Printing TGTP Renders Question?

[Volker Harun]

Hello Jay,

sorry that I forgot the " "s

If I get you right, you have a 5400x7200 original data, which is converted twice to make a 266dpi print while the original data would make a 300dpi of the same size. 

And I must admit that I was too lazy to read Franks's posts, I agree with him.
I used to downsample my TG0.9 renders at least to 50% to get a good screen-quality. With TGTP it is not necessary anymore. Thus your decision to render quarter size is very fine with me ,-)

Regards,
Volker

[buzzzzz]

Hello Jay,

sorry that I forgot the " "s

If I get you right, you have a 5400x7200 original data, which is converted twice to make a 266dpi print while the original data would make a 300dpi of the same size. 

And I must admit that I was too lazy to read Franks's posts, I agree with him.
I used to downsample my TG0.9 renders at least to 50% to get a good screen-quality. With TGTP it is not necessary anymore. Thus your decision to render quarter size is very fine with me ,-)

Regards,
Volker

Lets not confuse ppi (Pixels per inch) which is monitor resolution and dpi (Dots per inch) which is printing resolution. Totally two different things. With 266 ppi screen resolution of the image and I normally print at 600 dpi which my print software handles. This most times gives me really good print viewing even up close.

[buchvecny]

well the print you plan is very huge so i think you can go with 200 dpi. How long will it render? easy to count just render 800x600 and then multiply to get the results.

[gradient]

@Jay
I'm trying to understand your workflow........you said;

"With TG 9.43  I render 5400x7200 pixels for large prints. Then I convert from 72ppi (which is the output of TG) to 266ppi which enlarges the image to 19,950x26,600 pixels and a document size of 75"x100". Now this I downsize to a document print size of 18"x24" which is then 4788x6384 pixels. So to answer your question, yes a slight downsize."

If I understand correctly....First you are upsizing your image...then you are downsizing your image.  Both of these processes result in image degradation.   If you want to achieve an 18X24 print @266dpi...why don't you do the conversion in PS all in one step?

BTW, I don't think you'll be too happy with 2700X3600 at 0.5 quality....

Oh...and for those who didn't do the math....a 2700X3600 render will take 20.25 times as long as the render at 800X600 for the same quality setting....

[gradient]

@Voulge;
Sorry I just read your thread....
you said;
"I used to downsample my TG0.9 renders at least to 50% to get a good screen-quality."
Yes, I agree that was a typical 0.9xx workflow.....and, it included some measure of sharpening between downsizes...But, for printing, you could take a 5400X7200 render, sharpen it...take it to a print shop and get a decent 18X36 inch print (regardless of ppi setting btw...just take your image file and ask for a 18X36 print!))

What it seems folks are trying to do now is take a 2700X3600 TG2 render (which, granted is of better quality than a comparable 0.9xx)...then UPSIZE it with software to 5400X7200...which degrades the quality and get that same 18X24 inch print.

Which method is more efficient in terms of time and quality?.....guess you guys will have to try it out....

[Oshyan]

We do expect a great deal of optimization between now and the final version, but it is virtually impossible to make any accurate estimate of just how much faster it will be.

Ultimately you have the chance here to work with and learn the TG2 system and perhaps also get some good renders out of it in the process. The alternative is to simply wait and start from scratch when the final is released. I would say then it would be better to experiment and learn now and simply lower your expectations to a more realistic level, taking into account the state of the application as a "preview".

It may be that you simply can't reasonably expect to use TG2 as a stand-in for TG 0.9 at this time *for your purposes*. Print resolution is something I would agree TG2 is not particularly good with at this time, but this will be improved in many regards. The real question is whether the final release will be appropriate for your needs and I feel confident saying that it will be.

The bottom line on all of this is that you're working with a Technology Preview. It is capable of being used for production, which has already been proven by several companies, but the intention of this release is not that it be specifically used for those purposes, and we make no warranty that it is suitable at this time for such. If you feel the render times and stability are acceptable for your uses, as many others seem to, then that's excellent and you can get a lot of value out of TG2 even in pre-release. On the other hand if you feel your needs are more demanding than the current release comfortably allows, the simple reality is you will have to wait for the final release to see if it truly meets your needs.

- Oshyan

[Durandir]

When I made print sized renders in Terragen 0.9 I usually made them in 6000x9000 or something. This seemed to make it detailed and large enough for DeviantArt to accept them for prints. Even quite large sized prints.
But when trying to render in that size with Terragen 2 I get a error message... first this:
"trImage:unable to allocate pixelmap: size 648000000 bytes"
When I click ok I get "Unable to start render!"

Not sure why... but I did manage to find a threshold where I could render... About 4000x2667 or so...

[Cyber-Angel]

Talking of production rendering (Motion Pictures) what is the industry standard resolution for rendering for this as I'd like to find out weather, I can do it on my system?

What this program really needs is to be taken in house at a major production facility (Can you say Dream Works Pictures and ILM) and have feed back form them as to what they feel is missing in terms of features and put the functionality into the software there is a president in the industry all ready with The Brazil Render System.

TG2 need to have a well known animator do some work with it and while they are working with the software they would be suggesting new features and improvements to the software, the resulting animation would be shown at the major animation festivals and Terragen would in that way become a house hold name.

If you look at this history of CGI you will find that this has happen before with Alias Power Animator (Now Maya) with the world famous Luxo Jr animation.

Regards to you. 

Cyber-Angel

[Oshyan]

The standard film resolution render target is about 2000x2000, last I heard.

We do already have people from several well-known effects houses working with the current test versions. Certainly their feedback is very valuable, but the major issues like high resolution rendering and general workflow are well-known to us. I think feedback from industry professionals will actually be much more useful a bit later in development when we're more in the refining stage. Right now there are so many low-level, basic issues to work on that detailed expert feedback isn't needed to identify them or determine solutions.

- Oshyan