Q: Atmosphere sample (slow render)

[Sp34k]

Hallo there

I have a question about the atmosphere sample/quality..

I'm about to render a picture that seems to take forever and a day, I've uploaded a picture, take a look at it..
As you can see I've made a really straight stroke indicating my problem with the clouds .. For some reason, it haven't moved for about 15 hours.. Now my question comes about the right amount of Samples in the atmosphere, I have here:

Atmosphere:
Atmosphere: 64 samples, 1 quality
Cumulus layer 1: 404 samples, 0.90 quality
Cumumus layer 2: 500 samples, 1.23 quality
Cumulus layer 3: 138 samples, 0.83 quality
Cirrus layer: 500 samples, 51 quality

Render-settings:
Resolution: 900x450px.
Detail: 0.8
Anti-aliasing: 3
Gl relative detail: 2
GL sample quality: 2
Anti-aliasing bloom: ON
Microvertex juttering ON
Detail juttering: ON
Do ray traced shadows: ON

Currect pc-internal organs:
Windows XP 32 bit
Intel core 2 duo E8500, 3.16ghz
4 gb ram (only 3 reg.)
Geforce 9600GT

Now ehm, have I screwed it all totally up? I think that 44 hours is a little too much for a so simple picture so I guess that I have (once again, again...) made the quality way too high?

Best regards,
Mike

[domdib]

One insane value is GI sample quality at 8 - most of the good renders here rarely go above 3 or 4. There's a sticky about render settings at the top of this section of the forums that I suggest you read, as you have other options ticked that are unnecessary, e.g. microvertex. But my guess is that GI sample quality is the main culprit here.
EDIT: by the way, the render looks very intriguing - hope you'll show it when it's done!

[Sp34k]

oh shoote, thats my fault, the value is 2 and not 8, ill go fix it

And thank you, I hope it will be done aswell, but maybe next year it will be done xD Stay tuned hehe

[Hetzen]

I did a similar thing for one of my first renders, with loads of cloud layers. It got 2/3s the way through over 192 hours on a dual quad Zeon worksatation. What I've found gives a huge increase in render time, is high quality clouds off into the distance. What I'd try and do here, would be to copy and paste your cloud nodes, but use a distance shader to mask off the closer higher quality clouds, then invert the blend from the distant shader to mask off the distant clouds which can have a fraction of those quality settings.

[goldfarb]

being able to render layers would make this so much simpler/faster...

Hetzen is 100% right...different clouds masked by distance with different render settings

[Oshyan]

You seem to just have a lot of layers with very high quality, and with them all interacting with each other, it's going to slow things down a lot. I see at least 1 of your layers where quality/samples could be lowered quite a lot, the last layer with a *51* quality. The others are probably where they should be, although you might just try detail 1 for everything to see how that turns out (this would be an increase for some layers, but a decrease for others, probably similar render time overall or maybe a bit less). I think perhaps some of your settings are giving the cloud area you pointed out an unrealistic look, and this will probably not be helped by increased samples.

- Oshyan

[Sp34k]

Hetzen: uhm I think your message made sence in my head.. So far alot of what you write is on a far higher level than what my knowledge can understand.. Remember, I'm still just a rookie (not a cookie - but you wish ) - I will give your suggestion a try and see if I understand you right

Goldfarb: I sure would be a good idéa to work in layers like in photoshop, maybe it's impossible, I dont know.. I just know that I have no clue about the network notes in TG2, to be hornest..

Oshyan: So you would also suggest that the problem is that I have too many layers? I get some good responses here, so far I have to work less layers and possible deincrease the "51 quality" layer a bit..

Right now it's rendering at lower quality, its been rendering for 16 hours so far and I expect it to be done in 5-10 hours so let's see.. So when I get home from education I'll see if its done and post the result.. To be 100% hornest, from what I could see of the rendering this morning, I wasnt happy *cough*...

[Oshyan]

I'm not saying you have "too many" layers, just that having more layers will increase render time. And often times at least one of the layers will simply get lost or covered up. In nature you usually only see 2-3 "layers" of clouds at once, actually - generally one high and one low altitude.

You really shouldn't need anywhere near 51 *quality* for that one layer. 51 *samples* maybe (probably lower though, for cirrus).

- Oshyan

[Sp34k]

Thanks for cutting it out for me, it sure made me understand what you ment.. I can now see that the quality for some of the clouds are too high because, if I deincrease the quality of some of the clouds, you won't really notice that anything has changed..
I will do the final changes when I get home, I appreciate your help and thank you for cutting it out for me, sometimes thats necessary

Cheers,
Mike

[Goms]

Try to lower the samples as much as you can without seeing noise.

[Sp34k]

Alright the picture is finished after 20 hours and I don't know it.. It kills my mood to think about, wasting 44 hours at first and then 20 hours for a picture that really doesn't make sense at all but, well poop happens..

Anyways, I've added a few things on the picture to add a little more "life", but without much success, anyways, ive uploaded it so you can see it..
Thanks for the help guys, now I know what to do better the NEXT time, thanks for spending your time on helping me here..

Cheers,
Mike

[domdib]

Hey, don't be so hard on yourself - it IS an intriguing picture - how did you get that insane level of spikiness in the terrain? And the atmosphere colour is rather nice too.

[Sp34k]

Thanks for the kind words, but I guess I just expected something, better.. But it's mistakes like these that I learn from.. I'm still a rookie trying to learn
But I don't know how to answer your question so I have decided to share my TGD with you, so you can take a look for yourself and maybe, do something with it so you can create your own picture:)

But something that I can't promise is that everything is made currectly.. I'm still a newb trying all the functions

Cheers,
Mike

ps. thanks, I learned a new word today "intriguing" lol 

[domdib]

Hey, that's generous of you. I'm sure that I won't be the only one who'll be able to learn something new from this file. That's really the key to these forums - everyone can learn from everyone else, because the power and flexibility of TG2 means that different people pursue different ways of working - some will focus on cool surfacing, others on strange terrains, others on ways to incorporate models etc. In the end, we all get to have fun 

p.s., what's the Danish for "intriguing" 

[Sp34k]

Im glad you appreciate it.. I see alot of people who offer their work to help others, I wan't to do the same but with my knowledge I'm not able to make "stunning" images that many of you hardcore-maniac users can make hehe.. But Im glad to offer a little something here and there..

The Danish word for "intriguing" would be something like:

"interessant" = interesting
"spændende" = exiting
or in some cases "anderledes" = different

You can't really translate it 100%, but these would be Danish words for intriguing

ps. should I keep the tgd file here or should I post it in the file share category?