Confused about when to use ray traced/micropoygon render settings

[reck]

OK I have my first question regarding the new update and it concerns the new render ray trace option. I'm not sure I fully understand it.

Micropolygon renderer - Optimised for terrains, and possibly for objects because it allows displacements on those objects?
Ray trace renderer - Optimised for sky and clouds.

As 99% of my scenes contain sky/clouds and terrain and possibly objects it seems i'm going to have to compromise on the final result in some part of my image depending on which option I select.

If I choose the micropolygon renderer my terrain will look good but the sky might not look as good if I had chosen the ray trace all option.

If I choose the ray trace all option the sky may look better but the terrain would look pretty bad?

Is this correct?

Also from reading the notes it seems the ray trace option is best for objects, but you don't get displacements which most of my objects seem to use, such as bark etc so won't this make the objects looks worse?

[dandelO]

My problem exactly. It was explained to me a little better here... http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=8277.0

Basically, you only really need to use the 'ray trace objects' setting, for the type of scene you describe. I was in this quandry of 'do I sacrifice terrain for better clouds, etc.' Not necessary.

However, I am still finding the micropolygonal renderer quicker than using ray traced object rendering...

[reck]

The terrain looks terrible in that second image dandelO. I'm not seeing much difference in the sky between the images though so maybe the ray trace all option doesn't improve the sky that much.

I've not got as far as testing the speed between the difference options yet, still trying to work out which options I should have turned to get the best image if it contains terrain, sky/clouds and objects.

[Matt]

I strongly recommend ray trace objects ON, ray trace everything OFF.

Don't worry too much about whether ray tracing might help your clouds. Most of the existing advice and accumulated knowledge about cloud settings, detail levels etc. applies to the micropolygon render and I think you should continue rendering them as before. Only if you are rendering a scene where you can't see much terrain detail would I think about trying the ray trace everything option, and even then the quality-vs-speed tradoff probably won't be earth-shattering.

We are planning to provide options to render clouds and atmosphere using ray tracing without affecting terrain quality in future versions. Having the option to ray trace everything in current builds allows us to research the implications of doing so. Feel free to experiment, but I don't think it's the right setting to use for most scenes.

Regarding speed of ray tracing individual objects, there becomes a point where ray tracing the objects is slower. The big speed gains come with large, complex objects or populations.

Matt

[reck]

I strongly recommend ray trace objects ON, ray trace everything OFF.

I think i'll stick to this rule until I understand the new version a bit better. Sounds like for most scenes this setting would be fine anyway.

Thanks

[neuspadrin]

or i can start cropping the renders, rendering the sky separate from the ground and using the alpha channel to put together nice if you are stuck in wanting both

[Oshyan]

The sky doesn't really turn out better looking with raytracing in any of my tests. For complex skies it can potentially be faster, but it's really not something you will ever use unless you have an image with *only* sky. Then it would be worth trying. Otherwise don't bother. Future enhancements to control of raytracing will let you use it exactly where it's most effective.

- Oshyan