Deciding on a Render....

jason_maranto

This is well outside your budget but I thought I'd throw it out there anyway becasue they are running a promo right now: Maxwell Render http://www.maxwellrender.com/

Pro's:

Incredible Quality.
Outstanding Sketchup plugin that is getting better all the time.
Stand-alone "studio" application for working with assets from multiple softwares and high poly assets that Sketchup can't handle.
Free plugins for many 3D apps so you can take it with you from program to program.

Con's:

Price
Requires Sketchup Pro

Here's a link to some tutorial videos to give you an idea of how it works:

http://think.maxwellrender.com/first10steps.php?categoryFS=15

Best,
Jason.

remus

@jason_maranto said:

Requires Sketchup Pro

Didnt realise that, any ideas why thats the case?

Sorry for the off topic post Dragoon

jason_maranto

My understanding is the Maxwell exporter makes use of the C++ API in Sketchup Pro for mega fast exports to render... Ruby exports can take 10 times longer (or more) for the same scene. Since Maxwell is definitely a "high-end" renderer it seems reasonable to think that the user-base is mostly professionals where time wasted waiting for exports to render would be too costly to tolerate.

Best,
Jason.

remus

Im pretty sure thats not a pro only feature, can only be a good thing though.

jason_maranto

According to what little info I can find on the subject the C++ SDK is a Pro version only feature.

Best,
Jason.

notareal

@dragoonprogramming said:

hmmm.
twighlight refuses to open on my computer so probably not that....
ill try shaderlight though...
anyone else?

I don't recall that twilight itself have particular issues, maybe some other ruby is interfering. If you are on low budget, take a look on Kerkythea (Twilight uses same engine) or maybe luxrender, both are free. Thea Render might also fit in your budget (promotional pricing during beta phase) - it a step upwards with a full studio and interactive rendering.

jason_maranto

No doubt -- Thea would be my first choice if I wasn't using/couldn't afford Maxwell.

Best,
Jason.

remus

Doesnt mention anything about being pro-specific here: http://code.google.com/apis/sketchup/docs/downloadsdksubmit.html

jason_maranto

Near the bottom here:

http://sketchup.google.com/intl/en/community/developers.html

Doesn't mention Pro only -- but only mentions Pro... there are a few other links to coding forums that back this up.

Best,
Jason.

Dragoonprogramming

Thanks all!
You have all been so helpful!
I will be trying out maxwell and shaderlight

See Ya

Taylor,

fuzzion

@dragoonprogramming said:

Thanks all!
You have all been so helpful!
I will be trying out maxwell and shaderlight

See Ya

Taylor,

Why are you wasting your time? Vray is the only choice.

Frederik

@fuzzion said:

Why are you wasting your time? Vray is the only choice.

Glad you've read all posts in this thread...

@dragoonprogramming said:

Also my budget is alittle over $100

dedmin

@unknownuser said:

Why are you wasting your time? Vray is the only choice.

Vray is the only choice if He lived on the back side of the Moon ...

charly2008

Hi,

Why not try first the free Kerkythea! If you have experience with Kerkythea, you can you still decide otherwise.

Charly

Greg Law

Have a look at this site.

http://www.renderin.com/
It is a beta version of a very simple render. Even adds a sky to out door images. Great for doing fast renders. They say it will cost less than $200.00 when released. At the moment it is a Free beta.

minguinhirigue

I have said it many time, and will continue there :

kerkythea is the most polyvalent opensource renderer for sketchup as far as I know. Both biased and unbiaised render, many materials, users and renderer fonctions...
the fully intergrated renderers baseed on kerkythea are quite powerfull but not free... (thearender, twillight)
SUPodium is the simplest renderer I ever used, it make easy and good render without headeack (render with "noisy setting" always give beatifull soft shadows whitout complex configurations)

Some professionnal soft could be usefull but to expensive I guess :

Artlantis, as it is the only soft I used exploiting all advanced render options of sketchup (fog, sections plans, ratio aspect, animations...)
Vray as it is quite powerfull and fast with it's biaised render, but I never test it
Maxwell as the nicer and the more realistic renderer I have seen, but neither test it

Many recent softs are interesting, I never test them, but promising :

Octane render, cheap, with GPU integration, seem really powerfull with realtime render option (If you have good hardware )
Shaderlight, quite young, but the gallery seem quite good
RenderIn, beta of a fully integrated sketchup renderer, still promising, but I guess you already know it better than me...
renderingkiller, really promising, fast and beatiful render, but still not available...

Some are older, but could give really good result :

Indigo render, but always really good results with unbiaised render. I have tested it too years ago, quite good... but I dismiss when it turn from opensource to commercial... I don't like soft which exploit opensource community as beta testing support !
Lightup, fully integratd in Sketchup, with some nice feature like lux analysis and IES ligth, but render aren't the best I have seen...

Good luck with this list...
So nowdays, I only use, podium, kerkythea and artlantis, depending on wich computer (home or work) I am and what kind of work I have to do, but I am thinking about testing octane render. You sould have a look to what is the best for your work...

And never, forget, renderer didn't do anything. Modeler and postprocessing (people, vegetation, toning, context integration) are essential if your are work on large model (urbanism, architecture)...

notareal

@minguinhirigue said:

I have said it many time, and will continue there :

kerkythea is the most polyvalent opensource renderer for sketchup as far as I know. Both biased and unbiaised render, many materials, users and renderer fonctions...

the fully intergrated renderers baseed on kerkythea are quite powerfull but not free... (thearender, twillight)

A little but important correction. Thea Render is developed by authors of Kerkythea, but it's been build from the scratch (it's not based on Kerkythea engine), Thea Render can import Kerkythea scenes, as it does make a internal one way conversion. Twilight Render is indeed based on Kerkythea ECHO engine, but has fairly streamlined SU integration. Twilight can export Kerkythea XML (can be imported by KT, Thea and some conversion utilities). There is quite a lot different material systems and features if you compare Kerkythea and Thea.

Gaieus

AND Kerky is not open source AND Thea is not integrated into SU (like Podium, Twilight or others not on your list) but is a standalone studio just like Kerkythea if we want to stick to the examples.

I rarely like to chime in discussions like this (many reasons - among them one important is that I am not very good at rendering and knowledgeable at many of them) but indeed I would try out some of the "easy" ones that are more or less integrated into SU first.

Then if you want to learn how a more robust, standalone engine works and want to do it before finally deciding, try Kerkythea as it is free and I believe is a blessing for all who want to learn the ways renderers work as you do not have to spend a lot of money just to find out that it's not what you hoped for.

By the time you are more or less proficient in it, you will exactly know what you need and if you want to pay your more serious money on something else, you will have the rounds to decide.

frv

What kind of images do you think you should be able to do half a year from now ?

Francois

Gaieus

It depends on a lot of things. I have been trying (on and off) for years and I am not even a half decent renderer. Then I saw Majid for instance plunging in and n a couple of months he was already a well-known artist with Kerkythea.