That's some nice lighting!

Little too much DOF (we all know it's hard to resist ), and the chocolate looks like it's made of hard rubber, but apart from that: absolutely excellent.

Thanks, guys. The last image is indeed the best.

"That image alone really sells Podium to me."

Oooh, I like that.

And another one.

Reasonably happy with these. Y'all just wait til I get my hands on Podium 2.0!

Same thing here. Screenshots only. Doesn't bother me.

I checked the tut. That is some model! Excellent work.

Thanks for the tutorial.

@solo said:

if anything wait for Podium version 2 as it will not be KT based.

I may have seen 'something' by now. Let me put it this way: I got my wallet handy, as Podium's future looks very, very bright. Some may even be quite surprised.

Nuff said - I don't want Sepo and TBD coming after me.

These look good, no doubt about it. But ... how about KT's interface? Has it become even more, errr, "whoa, I must've stepped into a cockpit"?

Did anyone mention Podium's ease of use yet? Not to be overlooked, I think. Ease of use = speed and effiency.

@solo said:

Oh crap!!

I just offered you grass over the internet

And you posted renders of POTs at TBD Towers. I see a pattern emerging.

"Now you are putting words in my mouth. "

Ah. Now I understand. When you wrote:

“From the images posted, I really don't see what there is to get excited about. All the images are grainy and aren't anywhere near as good as what VrayforSketchUp (...) can produce.”

you actually meant:

“From the images posted, I really don't see what there is to get excited about. All the images are grainy and aren't anywhere near as good as what VrayforSketchUp (...) can produce. Then again, the annotations say these were done on a pretty low-grade machine, using an unbiased render method. So, in fact, it’s quite feasable that if one were to render these on a decent computer for the same amount of time, the result would be quite different. Let me rephrase that: that’s a certaintity. So ... in the end, it might be quite possible that KT can in fact, given you have the time, produce images that are better than Vray’s, as unbiased rendering, in terms of quality, generally is the better solution.”

It seems we agree. Which, of course, is a good thing.

What are you trying to point out here? That KT can't produce decent images? Or that KT can produce decent images, though it might take some time?

@dzinetech said:

@unknownuser said:

Read what's under the pictures, please.

Your point being? Of course I've read the annotation below the images. What counts is the quality of the final image produced before post-processing and in my opinion its not that impressive based on the examples provided. Yes the KT team do an admirable job working on a program that is free for all to use yet I personally dont think that it should be used as an arguement for the image quality it produces.

Let me walk you through it. "Rendered in MLT(BPT) mode for 5 hours... (single core machine)"

Unbiased render method. Thus grainy result after rendering on a single core machine for only 5 hrs.

I could go on like this, but sometimes you just gotta with Mies and think: less is more.

I'm neither a Max or a KT user, but I feel the need to add something nonetheless. I'm like that. Ask me mum.

Here it is: http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/item?siteID=123112&id=5666143&linkID=5572501

Opinion's free, but facts are sacred.

@dzinetech said:

From the images posted, I really don't see what there is to get excited about. All the images are grainy and aren't anywhere near as good as what VrayforSketchUp (even in its frustratingly buggy first release) can produce.

Read what's under the pictures, please.

I had a quick look. http://www.3dworldmag.com/page/3dworld?entry=3d_world_99_s_sketchup

Edit: always second ...

"Lux need to work the importer so it only opens the SketchUp layers that are turned currently turned on. That would be a help."

I agree, that would be great. Come to think of it, you'd expect a feature like that for the price they're charging.

"Also, there are times that the imported geometry cannot by selected. It's very strange and seems to import duplicate geometry with some odd icons. None of this geometry can be selected using poly, edges or vertices."

Yeah ... I've noticed that. Very annoying. Lux better get that sorted out before the official version of the translator is released.

As for the 99 $ - I really don't care. But I do expect everything to work as it's supposed to.