Octane 1.5 features revealed!

[Goldorak]

1.5 is a large update, with a longer release interval than 1.0->1.1->1.2. The goal of putting out a roadmap for 1.5 (which is not something we've done before) was to keep the community up to date on what is coming down the line during this time. BTW, Alembic brings major changes to the Octane ecosystem, and this feature in and of itself is one of the more involved updates we've taken on since release.

Gabriel - there will be release candidate builds with the new features prior to 1.5 showing up in the store, just as with 1.0, 1.1, and 1.2.

Lastly, we do read all the comments and feature requests in the forums. It's safe to say we're all looking at similar things for the major features we'd like to see added to Octane. We've got a large (and growing) development team working on making all this happen as quickly as possible.

However, the deployment of a feature isn't a sure thing until we have it working internally and have done some preliminary QA. In some cases, the reality is that a feature simply can't be added until we're done refactoring large portions of the underlying engine. We've done our best to strike the right balance with 1.5. We're already far along on developing the next round of features beyond 1.5, but we're not ready to announce much more until after 1.5 is out in everyone's hands.

[Rik]

sooo, any idea of a timescale? Are we talking days, weeks, months...

[mikelmnj]

Instead of making a new thread, may I request a quick feature here?

Smoothing angle in the material please.

More control, 15 degree smoothing angle, 30, 45 etc. would be greatly appreciated in addition to the enable/disable function. Thanks!

Mikel

[videoprice]

Hi,

Any plan for Ptex and multipass rendering?

Thanks,

Richard

[r-username]

"there will be release candidate builds"

I would also like to see a new release candidate build. For me, I liked the frequency of the candidate builds, it gave me a reason to visit the forum and see what is new. I have been visiting the forum less and when I don't see a new download its a bit of a let down.

Stephen

[amaauser]

Feature request:

Global material override (3ds max plugin)

[FrankPooleFloating]

Just picked up one of my gigs where I render and composite a ton of 3D stuff into existing photography. I am officially ready to test the holy hell out Visibility. And yearning for the chance to be your guinea pig. Oink. (edit: squeeeeak)

[matej]

- Entire API scriptable

I'm really interested in this. Will we be able to customize anything related to the node graph? Like adding new type of macro input pins or create entirely generic macro containers? Maybe scripting our own pixel blending modes or adding math operations, so you can do more with less input data into a macro node, and the user of the material doesn't need to open it and fiddle with the node graph inside.

Such tools would allow the creation of a more user-friendly higher abstraction of shaders. Currently there is too much limitations, to really achieve the "black box" concept of material macros.

[FrankPooleFloating]

Does anyone know if Motion Blur (when we eventually get it) is going to increase render times, because of needing multiple passes/samples etc?... or will it be similar to DOF, where it has no effect on render time?

This would be nice to know ahead of time...

[matej]

or will it be similar to DOF, where it has no effect on render time?

DOF has a huge effect on render time (of course, if you use it). You need a lot more samples/px to get a clear render. Mblur is/will be the same.

Some time ago we were debating about a "sampling brush", that would let the user to paint which areas should get more samples (so not to waste render time on areas that are already clear, while out of focus areas are still noisy). That would be nice...