Quote from: calico on April 10, 2007, 11:13:34 AM
Moodflow, is it possible the number of samples on your clouds/atmosphere are above 256? I usually use 16 to 32 on the atmosphere and 128 to 300 in the clouds. Of course, the clouds seem subjective. If we want all the grain in the clouds gone, then all of the quality settings are adjusted upward to some degree. That degree is where some of us have gotten into similar troubles. And, in case you don't know (you probably do), the clouds' setting for Ray Tracing doesn't usually need to be on and will definitely add time to the render.
Yea, the samples are at minimum 256, otherwise there is noticeable grain. Some of the tests I've done have had samples as high as 2000+. I am thinking I will stick with 256 samples across the board, with a .75 render quality on some of my next tests.
I literally have a folder of unfinished images due to their taking too long to render at a decent resolution.
Now here is the crazy talk: I like to work with atleast a 2:1 step down, where the native image size is 2X as large as the final (for detail compression). Higher ratios are even better, technically. So if I want an image of 1600x1200, the minimum native resolution 'should' be 3200x2400. I was able to pull this off on Terragen 0.9 and Bryce. I'd love to see a high quality TG2 image of this resolution - I bet its amazing! And for decent posters, the final would need to be around 3200x2400, meaning the native resolution would have to be 6400x4800 (for best results). This would be a job for the BlueGene/L supercomputer.
I think we just need some simple renderfarm options (or does this exist yet?). I'd go find some lower end PC's and set this up if it were implemented. Find some old 1GHz jallopies and string them together with NetBEUI. Watch my electric bill skyrocket in the name of kickass images!