What is your favorite overall rendering engine for SketchUp?

CadFather

well, there's 'octave'...

Rich O Brien

I've edited the poll to add the missing apps mentioned. It means re-voting but since the OP is not replying I didn't want the discussion to be about what's missing

As Vic reeves once said....

@unknownuser said:

"88.2% of Statistics are made up on the spot"

So get voting

unigami

How can anyone vote on this unless they have tried them all and compared them? Furthermore, how do you define "Best Overall"? There are so many factors to that; price, speed, flexibility, SU integration, support, etc. etc, and what is important to me, being a hobbyist, is certainly different than the needs of someone rendering for a living. I just don't think it is a valid poll...

andybot

vote early, vote often!

edit: just for the record, I think this is a flawed idea as others have said, and I'm sure will say. Interesting popularity contest though.

pilou

Blender but for a special reason
I have a very old computer so speed render is like as *25 with Blender if I make the same directly with something like Podium or Twillight inside Sketchup even at very low level !
7 seconds against 3 minutes
From the cool lighthouse Challenge by Solo

irwanwr

wow, even Kerkythea can compete with paid version render apps

Marian

I don't see Simlab Composer in there.

I guess the answer to your question depends heavily on people's needs, ability and budget. For me Simlab is very good right now, but I may also buy Thea one day.

valerostudio

My apologies for forgetting a few and stirring the pot. I guess I wanted to see which was more popular and not the 'best'. There is no best rendering engine. All have there own advantages and disadvantages. I guess I wanted to see where the bigger user base was and so far it seems Thea is the leader.

david_h

I can only vote for one, but I use Podium, Thea and twilight.

I suck at all 3.

Krisidious

Vue and Lumion will blow your mind... so fast, so easy such incredible results. movies and renderings. what is also out of site is the price for either one. but it will make you look and feel like a master.

this was done in lumion demo in like 15 minutes.

Youtube Video

sonder

I've tried Kerkythea, V-ray and Podium. Of the three, my favorite by far has been Kerkythea. I am really glad to see Thea in the lead, as I am buying that shortly. Kind of makes sense I guess!

Pixero

I have Thea, Twilight, Vray and LightUp. (Twilight and Vray aren't used much though.)
I think Vray for SU in it's current state isn't quite working for me. No instancing/proxies possible, and the set up time is much longer than with Thea. I did some tests that seem to indicate that Theas Adaptive (BSD) is a little faster than Vray with comparative settings.

julyyen

@irwanwr said:

wow, even Kerkythea can compete with paid version render apps

Yep,

I also vote for Kerkythea and I think this render engine with proper settings and a good illuminated hdri can beat big boys!
Any news about new improved version (maybe with IBL )?

jason_maranto

Perhaps a more revealing poll would be something like this:

On a scale of 1 to 10 what are the most important factors for choosing an external Render Engine to you:

Not Important - Most Important
Price:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Ease of Use:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Speed:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Quality of Output:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Photo Realism:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Flexibility/Features:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

SketchUp Integration:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Documentation/Training/Support:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Industry Standard/Familiarity:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Peer Recommendations:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

And then add the poll we are using here but change to "What is your preferred render engine."

I think that would tell us alot more useful information than the current poll -- something like this can be set up on http://www.surveymonkey.com/ pretty easily.

Best,
Jason.

david_h

I'm planning on buying all of them. I want to expand my suckiness horizons.

irwanwr

@julyyen said:

I also vote for Kerkythea and I think this render engine with proper settings and a good illuminated hdri can beat big boys!
Any news about new improved version (maybe with IBL )?

Well, actually i use Kerkythea only now. Dropped any other "free" with restriction shorted paid version renderers. Agree with that potential it has behind settings as I can see the difference between. Might even beat those paid ones. I'd go for Thea if I got the chance.
Haven't heard much about the new release yet. But the latest Boost (beta?) release really impressed me with the shortened time needed to render in most settings.

Zoom123

IS Kerkythea actively developed? Last version seems to be from 2008.

From the ones I tried so far I like Twilight most, which uses the Kerkythea engine, but it also has not been updated for more than a year.

irwanwr

Hi there Zoom,

As I already mention up there in the recent reply, there is a Kerkythea Boost.
The one you mentioned is the Kerkythea Echo 2008.
Kerkythea Boost is still under development currently. Haven't got any further info when should it be published as a final release. It works a bit faster than the Echo release, I think.

Perhaps you should try to get the info from the Kerkythea forum. That's where I got the Kerkythea Boost.

notareal

@Zoom123, There will be a new Kerkythea release in some point. At the moment you can try a development version. It will offer some speed improvement, but as been a development version - there are some known issues (better read trough bug topics ).

allanx

Based on my experience with Render engines in Sketchup I prefer and use Maxwell Render, because it has the best integration right now and has fast results, alot of preset materials and can run in slow computer...and the UI is great!!!

allanx