Adaptivity/Denoising rendering playground

[maru]

Note: Currently only a few lucky ones were handed the new daily build with experimental adaptivity and denoising implemented. The features are not production-ready yet, and we are still testing them to see how and how much they can help.

Let's post our experiments here to show how awesome this new features are, and to share each other's observations.

Example 1 - both adaptivity and denoising enabled. The scene features DOF, volumetric fog, glossy materials, car paint. In this case the results are simply great. Despite the denoising, you can clearly see the pattern on the tire, or on the grid next to the lower halogen.



Example 2 - adaptivity on vs adaptivity off, no denoising. Generally the results are good as the noise is more uniform and much weaker in some areas. You can however see that there is slightly more noise visible in the background. As I understand - this is caused by having some areas of the image refined at the cost of some other areas.




Comparison - this is based on the second set of images (adaptivity only).


I am also attaching all the images if anyone wants to inspect them with no additional compression.

[Juraj]

In the last crop showing white paint corner, did you attach the images correctly ?

Because adaptivity made the overall noise levels worse. The other examples show minor improvement of details (rather then less noisy they are better articulated).

[lacilaci]

Looks kinda ok. Are there controls over denoising strength? Do you have maybe a more agressive tests? Just curious how much can it be pushed etc..

[maru]

In the last crop showing white paint corner, did you attach the images correctly ?

Because adaptivity made the overall noise levels worse. The other examples show minor improvement of details (rather then less noisy they are better articulated).

Yes, that one is correct. As I wrote - I think this is because the noise level becomes more uniform, so given the same time, some areas had to "sacrifice" quality so that other ones can be improved. I think this is also important for the denoising to work correctly.

@Lacilaci: yes, there are controls for denoising strength and adaptivity error tolerance, but the UI is not yet finished, so I don't think it should be discusses. There are also some bug reports about the denoising already, so it has to be improved before any official tests.

[Ondra]

A crop from a scene that Cecofuli posted few years ago as prime example where out-of-focus reflections wouldnt clear up. Only adaptivity.

[cecofuli]

This last test is very, very interesting. Also in V-Ray it was hard to slove bright highlight reflection with strong DOF! Great result!  O_O

[Nekrobul]

A crop from a scene that Cecofuli posted few years ago as prime example where out-of-focus reflections wouldnt clear up. Only adaptivity.

It seems that worst case scenorios with sharp reflections in Dof are no longer worst case scenarios. Tho it does not make big difference on the images that does not have wird noise problems. Am i right?

[Ondra]

actually it really helps even on images that previously looked OKish, as long as there are some differences (shadows vs. bright areas, interior/exterior, ...). Obviously it wont work if you render only an empty wall ;)

[Nekrobul]

I wounder how this will work out with fumeFX. As long as if the scatering for the smoke (or even without the scatering) is turned on rendertimes geting dramaticly long but fume itself clears from noise in one pass.

[romullus]

Great thread!
maru, in your first set of images, what render settings was? Number of passes is almost identical with adaptivity and without, does that mean that adaptivity almost took no place?

[maru]

maru, in your first set of images, what render settings was? Number of passes is almost identical with adaptivity and without, does that mean that adaptivity almost took no place?

Shamefully, I don't know what were the render settings as I have already altered the scene in every possible way and overwritten it. I am pretty sure the settings for the nice one with denoising were GIvsAA 64, LSM 1, adaptivity 6, denoising 1.
About the number of passes - I think it's more complicated. I noticed that usually the number of passes with adaptivity enabled is actually lower, but the overall quality is better. 

[jjaz82]

My tests...
1°  5 min without any trick..
2°  6 min adaptivity on default setting
3°  6 min adaptivity on and  full denoise on 0.9
4°  24 min without any trick.. 201 pass

[jjaz82]

in this scene adaptivity can't work perfectly but i noticed a improvement on glossy reflections..
denoiser it's amazing, It should be used moderately but i love it :)

[mitviz]

where is the adaptive setting?

[mitviz]

just ran a test with one scene i am working on currently, this is awesome! denoising is so nice to use