OctaneRender for Blender released! Tweet

[Stealthworks]

One of the things I really wish Blender had is a material library (like Octanes LiveDB). It's a real pain to have to set up each material from scratch each time you create a scene when you're just trying to throw together a quick concept render. Now from the video, it looks like this Octane plugin for Blender still requires you to create each material from scratch (or am I missing something!). If you could drag and drop LiveDB materials onto selected polygons in the blender scene it would solve what I think is a big deficiency in Blender. Without this feature I'm not sure i see much point in just not using cycles from within blender. Certainly the demo video could have been done just as well using regular blender and cycles. Just my two cents worth...

[radiant]

I would like to thank my fellow testers, we ironed alot of bugs
time to make some tutorials

[saidosi]

I have a quick question.

I noticed the requirements lists 'Blender OctaneRender Edition' does this mean I cannot simply download a daily build of Blender (2.68 and up) from graphicall.org and use this plug-in?

Do I have to wait for OctanteRender to updated Blender OctaneRender Edition to keep up with Blender's builds?

Or does this plug-in work with any build of Bledner 2.68 and up as an Add-on?

[JimStar]

I have a quick question.

I noticed the requirements lists 'Blender OctaneRender Edition' does this mean I cannot simply download a daily build of Blender (2.68 and up) from graphicall.org and use this plug-in?

Do I have to wait for OctanteRender to updated Blender OctaneRender Edition to keep up with Blender's builds?

Or does this plug-in work with any build of Bledner 2.68 and up as an Add-on?

I will try to explain a little.
There is not absolutely correctly to name it "plugin". As due to GPL issues we were forced to develop not just plain "plugin", but the whole "system" consisting of server, and the internal module integrated into Blender inself. So, the server - is the service which is run on your machine and listening for the TCP/IP commands from the client. And the client in this case - is the second part of the system, this internal module integrated directly into the Blender source code. Only this module knows how to work with OctaneServer™, the plain versions of Blender know nothing about them.
So, as the module is internal Blender module (external modules can not do all the things which are needed to fully integrate the OctaneRender™), it can not be distributed "on its own", but can only be compiled together with the whole Blender distributive (and distributed under GPL as the whole "Blender - OctaneRender™ edition" installator).

So, if you will get just plain Blender distributive - you will not even see the "OctaneRender" module in the preferences. And the OctaneServer™ will be unusable for it.

[saidosi]

@JimStar

Thanks for the quick and informative reply. And a huge thank you for you making the plugin possible.

I am a little concerned that I will have to wait for Otoy to update Blender OctaneRender Edition in order for users to keep up. What happens when Blender 2.69 is released? I 'd have to wait for Otoy to update Blender OctaneRender Edition and so on and so on.

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I may have to wait for the MODO plugin to happen. I feel unconfortable with OctaneRender for Blender. I like to play with various builds of Blender and if this plugin cannot be compatible with them I'd have to save my scene and re-open inside Blender OctaneRender Edition.

Although I do see the advantage, I can continue to tweak my scenes inside Blender OctaneRender Edition but I feel like I'm held hostage to use an stagnant build of Blender.
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Are there any plans on how long Otoy will be supporting Blender? It's like by supporting Blender Otoy will always have to play catch up and constanlty release newer versions of Blender OctaneRender Edition

[JimStar]

@JimStar

Thanks for the quick and informative reply. And a huge thank you for you making the plugin possible.

I am a little concerned that I will have to wait for Otoy to update Blender OctaneRender Edition in order for users to keep up. What happens when Blender 2.69 is released? I 'd have to wait for Otoy to update Blender OctaneRender Edition and so on and so on.

We've just proposed to one of Blender developers (who requested of this GPL-ed module's source-code from us) to include our module into Blender trunk if they want. To make the Octane-and-Blender-users be able to have the most recent Blender version right after every Blender release.
But so far we were answered that there is no benefit for Blender to have this module included into trunk.

I've always thought that "the benefit of the software" - is the benefit of its users in the first place. And Octane already has a huge popularity among Blender users...
So, I think it is now up to you - to convince the Blender Foundation that it makes sense, if you need it.
But anyway - on the place of Blender developers I'd never included the beta (perhaps unstable) software into the trunk. So anyway - Octane plugin should finish the beta stage to start talking about that...

[saidosi]

@JimStar

Thanks for the very informative reply.
I got some thinking to do and I gues I'll wait fro teh demo. I actually bought Octane Render specifically for Blender.

[Alain]

A few questions:

Is Instancing implemented yet or are Instances converted into a mesh ?
I have Scene where I distribute a grass patch over a landscape. This works perfect in Cycles but in Octane for Blender it crashes, even if I set a very low number of Particles.
When I try this with the expanded Export Script for Blender and doing the Instancing in the Octane Standalone then it works.
What could be wrong there ?

Why are all the Nodes of Cycles listed in the Node Editor ?
They are unusable at the moment, I don't understand why there are there if you can't use them.
Will they every be usable for Octane ? For example the "Attribute" or the "Object" Node would be very useful.

Where can I see how mutch my VRAM my Scene is taken ?

Kind regards
Alain

[JimStar]

Alain
I've answered to you in the current version thread.
Post there please any issues which you will encounter, I will fix them as soon as possible.

[megacal]

A license for the plugin product alone will cost 99 € while in the initial open beta phase, and 199 € when the final version of the plugin is released.

If we purchase the beta, what will it cost to upgrade to the final version?