Messages

1

[Max] General Discussion / Re: corona uvw randomizer "multiple input"?

« on: Today at 18:45:55 »

Right now only possible with "Float Controllers". Very cumbersome though.

This was requested quite a lot of times, hopefully it is in pipeline. It should be one solution to all Corona Nodes.

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Gallery / Re: Dark Road

« on: 2023-03-26, 17:38:50 »

Very cool, the first shot is my favourite. Reminds me of one car photoshoot I saw don't remember the name of the supercar but it was under Brooklyn Bridge I think and the photographer used very similar post-production to make it feel like old master's painting type (dimmed highlights around the car, but the car with much stronger focus).

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Gallery / Re: W20

« on: 2023-03-26, 17:36:44 »

Very cosy :- ) But also nice play of light, angles and wood surfaces.

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Hardware / Re: Dual Monitor

« on: 2023-03-26, 13:42:45 »

Asus vs Dell is not about price though. Dell also has 300 Euro 27" 4K model (Dell S2721QS, I have one, I use it for travelling, it's very good for its price!). Dell has like 20 27" monitors alone :- ). With 300 to 3000 Euro in range.
Asus has smaller range to chose from and they have bigger jump from low-end to high-end. They don't have such affordable prosumer model with IPS-Black tech, their high-end has Mini-LED instead and costs 2000+ .

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Gallery / Re: CGI- Boulevard Haussmann Interior

« on: 2023-03-25, 09:38:00 »

Welcome! These are very beautiful, but they could use little bit more rendering time to clear (and little less denoising maybe).

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Hardware / Re: Dual Monitor

« on: 2023-03-25, 09:24:41 »

Dell U2723QE is very nice monitor for work. It's also one of the only 4 monitors on market with "IPS-BLACK" technology, which means instead of the usual IPS contrast ratio of 1:1000 they have 1:2000 (some very good Apple laptops for example have IPS panels with 1:1500). Yes that's still worse than VA (1:3000+ but lot of problems for work because of poor angles) or OLED (1:Infinity) which is pretty expensive for 27/32" 4K because there is only one panel from small company JOLED available.

Asus doesn't have any IPS-Black monitors right now on market, and neither does BenQ. But for past 8 years, BenQ became the most popular "prosumer" brand for color-accurate work. It costs less then NEC/EIZO top models, but only slightly more then Dell/LG/Asus/etc.. and have excellent quality control and build. The BenQ U-series is seriously high quality. My PD3200U is almost 5 years old maybe? And it's still in excellent condition. You cannot say that about any Asus monitor that will break after 5 days :- ). And no kidding... just go check r/monitors on Reddit to see how happy people are with Asus & Samsung monitors. Great price, non-existent quality control.

When talking about purely quality control (which may also include good factory calibration), Dell & BenQ (and maybe LG on good day) are the only affordable prosumer brands. They all use the same panels usually but the Quality Control, Support & Warranty is what sets them apart. Asus Pro-Art series has very good features/value, but there is reason why almost no one is buying them anyway.

For people looking for 27" 4K Monitor, who doesn't need high-refresh rate for gaming (IPS-Black is only 60HZ right now), I would suggest the Dell U2723QE.

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Hardware / Re: Looking for Help on Setting Up a New Dell Monitor for Max/Corona and Windows 11

« on: 2023-03-25, 09:11:36 »

Yes this is one of the correct ways to do it. Setting monitor color profile to generic profile (sRGB) instead of custom ICC is ok if the monitor is using hardware LUT inside the OSD to manually clamp the final output.
This also solves the fact that 3dsMax, Corona, Windows 11 Photo App, and many other applications are not color managed and will ignore any ICC profile from Windows.

(But in any case, Software Color Management (ICC profiles in Windows) and Hardware Color Management (3D LUT in monitor menu) need to match. So sRGB/sRGB, or DCI-P3/DCI-P3 or CustomICC(srGB)/sRGB, etc.. There cannot be misaligment. These need to match, they only calibrate in pair).

Second option is using full-gamut of monitor (Default profile) or an wide gamut (DCI-P3 for your Dell), and then use https://github.com/ledoge/novideo_srgb/ to clamp colors of the whole Windows on software level. This is good option for people whose monitor doesn't have sRGB mode, like many laptops or gaming monitors.

Third option, is to wait for 3dsMax 2024 which MAYBE will finally have color management of some sort :- ). Then we will be finally able to work in wide-gamut from start to finish, like in DCI-P3.

8

Hardware / Re: New PC 7950x vs 7950x3d

« on: 2023-03-24, 21:25:44 »

I would say the benchmarks you linked says exact opposite :- ). You can't compare to 1st post, the whole page1 are overclocked/undervolted massively.

9

Hardware / Re: Ryzen 5995XW Build - your opinion

« on: 2023-03-22, 00:17:29 »

If Corona was running on GPU, I would be fond of GPU rendering :- ).

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[Max] Daily Builds / Re: Chaos Corona 10 for 3ds Max - Daily Builds Discussion

« on: 2023-03-22, 00:13:19 »

Same issue here, reverting to 3rd March daily solved the issue. The slowness is everything, the whole UI.

3dsMax 2023v1 here because of FBX exporter, although I am not sure if my laptop isn't v3 so may try there next week. Win11, Quadro Drivers.

11

Hardware / Re: Ryzen 5995XW Build - your opinion

« on: 2023-03-21, 11:25:27 »

Hi Juraj,

I see you said "GPUs are not even worth mentioning with any positive word." I thought you liked Fstorm GPU renderer or maybe I'm mistaken.  Just wondering why you are saying that about GPU's?

I think you read too much into my words, I meant it quite literally, in terms of cost/value :- ). It's hard to say positive words about 4xxx nVidia if the only good model (4090 with 24GB Vram) costs 1800+ Euros while you can buy 3090 for 600 Euro second-hand when lucky.

It doesn't mean anything about GPU technology or GPU rendering.

12

[Max] Resolved Bugs / Re: Corona Picker values changing, resetting and showing wrong preview

« on: 2023-03-15, 20:58:05 »

I've heard a rumor too ;- )

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[Max] Resolved Bugs / Re: Corona Picker values changing, resetting and showing wrong preview

« on: 2023-03-15, 16:59:44 »

Getting precise sub <50 RGB values is indeed hassle, it's funny that it is hardcoded so that it doesn't matter what kind of conversion is displayed on top by Corona.

14

General CG Discussion / Re: Working with calibrated monitors- which color space?

« on: 2023-03-15, 16:56:02 »

Yeah you can do that as well, in fact it isn't big difference. But the "correct" way to keep all calculations in wider gamut and still see the correct output, is to use the "Proofing" function. You set your Proofing color to be sRGB, your working color space to be any wide gamut color space and you will always see the colors that you will get when you convert down to smaller output gamut that working one (aRGB --) sRGB).

There is a logical theory to do all color calculations in widest color gamut (like LAB) to avoid innacuracies and artifacts, but practical tests have shown the result is rarely affected at all. It's bit like audiophilia :- ). So using LAB colors is really more of a fetish at this point :- ). At least for general design/photography work.

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General CG Discussion / Re: Working with calibrated monitors- which color space?

« on: 2023-03-15, 11:29:46 »

What you do sounds correct and how should be done, at least in terms of color profile. But you should do most of your post-production in 16bit PS mode (it's non-linear as well) to get the most out of avoiding banding and other type artifacts. In the end you can still convert down to 8bit, loss-less compressed Tiff(or whatever your client prefers).

Don't send aRGB unless the client requests it due to print (aRGB is closest to CMYK coverage), ideally their own in-house, that's the only AdobeRGB use nowadays. Even majority of wide-gamut display users are simply on high-end laptops& (Apple) desktops which may cover 100perc. DCI-P3 but rarely more than 90 aRGB so they would still end up seeing it wrong.

sRGB as client's output will still be the most popular and logical choice for at least another 4-5 years.