What to call a high quality image

Al Hart

We have called this process - creating images from 3D models - "Rendering" for a long, long time. But it may not be a word which would occur to new users.

If you were a new SketchUp user and had never heard the word "Rendering", (with regard to high quality images), what else might you call it.

(Or more important, what might you search for in Google if you wanted higher quality images?)

jeff hammond

i think i'd try searching for

realistic 3D
realistic drawing
3D realism
real cad
etc.

boofredlay

It is funny, I was showing my father some renderings this past weekend when he was out at our house for my daughter's birthday. I kept saying "rendering" and he blurted out; "Isn't that what you do to bacon!"

Gaieus

The word "rendering" is not confined to "high quality images" and especially not those "HQ images rendered photorealistically". A straight SU output is also a "render" as well as how an internet browser lets you view all those funny html (and other) codes that are in the source of a web page.

It's just been recently that the term "render" started to mean "PR rendering" while basically it means that an application creates visual information (say "image") from a bunch of codes.

museummaker

You might want to play around with google suggest feature, I believe they are in order of how frequently people search.

what to call.PNG

Al Hart

@unknownuser said:

You might want to play around with google suggest feature, I believe they are in order of how frequently people search.

Thats part of what I am after. If I type in a phrase Google give me more suggestions. But I want to start with something not including Rendering.

For Instance, SketchUp Rendering gives these ideas:
(In order of search count)

maxwell render sketchup
vray sketchup render
sketchup render plugin
free sketchup render
google sketchup render
rendering for sketchup
google sketchup rendering
render in sketchup

I tried for a list based on "SketchUp realism", but it didn't come up with any actual searches which looked promising. Two of the top ones with the word SketchUp in them were "SketchUp crack" and "SketchUp model", neither of which seemed relevant.

free sketchup rendering

Chris Fullmer

Here's what merriam-Webster says about "render"

@unknownuser said:

"to reproduce or represent by artistic or verbal means"

We use it to talk about hand drawn images all the time too. In my mind it has always just meant to create an image with an emphasis on taking it into the beautiful/artistic realm (but never including the "High Arts").

When I think about computer rendering, I often jump automatically to phototreal rendering though. So I often don't think of SU as making renders by default. Not until something beyond the basic output of SU happens.

I don't think that helped at all....

Chris

Daniel

To me, a rendering is any image that has shades, shadows, and textures applied, regardless of whether it is hand drawn, SU output, or one of the photorealistic rendering engines. It can be 3D or 2D (as in a rendered elevation). To me, a high quality rendering has nothing to do with photorealism, but whether or not the image is clean and crisp.

What else to call them? I've heard people use the terms image and picture. Or they will just refer to the format (jpeg or pdf). Another term that comes to my mind would be scene. Or, what about illustration?

Gaieus

Or what about Tom's (tomsdesk's) "water colour" pieces (just to avoid the terms "image" or "picture"). You cannot even call them "crisp" or "clean" (in the everyday meaning of these words) but calling them "not high quality" or "not renders" is also a mistake.

Just another way of expressing things.

jeff hammond

i think the question isn't really about the definition of rendering or wether or not that name should be change. for one, i highly doubt the name will be change and i don't think it needs to change.

the problem is, people will see a rendering but not know what it's called or what to search for when they want to find out which software or techniques are used to create 3D renderings. (and the same problem is likely to occur no matter what the name would be)

so imagine you're new to the game, just saw a nice rendering and would like to learn how to make something like it yourself.. what are you going to type into the browser's search field?

in my case, i would use variations of 'real' which along with google suggestions leads me very quickly to podium, kerkythea, artlantis, and vray.. from there, i'd come across the word rendering and investigate further..

screen 1.jpg

honoluludesktop

Traditionally, a Architectural render was a presentation quality image that portrayed your project. Before computers, the Architect would put down his drafting tools, pick up watercolors, colored pencils, or use not for production techniques to "render" a design. In this context, a modeled, ray-traced, bumped mapped, textured, and "photoshopped" image is a rendering.

To my knowledge, the terms are still used that way in schools of Architecture.

Al Hart

@unknownuser said:

so imagine you're new to the game, just saw a nice rendering and would like to learn how to make something like it yourself.. what are you going to type into the browser's search field?

You hit the nail on the head. I have been calling the process "rendering" for so long that I have no idea what some who does not use that term might call the process. I will add the word "Realistic" to my search optimization. It turns out that Google sees Photorealistic and a very different term then Photo-Realistic when it comes to searching for just Realistic. (Realistic does not find Photorealistic, but does find Photo-realistic)

Phil Rader AIA

Illustration
Visualization
3d Drawing

Al Hart

@unknownuser said:

Illustration
Visualization

These two were good. Google used them to suggest:

SketchUp illustrator

as well.

tomsdesk

image export enhancer

TIG

To a layman 'rendering' can be something you do to song OR plaster/cement on a wall OR what you do to fat/dead-animals OR something you do to terrorist prisoners OR an image...

If it's a 'high quality image' why not call it just that ? There's no ambiguity...

pbacot

@tig said:

To a layman 'rendering' can be something you do to song OR plaster/cement on a wall OR what you do to fat/dead-animals OR something you do to terrorist prisoners OR an image...

If it's a 'high quality image' why not call it just that ? There's no ambiguity...

Because that doesn't say what it is. Depends on what you want. An outline term for a proposal of architectural services would be "architectural renderings" regardless of other uses of the word. No one would know what you are offering with "high quality images". If you want to be specific you can also say "photo-realistic perspective views" although MOST such offerings do not qualify as "high quality images". I totally disagree. If I offered high quality images to a developer that'd sound like hype and i could give them anything and say "looks like high quality to me!"

TIG

But 'photo-realistic images' might mean something more to them than to you ? Why not try 'computer generated images' - then show examples of varying levels of complexity... and the can choose from 'simple' through to 'deluxe' - the cost varies with the effort and quality...

Alan Fraser

Photorealistic render. The fact that it's qualified as photorealistic precludes it meaning boiling a whale down for oil...or any of the other possibilities.
I wouldn't use illustration. Being an illustrator by profession, it usually has the connotation of being hand drawn, but it gets a little weird...a book can be 'illustrated' with illustrations or photos.

Mike Lucey

REAL IMAGE!
REAL VIEW!
REAL PHOTO!
PHOTO IMAGE!
PHOTO VIEW!
REALISTIC VIEW!
REALISTIC VIEWS?
COMPUTER GENERATED REALISTIC VIEWS?