Render in Rhino plans

Serengeti (Rhino WIP)
1

It seems to me that, in addition to the completely independent 3rd party renderers, McNeel is directly or indirectly developing a bewildering number of renderers. We’ve been told in vague terms that they are each aimed at different groups of Rhino users, but without elaboration about what those groups are. Nor what the planned future (or lack of future) each renderer has, how each works or doesn’t work within the Rhino viewport or with the Rhino materials palette(s).

Several versions ago I purchased Flamingo and Penguin. Flamingo morphed into NXT with some fanfare, but since seems to have been somewhat sidelined. Penguin just faded away without any information about what was going on. Then various in-house renderers have evolved or appeared. Brazil, which isn’t actually developed by McNeel but provided with various hooks into the interface, is also competing for attention.

So… It’s very difficult to know which platform to put an effort into learning, or to recommend to students. Especially for those of us for whom rendering isn’t a daily event. Is there actually a plan or even a map or does this all happen randomly?
Thanks,
Nick

2

Yes, its sad. But mcneel has primary software Rhinoceros and now all his developers work on him. Brazil is 2 years in cold water. Corona renderer stops work on plugin for rhinoceros.

If you work on archviz the best is vray or maxwell, if product design … try keyshot and if you do art try Brazil :D.

3

Yes, I think McNeel should do whatever is best, in their view, for the future of Rhino.
I just wish they’d be more transparent about where that is headed. I’m not talking about e.g. the options on a particular command, but entire plug-ins, which were promoted by McNeel and now seem to be dead or dying with no explanation.
Nick