OctaneRender® 2023.1 [updated 2023-10-18]

[northalex78]

Please refer to the 2023.1 Alpha release post where you can find the official information about this, specifically the section about Geometry pipeline overhaul, the only change respect to the initial plan is that we will likely skip 2023.2 and release this part of the roadmap as 2024.1.

I don't understand. Is it back or not then?

As the alpha post says it's back, but you're saying that it's skipping 2023.2 (so, not in 2023.1?) and moving to 2024???

This is not clear.
If 2023.2 is not out why does the post say "is back" instead of "will be back"? IS is present tense.

It sounds like Otoy has teased a feature yet again, using confusing language, only to push it a year. Common method of operations for Otoy. Jules said on Twitter 2023 would have network rendering back... but it feels like Otoy is instead putting resources into chasing other new shiny toys, instead of focusing on core features. The number of Otoy users on Mac hardware like laptops but using PCs to render is only GROWING. But I guess, killing network render (but "saying" it's forever on the roadmap) forces users into RNDR? Because... what else are we going to do. This is poor form. Really, really poor form.

[frankmci]

...The number of Otoy users on Mac hardware like laptops but using PCs to render is only GROWING. But I guess, killing network render (but "saying" it's forever on the roadmap) forces users into RNDR? Because... what else are we going to do. This is poor form. Really, really poor form.

I'm still hoping to make the hybrid Mac/PC 3D work environment a viable option again, but I also realize that the Mac workstation/PC render node segment of Otoy's user base (as our shop was for several years) is probably quite small. The development of a program as complex as Octane while maintaining compatibility with an insane number of host programs truly boggles my mind. I've been on the messy end of software development a few times, and even with the most well managed team of highly competent people, feature compatibility/priority conflicts develop. Prioritizing them is not easy, and some people are inevitably going to get the short end of the stick.

As a professional in the 3D industry who has primarily used Macs since 1992, I am delighted to see that Otoy has chosen to continue to support the platform at all. I think they are making a significant gamble on the future market instead of focusing on current profitability, and want to stay relevant on MacOS and iOS hardware. I salute them for that. You can tell from their demos over the last several years that their ambitions are much greater than just being a render engine for 3D content creators. They are shooting to be major players in the immanent, ubiquitous display of 3D data barreling down on us.

It wasn't an easy decision for our shop to shift our 3D workstations to Windows over the last few years. We held out as long as was reasonable, but ultimately had to make the move. I'm hopeful our next round of major hardware purchases will include Macs again, without losing the investments we have made in PC render hardware. But if that doesn't work out, I doubt it will be because Otoy didn't try very hard to make it possible. Business is business, and Otoy is in an extremely competitive one. Keeping everyone happy is rarely an option.

[northalex78]

Hey frankmci, Cool, I like Macs too, many people do as well.
But that doesn't excuse Otoy from breaking their word all the time.

Jules said 2023, it's on the record. Now I hear on this forum that net render is being pushed to 2024, which is literally another 12 months away (the version number not the calendar year). Why do I get the feeling it's now going to be like brigade... forever coming, but never done. How many times has the CEO said something about Brigade coming soon?

And it's not just the CEO's word, it's the announcements. The 2023 alpha page says network rendering "IS" back, but it's not. It reads like they're actually saying it will come back in 2023.2 (so, next version?).

So I ask about clarification and @mojave says "check the alpha post, it tells you. Oh also, we've changed our mind on what the alpha post said, we're not actually doing it, so that post is actually not a help to anyone". It's so confusing.
- Jules said 2023
- Alpha release post says "is" but is talking about 2023.2 (not made yet)
- This release post for 2023.1 then has a comment about "oh we're doing either of the above, it's pushed a year".

To me it feels like Otoy is just about chasing new things that look good in press releases. Now the CEO's twitter posts are about things like making RNDR do stable diffusion (or AI, subtle difference). Sure, cool OK I suppose RNDR value-go-up is nice, but Otoy can you ALSO please stick to the core promises you make to your user base? Core FUNCTIONALITY.

More and more people ARE using Macs for daily building. Apple Silicon is blazing fast, eats sims for breakfast, runs cool, and uses low wattage. PCs with GPUs are great for rendering though and Macs suck. Again I feel like the subtext here, the quiet part from Otoy that they don't say out loud, is that everyone should just use RNDR for rendering, and stop asking about network-rendering coming back. The fact is, RNDR is not cost effective for us. We need multiple nightly test renders of shots and scenes, and if we pumped all that through RNDR, we'd quickly use up the project budget. Not to mention the time it takes to prep shots - bake this, bake that, alembic something, no XP or other plugins, upload big ORBx files, hope there are no errors, download passes that are not even in separate folders. Online farms might be good for FINAL high-res renders at high samples, but they're terrible for daily driving, test shots, animatics, etc. All the stuff that's 95% of the real work in a project.

Look, the new features are great, I suppose. I'd still prefer to do chromatic aberration and flares in post 90% of the time - because those are things you want to dial in and quickly adjust, not wait for a 4k, 3000sample frame (x100 frames) to clean up if you need to re-do it based on client feedback. But cool anyway. It's just also a shame some of the coding time couldn't go to a feature PROMISED BY THE CEO and other posts. Just imagine if Otoy could not only have a great render engine, but you could have faith in whatever roadmap announcements the leadership makes. Surely trusting what the CEO says is a thing for shareholders or investors? I don't know maybe it's not high on the priority list... like network rendering it seems.

[mojave]

Hi northalex78,

Apologies if my previous reply wasn’t clear enough. Cross platform network rendering is literally ready to go out as part of a test release, this is definitely happening this year, the only change regarding previous announcements about this feature is that the next release number will be 2024.1 instead of the previously planned 2023.2.

We have been working hard to make this possible and totally understand this is an important requirement for many Octane users, however this is also an important core change that needed to be implemented carefully and has to go through thorough testing which involves the typical release phases before being able to make a production build supporting it. Also please understand that releasing this change as part of 2023.1 would have required delaying other features that were already tested and ready and are useful by themselves.

I hope this helps.

[northalex78]

@mojave,

OK, thanks. So as I'm not having any other misunderstandings - you are saying 2024.1 is coming out at some point before Jan 1, 2024 (or as you said, this year)? If so, I hope you can understand my confusion, because for the past few years, the release schedule and naming has been behind the actual calendar year. To see a named 2024 release before 2024 rolls in, would be something that I think has not happened in many years (if at all)?

So thanks for clarifying. I do think that most users would have seen "2024.1" and thought "oh, late in the calendar year of 2024", and I reacted the same. Hence my frustration, that so obviously came out in what I wrote (and the wait for network rendering HAS been very frustrating!).

I hope this is truth, and we'll see 2024.1 in the next two months as you say. We believe (cross platform) network rendering is the last big missing piece for many users. The smaller things are nice to have (flares less so, light spread more of a thing, etc) but don't have as much impact on productivity as netrender!

Thanks again,
AN

[frankmci]

Hey frankmci, Cool, I like Macs too, many people do as well.
But that doesn't excuse Otoy from breaking their word all the time.

Yeah, I get that, but I also get that sometimes something we are confident we can achieve in X amount of time actually turns out to be a lot harder than we thought, turns out to have significant conflicts, or is sometimes even impossible. Companies like Otoy are under tremendous pressure to stay at the head of the pack in a cut-throat technology race. Yes, I wish tech companies always gave us accurate and realistic timelines, but that's just not the reality I have seen in this market for the last thirty years. A company who regularly makes completely realistic announcements and promises will be at a sales disadvantage. Yup, that sucks, but it's the world we live in.

My attitude is if it's not shipping right now, don't depend on it ever shipping. I've been burned more than once. Do the tools we currently have let us meet our client's expectations on budget now and in the near future? No? Then we need to change our tool set. If we are going to buy new tools, will they provide what we need for the foreseeable future in the form that is shipping right now? If not, don't even consider them based on what may or may not be coming down the pike.

When new, powerful tools do actually become available, great! But it's just not worth the energy of getting worked up about marketing material that pitches what might or might not materialize, or when that might happen. In my opinion ignoring future hype leads to improved quality of life for me, everyone on my team, and our customers, as well as being a more stable business practice.

That's just my 2¢, for what it's worth.

It's great that there is a good chance Mac/PC Octane network rendering may be available soon, but I'm not making any plans on that being so until it is a reality.

[manalokos]

This duplicate frame bug is causing a lot of trouble, I managed to find the source of it.

It seems that when using a sequence of csv in a scatter or a sequence of images in a texture,
the batch render job seems to skip every other frame and creates a duplicate frame instead.

I managed to create a simple scene that I am uploading with this message for you to be able to replicate the error.
On the scene there is an alembic animation, a scripted animation and a sequence of csv's.
Render the batch_render job to a folder and check the result.

Let me know if you could replicate the error, and if it is easy to fix.

Thanks
Kind regards
Filipe

[john_otoy]

This duplicate frame bug is causing a lot of trouble, I managed to find the source of it.

Thanks for the scene. I can reproduce it here. We'll look into it

[Hesekiel2517]

Hey there,

thank you very much for the latest update really great stuff! I recently started to use the photon tracing kernel and it created great results. One thing i noticed is that some photons seem to go through the material and create unwanted spots. Is there some setting I can use to prevent this from happening?

Photontracing.JPG

[SSmolak]

Add Bloom, Add Glare AOV nodes works different than regular ones from Camera Post Processing. It looks that they use wrong mixing mode with beauty pass - like screen instead of add or something. They produce more blur than glow/glare.

bloom_glare_difference.png

Bug 2 : chromatic abberation destroy post processing aov node - it replace post to beauty