(the extra symbols in the title are to reach the minimum 10 character length)
Is V-Ray for Rhino widely used in the Rhino community like it is for Maya and 3DS Max? I’ve never been able to navigate the Chaos Group’s website (I wish they would just dump that whole system and do something like Discourse) and I can’t get a feel for the V-Ray Rhino community over there.
Thanks in advance for any input you’ve got.
Sorry for being blunt, but it is meant in a friendly manner:
If you can’t navigate the website forget about being able to navigate the V-ray settings… I don’t think V-ray is your path.
V-ray is big among designers and maybe even bigger among architects. It has great quality but the logic is far from rational for a normal beings. You should like math, programming and science to become a buddy with V-ray. Most people make (read: get from a friend) a good scene and reuse that and it’s settings to it’s fullest.
What kind of rendering are you used to making? And what are your goals?
My comment was poorly phrased.
What I meant was - by comparison with the other forums I frequent (Sketchucation, Luxology and now McNeel’s Discourse) I find Chaos Groups website to be an eyesore and difficult to ‘read’ in the sense of getting a feel for how well received the software is. If I go to the General tab under Rhino the last post is 3 days ago. It appears to get a couple of posts a day at most (Luxology’s forums by comparison get dozens of posts every day, a reply to a question generally happens within an hour). The forum seems to be very sparsely populated which might be an indication of how invested people are in the software or not - hard to say.
I’m not as unfamiliar with V-Ray as you assume - I’m a SketchUp / V-Ray user. My question really was intended on a more general level - meaning is V-Ray for Rhino in widespread use? Is it well supported by Chaos Group? Is there a substantial amount of resources like there are for 3DS Max & Maya? Do large numbers of Rhino users use V-Ray or is it not the renderer of choice for this particular application?
Sorry if I wasn’t clear.
Well, if it’s any help to you, here, as a reseller, V-Ray for Rhino is by far the #1 rendering engine choice of my clients…
–Mitch
That’s precisely the type of information I was looking for.
I have tested V-ray and despite the quality I have found it to be unstable and slowing down Rhino a lot. Besides, You have to buy a separate licence for every application! As a SketchUP user using Thea is better - there is a Rhino plugin for Thea. The best integrated render for Rhino is Brazil - but small community, lack of books and tutorials. There is Flamingo nXt - very stable, but not so good quality - especially for interiors. And the new kid on the block - Octane render got a fresh plugin for Rhino! Very promising!
I think the intent here is for you to think up a subject line that summarizes your discussion topic. Something like “is VRay popular” or “VRay forum seems dead”.
That makes sense Brian. The way I worded the title makes it look like I’m putting a swear word after V-Ray.
Thanks for the reply cadmaster.
I’m concerned about the ‘slowing down’ you mention. Do you mean even when you’re not rendering?
I have looked at Thea and I like the idea of a ‘studio’ application so you don’t have to buy separate licenses. I wish Chaos would step up to the plate and offer some kind of reduced price for multiple versions. Ultimately, I expect Rhino will become my primary application so a good rendering solution will become a necessity.
If you mean that you can’t use your existing V-Ray for Sketchup or 3DS Max license to run V-Ray for Rhino, yeah, that is not very cool… They will “crossgrade” them for you (for a fee) if you want to switch permanently, but you can’t use both.
–Mitch
The advantage of a studio application like Thea is that you can bring your model in from any application you work in. The downside is that every time you make changes to the model you have to re-import it into Thea. I haven’t looked at the program in awhile but I think they now offer the best of both worlds for SketchUp - a stand alone application and a plugin so you can work from within SketchUp if you prefer.
But ultimately I tend to like the light in a V-Ray render better than any of the other applications I’ve tried. I’m not a very competent renderer but I seem to be able to pull it off with V-Ray. So I’m looking ahead and planning for a time when Rhino is my primary application.
Thanks for all the feedback you’ve provided.
And sorry for jumping to conclusions.
I agree with Mitch.
I’m a VfR user from the first hour of the betas and use it as pro viz freelancer for living. For me there is no alternative for Vray, quality and speed are awesome, it can be universal used, it’s open for complex scenes, large renderings, stable network rendering, it allow you to grow with your knowledge. But you ask for the VfR community?
The history is, that there was a very lively community at the beginning, but over a time of 5 years the plugin delevelopment of ASGvis was freezed, the community fall asleep.The pro user did there daily work, the plugin was rocksolid, no need to talk … than ASGvis was adopt by Chaosgroup, the development started again.
The ASGvis team is using the same code for Rhino and SU, so, from time to time the focus of the development of VfR seems to be lost to the SU plugin. There is no big chance to talk about the development of features at the forum.
There is a beta user team that get access to the nightlies, over the months the plugin grows, but not so fast like expected. But at the moment the plugin starts to be more and more powerful. Since a few months I use the nightlies for my daily work, because the new features save me a lot of work and time. The plugin is stable. I hope there will be an update for every user soon.
VfR slow down the start of Rhino, I havn’t seen other big slow downs. The image calculation is very fast.
The community needs users who like to be the community. In the past I was one of the core community user, but since I’ am pro user, I like to use my spare time not for rendering most. The community needs to grow again.
For me the Chaosgroup forum is a standard forum, no problem to use it and I like the simple clean UI. It’s open for paying customer only, but there is a public forum too. The VfR forum is not so often read by the moderators, I know the problem.
cadmaster, can you comment more on your mention/experience with Octane? Thanks
Sorry - don’t have any! We have AMD GPU’s at work. Just watched the demo - very impressive! And I like the standalone+plugins approach more than new V-ray for every new software!
I am correct that my AMD Radeon HD 7950 card is incompatible with Octane?
“Octane Render requires a CUDA enabled NVIDIA video card.”
V-Ray for Rhino is the best rendering plug-in for Rhino in my opinion. It works great for product shots all the way to architectural exteriors. The range of environments it can realistically render is excellent.
The complexity and learning curve is on the high side. But, just like it took you months (years for me!) to get good at Rhino, there is an investment in time. Once you get there, you will be able to do world-class rendering and charge higher fees. So, yes, its not easy, but anything worthwhile takes both talent and practice.
The good news is that V-Ray has a nice group of pre-sets (visopts) that can save a lot of time. Make sure you get those, as they are a separate download from their website.
I used to use a separate app for my renderings, but V-Ray is totally integrated into Rhino. That one change has doubled my work output. The Keyshot app claims to be a plug-in, but you are really working inside of a totally separate program. Not as easy to change stuff, and that’s all my clients ever seem to do.
Support was a big consideration for my decision. There maybe a faster or better render engine, but if you’re the only person using the app,it it will get very lonely … and dangerous if they go out of business. V-Ray has been around a long time and has great resources for training, materials, forums, etc.
Finally,go look at rendering examples of whatever app you are considering. I have a few projects here schultzeworks gallery
Uh … I’m still at the very beginning of my learning curve with Rhino. What I do find is that the learning curve with Rhino is long but, unlike other applications, enjoyable.
By the way - great looking work on your site. I’d buy that computer in a second if it was available (and I could afford it).
[quote=“schultzeworks, post:18, topic:2166”]
The Keyshot app claims to be a plug-in, but you are really working inside of a totally separate program.
[/quote] I’ve looked at Keyshot but my impression is that it’s excellent for a certain class of product shots but not great for other work like interiors and exteriors.
All the feedback I’ve received has convinced me that V-Ray is the choice to make. Not immediately, due to $$ considerations but that’s okay - I think Neon will bridge the gap between now and then.
Thanks for checking the work out!
If you’re a student, then use your educational discount whenever possible. V-Ray 1.5 sells for $900, but you can get it for $270 V-ray for educational use