Edit:Alpha-Map bug or not? And more questions about cloning.

[Humpti]

Hi,

I was playing around with the tree I got from xfrog to test instancing and cloning. I managed to create the nodes for Octane quite easily once I knew how. But the rendered result for the leafs didn't look correct. I checked the alpha map, and -as the manual suggests- the Node Type was set on float. The little preview image displayed the alpha map correctly. I then changed the type to alpha and now the preview display was all white but the render was fine. Is this a bug?

GPU: I have two GPU's. Normally (in Standalone and Rhino) when I set the gtx970 as the one to be the one to render, the display stays fast. In LW, once the ipr is on, moving things (windows, etc )around gets very slow. I tried several settings but with no help. I can activate both GPU's and this doesn't change the slow ui. I can switch to the low gt640 and the rendering is of course much slower, (but still the ui is slow) EDIT1: Then the ui is fast. Why is that?
Edit 2: It seems as if LW can only use the fast GPU connected to the screen. So either I render slow and the ui is fast or I render fast and the ui is slow. Is this correct?


Instances: In the manual it says that I can rename a null with a '-' prefix with the name, but unfortunately this method doesn't seem to account for the children objects inside the hierarchy.

When I create an instance, and then do the '-' thing for the instance it isn't rendered at all.

In Rhino I can have placeholder objects which I then automatically replace with the desired geometry. Can this be done with Octane for LW?

Thanks
Philipp

[juanjgon]

I was playing around with the tree I got from xfrog to test instancing and cloning. I managed to create the nodes for Octane quite easily once I knew how. But the rendered result for the leafs didn't look correct. I checked the alpha map, and -as the manual suggests- the Node Type was set on float. The little preview image displayed the alpha map correctly. I then changed the type to alpha and now the preview display was all white but the render was fine. Is this a bug?

I am not sure. In the texture image node, the color mode means that Octane uses the RGB for texturing, the float mode means that the texture is monocrome (or it is converted from RGB to luma), and the alpha mode means that Octane uses the alpha channel of the texture image as float texture. If you want to send me the texture I could check it here.

GPU: I have two GPU's. Normally (in Standalone and Rhino) when I set the gtx970 as the one to be the one to render, the display stays fast. In LW, once the ipr is on, moving things (windows, etc )around gets very slow. I tried several settings but with no help. I can activate both GPU's and this doesn't change the slow ui. I can switch to the low gt640 and the rendering is of course much slower, (but still the ui is slow) EDIT1: Then the ui is fast. Why is that?
Edit 2: It seems as if LW can only use the fast GPU connected to the screen. So either I render slow and the ui is fast or I render fast and the ui is slow. Is this correct?

I am not sure to understand your problem. I think that if you use your low GPU gt640 for display and your fast GPU gtx970 for rendering (with the low GPU disabled for Octane), the display performance should be good. Do you have this problems with any scene, even with a simple one? ... The layout can became slow while the IPR is rendering, but only in very complex scenes with a lot of instances and so on.

Instances: In the manual it says that I can rename a null with a '-' prefix with the name, but unfortunately this method doesn't seem to account for the children objects inside the hierarchy.

When I create an instance, and then do the '-' thing for the instance it isn't rendered at all.

The "-" prefix is a very old trick to render instances in LightWave, that is deprecated and available only for compatibility with old scenes. Currently it is better to use the LW native instancing functions. If you want to instance a object using a Null, use "ALT+c" to create a native LW null instance of the base object. "ALT+c" is going to instance also objects hierarchies.

In Rhino I can have placeholder objects which I then automatically replace with the desired geometry. Can this be done with Octane for LW?

I think that this is what you a are doing with the LW native instancing, you get a null as placeholder that is replaced with the object at render time.

-Juanjo

[Humpti]

I am not sure. In the texture image node, the color mode means that Octane uses the RGB for texturing, the float mode means that the texture is monocrome (or it is converted from RGB to luma), and the alpha mode means that Octane uses the alpha channel of the texture image as float texture. If you want to send me the texture I could check it here.

Ok, I checked and it has an alpha-map. I was irritated, because Octane converted it as float. All is good. The textures are tiffs. I would prefer a masking map and a background in the color of the border of the leaf.

EU43lef2.zip

Packed version of tif-leafe

(473.84 KiB) Downloaded 167 times

I am not sure to understand your problem. I think that if you use your low GPU gt640 for display and your fast GPU gtx970 for rendering (with the low GPU disabled for Octane), the display performance should be good. Do you have this problems with any scene, even with a simple one? ... The layout can became slow while the IPR is rendering, but only in very complex scenes with a lot of instances and so on.

Sorry, my bad. I use the gt640 for display and the gtx970 for rendering. The scene is not very big, a simple tree from xfrog. When ipr is rendering the ui is sluggish. When gtx is on for display and gt640 for rendering, then the ui is fast but rendering (of course) slow.

I think that this is what you a are doing with the LW native instancing, you get a null as placeholder that is replaced with the object at render time.

Yes indeed. It's different than Rhino does it. Being able to place any low-res model and having it automatically replace with the high-res instance is very cool though.

Thanks
Philipp

[juanjgon]

I am testing your image here and the preview seems to work fine. You get the RGB, the float (converting the RGB to luma), or the alpha available in the tiff file. For clipping you must use the alpha, linked to the opacity channel of the Octane material.

-Juanjo

[juanjgon]

Sorry, my bad. I use the gt640 for display and the gtx970 for rendering. The scene is not very big, a simple tree from xfrog. When ipr is rendering the ui is sluggish. When gtx is on for display and gt640 for rendering, then the ui is fast but rendering (of course) slow.

Weird. Are you sure that you are not rendering with the same GPU that you are using for the display. As I understand, you have your monitor plugged to the gt640, and you are rendering with the gtx970. Are you sure that with this configuration the gt640 is disabled for rendering, using the options in the plugin options panel?

I can't understand why if you plug your monitor to the gtx970 and render with the gt640, the the Layout works fine

-Juanjo

[Humpti]

I am testing your image here and the preview seems to work fine. You get the RGB, the float (converting the RGB to luma), or the alpha available in the tiff file. For clipping you must use the alpha, linked to the opacity channel of the Octane material.

Yes, with Node Type alpha it works fine. In the first version LW created a 'leaf(1)'. When I replugged the 'leaf' the preview display was fine as was the rendering. So if any bug at all, it's a LW one and not an Octane one, but probably it was just me when I pushed a button , I really don't know.

Weird. Are you sure that you are not rendering with the same GPU that you are using for the display. As I understand, you have your monitor plugged to the gt640, and you are rendering with the gtx970. Are you sure that with this configuration the gt640 is disabled for rendering, using the options in the plugin options panel?

I can't understand why if you plug your monitor to the gtx970 and render with the gt640, the the Layout works fine

Yes, pretty sure. In Octane standalone and Rhino it works as expected, no problems. I have the monitor attached to the gtx970! Is this a problem for LW?

I switched the GPU's back and forth to try out. I have the choice between responsive ui or fast rendering. The experience is much nicer on Octane for Rhino.

I checked in Rhino again, with the same tree. Very fluid BUT I noticed that the render view only updates, when I stop navigating. When I continue to turn around the tree, the render view doesn't update.

Does this help?

[juanjgon]

But if you have the monitor attached to the GTX 970, you are always using this GPU for display. You can't change the display GPU in the plugin options, you must plug your monitor in the GT640 to use it as display GPU.

The Layout needs a lot of OpenGL resources while updating the viewports, specially if you are not in wireframe modes. As you say Rhino is not updating the full scene while you move the objects or the camera, only when you release the mouse button. This is the difference.

Anyway, please, plug your monitor in the GT640 GPU and render using the GTX970. I am sure that then all is going to work fine.

-Juanjo

[juanjgon]

Also check the priority options. If you set the priority to low, and enable the priority in the display GPU, the performance is going to be a bit better.

-Juanjo

[Humpti]

Also check the priority options. If you set the priority to low, and enable the priority in the display GPU, the performance is going to be a bit better.

I already did this.

I checked in Octane standalone with a big scene, no problems at all. All runs very fluidly. It's only with LW, so why should I attach my Screen to my old GPU? Octane standalone renders constantly while I'm navigating around, so this really a Octane for LW only problem.

Now I tried with Blender and Octane, no problem at all! Fluid like it should be.

So, if it works fine with Octane Standalone, Rhino and Blender, it's an Octane for LW problem. And for the viewports, they are all set on wireframe, and the instances are bounding boxes anyhow. Once the ipr window is closed all works fluid again.

Cheers
Philipp

[juanjgon]

Octane Standalone doesn't use OpenGL at all, and I don't know how other programs handle the real time OpenGL viewport rendering. The problem is that the host application (the Layout) is rendering an OpenGL scene at the same time than than Octane is rendering, all in the same GPU.

Do you have this behavior with any kind of scenes, for example a scene with only one cube or sphere? ... Please, open the Layout, enable Octane and load a cube. Do you have problems moving this cube or the camera while the IPR is rendering, with the display GPU priority set to low?. And what happens if you disable all the viewports (all set to none)?

Anyway from my point of view, yes, it is a good idea use your GT640 as display GPU. At least with Lightwave it is going to be near as fast as the GTX970, and you are going to have a perfect performance in the Layout while rendering with Octane. Other issue is that if you use your GTX970 GPU for display, the applications are going to fill the GPU RAM with the OpenGL buffers and other stuff, and you are going to have less free memory for Octane.

-Juanjo