Heads up...new VRay fo SU service release

lewiswadsworth

Just received an email about this...

*The Change Log is as follows:
12 Feb 2008

Fixes

Resolved issue where the intensity for physical light units was not being used correctly

11 Feb 2008

Fixes

Licensing dialogs made to stay on top of windows ( some cases where it went behind other windows )
Trying to render with floating license and being unable to get a render license will no longer crash the program
Modified where licenses are placed to support Vista compatibility

6 Feb 2008

The most noticeable change for our service release is we have stopped utilizing the Installshield Activation Service for our license protection. The team at Chaos Group has been nice enough to let us utilize their license system so we decided to make the switch. When you launch SketchUp you will be asked whether you have a license, a floating license server, or if you wish to demo the product. The following is a brief walk-through of those three scenarios.

To demo our product ( 30 days )

Ensure that your machine is connected to the Internet
Start SketchUp
When our License Dialog pops up choose â€œI would like to demo your productâ€
You should now have a temporary license â€“ if you encounter any problems please contact authorizations@asgvis.com

To use an existing license

Ensure that your machine is connected to the Internet
Start Rhinoceros
When our License Dialog pops up choose â€œI have a license and would like to use thatâ€
When you are prompted for your purchase number, insert your existing serial number
You should now be licensed and ready to go - if you encounter a problem then contact authorizations@asgvis.com

To setup the floating license server please take the following steps:
On the machine you wish to use as the License Server

Install the Floating License Manager to the machine you wish to use as your license server. You can use our installer to do this â€“ just do a custom install and choose only the Floating License Manager.
Once installed go to C:Documents and SettingsAll UsersApplication DataASGvisLicensing ( If you use Vista it will be c:ProgramDataASGvisLicensing ) and double click on the file Floating License Manager.exe. This will run the license manager.
In the Manage Licenses section choose "Add existing license".
Select the product you have purchased and wish to authorize.
When prompted for the Purchase Number you should enter your serial number. You can locate your serial number on the original invoice or purchase order that you received from billing@asgvis.com.
Go to C:Documents and SettingsAll UsersApplication DataASGvisLicensing (if you use Vista it will be c:ProgramDataASGVISLicensing ) and run VRLServer2.exe

On the client machine(s)

Start SketchUp
When the License Dialog pops up choose "I have a floating license server and would like to use that."
The V-Ray License Server Information dialog box should pop up
Enter the IP or hostname of the machine that is acting as your server ( the machine that is running VRLServer2 )
Restart SketchUp( You MUST restart SketchUp for your changes to take effect )

V-Ray Changes

Updated to V-Ray 1.60.15
V-Ray has changed its path sampling from Quasi Monte Carlo to Deterministic Monte-Carlo
For the most part this should not cause any major differences. The parameters are still the same but the outcome is now deterministic, meaning it will always come to the same result when given the same input
The only choice for path sampler is Schlick now - Latin Hypercube is no longer supported

Fixes

Fixed serialization issue where materials or options could be read incorrectly or disappear
Able to Control the Floating License Manager Dialog while vrlserver is running.
Switched back to previous DR licensing until the V-Ray licensing system works properly when DR is initiated by a machine that is not utilizing a floating license server.
Fixed bug where angular blend materials weren't having their child material names updated properly
Fixed bug where object exclusion UI would carry over between multiple materials in our editor
Materials that contain other materials ( AngleBlend, 2Sided, Skp2Sided ) will now save out their sub-materials when put in a vismat
Fixed a bug where loading a visopt could cause the defaults to not be read in properly
Made it so importing a vismat will add the vismat directory to the resource search path
Added build version to About page for easier identification of product by users
Added alpha contribution multiplier in our material options panel
Angular blend material can now be created. It uses the angle between the view direction and the surface normal to determine the amount to blend between two materials
Object Exclusion UI is in place (Options material panel ) - though it is not fully functioning yet. If you wish to ignore all other objects you can simply change the mode to "Include"
Added new properties to lights - shadow color, units
Introduced barn door effect for the spot light
Sun/Sky not matching DR spawner has been resolved
Modified serialization process to allow larger scenes without running out of contiguous ram
DR crash bug where default conditions were not being restored for each new render
Removed a bug where several temporary files were being created during renders
Volume fog was not being applied properly when bump or displacement was utilized
Override environment was not working properly with refractive materials due to Volume fog issue
We now only access user-specific portions of the hard-drive and registry
Fixed crash where bump map is enabled but no map is set ( also for displacement, etc )
Unicode characters can be used in VFB output filenames
Renaming a material but only changing case will now work ( i.e rename DefaultMaterial to be defaultmaterial )
Deleted layers no longer show up in apply material to layer dialog

Changes

We now make V-Ray materials for each Sketchup material - likewise creating a v-Ray material creates a SketchUp material
Right-click menu is not used for applying materials anymore. Just use the regular Sketchup method (PaintBucket)
We are now using Chaos group V-Ray Licensing System
Spaces are allowed in material names now
Authorization tab has been added to handle users with floating license server
Added some common frame stamp variables
Added DMC Threshold UI
Added Show Samples UI for Adaptive Sampler
Pack material functionality is in our Material Editor now
We now install our render spawner and other stuff to Common Application data folder which is...
c:Documents and SettingsAll UsersApplication DataASGvis on XP (note that Application Data is a hidden folder )
c:ProgramDataASGvis on Vista ( note that ProgramData is a hidden folder )
You can now remove Color and Alpha VFB channels if you wish - they are no longer required
Changed our default options ( phys cam stuff and default vfb channels )
Added the ability to query the active viewport for its aspect ratio (Output Tab)
Layers remember open/closed state in our material editor
We no longer show the toolbar when V-Ray is set as the current renderer
This will add the given path to the list of directories that get searched when looking for a resource (bitmaps).
Made it so importing a vismat will add the vismat directory to the resource search path

Coming Soon

Object exclusion UI to allow users to pick specific objects to ignore. It is not working correctly at the moment.
Sphere Light addition - UI is ready but we need to clean it up - visSphereLight does exist
IES Light - the visIESLight command exists, but it has not been fully implemented
Physical units to lights

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http://asgvis.com/index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=90&topic=3555.0

That light fix should improve things nicely for my purposes. However, I wish they would rationalize the whole interface. There's too much about the whole VRay options dialog that requires trial-and-error, too often a random search for "the magic number."

Jackson

Thanks Lewis,

Though I can't believe they've not fixed the "disappearing groups", "incorrect environment from SU shadow settings" and "VRay materials getting 'stuck' to SU geometry even though the material's been changed in SU" bugs. They're pretty damn serious- the disappearing groups and shadows ones are bad enough to put demo users off. Sure they all have workarounds, but they should have been picked up early in the beta stage IMO.

Oh well, it's still one of the best and definitely the fastest renderer out there and a very stable prog (Vue d'Esprit users will know how novel the latter concept is!).