From the desert to the forest

[Oshyan]

Needs Soft Shadows, but otherwise looks good still (though I prefer the original dog ).

- Oshyan

[archonforest]

I prefer the original dog ).

- Oshyan

[DocCharly65]

Ahhh ... you got it, Oshyan! I had a silent small voice in my brain that something bothered me... I think that's it.

Usually I switch soft shadows off for my (mostly) animation renders, because it had some strange effects on the GI. But for this one I will give it a try.

In app. 1 hour the right eye pic for my 3D version should be finished then I can try Soft Shadows.



Concerning the dog... I like the original dog too -- but the girls win -- they always win

[Oshyan]

Soft Shadows should be fine with animation, although you may need higher samples to avoid additional noise (or you can try turning off Sample Jitter, depending on the scene. Sometimes this works quite well.

- Oshyan

[DocCharly65]

Is that "Detail jittering" under "render" - "extras"?

[Oshyan]

No, I'm referring to the Jitter Samples checkbox (formerly a slider) under the Do Soft Shadows option in the light source/sunlight node.

- Oshyan

[DocCharly65]

Ah, thank you. I'll try.

[TheBadger]

It interesting. The stick in the dog's mouth.
I did not see that at all. Even you saying it is there now, I have to make my self see it. To me it really looks like it is something behind the dog.
The puppy is is a funny response to me. I Laughed a lot when I saw it. Thanks for that.

[DocCharly65]

You're welcome Badger
Anyway the puppy made me a hero for my loved ones 

Nevertheless I want to put the new stick (in front of the feet of the puppy - almost unremarkable) in the mouth of the german shepherd dog and use the same lighting as here.

I remember now, why I mostly don't use the Soft Shadows: I had a increasing render time from 3 h before to 5.30 h now but the mood with the soft shadows is much better:

[attach=1]

I wonder a little about the interference of the straight lines of the shadows in the foreground... when I have more time I'll play with some settings. On the other hand I vaguely remember to have seen this effect in real life too...



But now an absolutely new question:
I'm thinking about an animation from inside a car driving down the road. I found a model for testing this and already have separated the windshield. I have tried many settings of a glass shader but the view outside the car is always blurred so much that you can not see anything of the road properly outside (I also tried a water shader - it doesn't work, because it cannot be doublesided and the surface of the windshield with water shader is only outside the car). Any suggestion?

[Dune]

Really cool. There's a little banding in the shadows though. Not important, but my eye fell on it. Not enough samples maybe, or is that the absence of jitter in soft shadows?

For a sharp look you could either take the window out altogether, or go inside the render node and change the subdivision settings from 0.25 to 1. I think the glass shader still needs that (haven't used it much yet).

[DocCharly65]

Thanks Ulco, what you call banding seems to be what I called interference... In fact I switched off jittering in soft shadows - let's see, what happens when I switch it on.



Update 10:34
I did a cropped render of that area... Switch on Jittering is it. Means, there will be an updated picture in some hours...

[mhaze]

Super work.

[choronr]

This latest image is absolutely beautiful.

[j meyer]

I'm thinking about an animation from inside a car driving down the road. I found a model for testing this and already have separated the windshield. I have tried many settings of a glass shader but the view outside the car is always blurred so much that you can not see anything of the road properly outside (I also tried a water shader - it doesn't work, because it cannot be doublesided and the surface of the windshield with water shader is only outside the car). Any suggestion?

If I got you right you could try to flip the sides of the windshield so that the outside becomes
the inner side.In case the windshield is bent it would not be flipping,but swapping the
polygon surface qualities.

[Oshyan]

Having Jitter off will give you higher quality at reduced render time *but* can cause banding like this. In an animation it's much less noticeable. Turning it back one will get rid of the banding, but without increasing samples, in this case you may have slightly more noisy shadows (have to see). For a still we'd generally recommend keeping Jitter enabled, unless there is a lot of vegetation on the ground breaking up the shadows, in which case you won't see the banding anyway. For animation Jitter can often be disabled, giving you less noisy results at lower render times, while still having most of the benefits of Soft Shadows.

Anyway, it's definitely a better-looking result with Soft Shadows!

- Oshyan