it is a proper greyscale and not just "on" or "off" (since both effects blend the object in question into what is seen in the background), not having to worry about fringing/aliasing as those should be accounted for afaik, plus having layers that are named and correspond to objects or groups of objects so you can find the mask that applies (which should allow you for example, in their case, to have all the windows on the building on the left grouped and appearing in one mask layer, not as 30 different colors).

So, does their use work? Sure, because nothing is moving or blurred or out of focus - but you can just do that, more correctly, with other types of such "puzzle matte" single layer solutions anyway. None of this is what cryptomatte is intended for, nor is it using the "real and full" cryptomatte data.
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2022-02-11, 14:49:29
Reply #14

davetwo

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You can see how Photpshop handles the Cryptomatte masks iwith the aid of the Exr-IO in this V-ray tutorial: https://vrayschool.com/vray-cryptomatte-exr-in-photoshop/