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Support => Terragen Support => Topic started by: andronikos on January 13, 2009, 01:50:36 PM

Title: Very slow rendering
Post by: andronikos on January 13, 2009, 01:50:36 PM
Hi all

I'm all new here and on terragen 2.
I have the following machine: Pentium 4 Q6600 quad core
Gigabyte P965 X38 Motherboard with 8gig DDR2-800 RAM
Nvidia GeForce 8800 Ultra graphics card
WD Raptor 10K RPM Harddrive
Windows XP 64bit sp 2

It took Terragen 2 about 20 minutes to render a 720x576 image.
Is this normal?
If so, then it'll take about a month to render a whole sequence.
If not, then anyone with help or explanation please

thanks
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: Tangled-Universe on January 13, 2009, 02:26:27 PM
As you may know rendertimes depend heavily on the qualitysettings of the render, but also on the complexity of your scene.
I think an average scene could easily render in about 20 minutes, maybe even longer. I have a similar machine like yours.
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: andronikos on January 13, 2009, 02:54:03 PM
i agree with you, but never thought it would render SO slow
i do video editing and special effects. i work with 3DS max a lot and my renders at very high quality at full HD take much less time.
i just thought there was a render setting that would make it faster. i changed the cores to 4, but not much improvement.
maybe the core i7 systems will do the trick. i'm upgrading in a few months.
thanks for your reply tho, i appreciate it
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: PG on January 13, 2009, 03:07:14 PM
The core i7 (according to PS member FrankB) will improve the render times, however remember that, unlike 3ds max, Terragen is made by 2 very talented bedroom programmers not an army of resident programmers and is not yet a finished, completely optimised product. Also it's important to note that Terragen can produce images above and beyond anything that most any other program can. You can indeed lower the quality settings but if you wish to work with HD footage then this would only be applicable for testing. If you wish to render sequences longer than a few minutes in a short time for professional work then I'd recommend renting a render farm.
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: jo on January 13, 2009, 05:08:42 PM
Hi PG,

Quote from: PG on January 13, 2009, 03:07:14 PM
The core i7 (according to PS member FrankB) will improve the render times, however remember that, unlike 3ds max, Terragen is made by 2 very talented bedroom programmers

Well, thanks, but although I work from home I do have an actual office which is a completely different room to my bedroom ;-).

Regards,

Jo
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: buzzzzz1 on January 13, 2009, 05:32:33 PM
Quote from: jo on January 13, 2009, 05:08:42 PM
Hi PG,

Quote from: PG on January 13, 2009, 03:07:14 PM
The core i7 (according to PS member FrankB) will improve the render times, however remember that, unlike 3ds max, Terragen is made by 2 very talented bedroom programmers

Well, thanks, but although I work from home I do have an actual office which is a completely different room to my bedroom ;-).

Regards,

Jo








LOL....Get'em  Jo!
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: PG on January 14, 2009, 06:11:55 AM
yeah it is rather loose terminology for someone with enough reception rooms for an office. I've got my computer in my bedroom so I kinda fit the description. lol. anyway, little bit OT
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: Tangled-Universe on January 15, 2009, 01:23:03 PM
Quote from: andronikos on January 13, 2009, 02:54:03 PM
i agree with you, but never thought it would render SO slow
i do video editing and special effects. i work with 3DS max a lot and my renders at very high quality at full HD take much less time.
i just thought there was a render setting that would make it faster. i changed the cores to 4, but not much improvement.
maybe the core i7 systems will do the trick. i'm upgrading in a few months.
thanks for your reply tho, i appreciate it

You should keep in mind that the Terragen renderer is in no ways like the scanline renderer of 3DS Max, mental ray or any of those others.
There's really no way to compare them.
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: rcallicotte on January 16, 2009, 12:03:35 PM
...except TG2's is more awesome.   ;D


Quote from: Tangled-Universe on January 15, 2009, 01:23:03 PM
There's really no way to compare them.
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: Seth on January 24, 2009, 07:09:46 AM
http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=4021.0

longest render time topic ^^
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: Nathanny2009 on April 07, 2009, 10:48:45 AM
Quote from: andronikos on January 13, 2009, 01:50:36 PM
Hi all

I'm all new here and on terragen 2.
I have the following machine: Pentium 4 Q6600 quad core
Gigabyte P965 X38 Motherboard with 8gig DDR2-800 RAM
Nvidia GeForce 8800 Ultra graphics card
WD Raptor 10K RPM Harddrive
Windows XP 64bit sp 2

It took Terragen 2 about 20 minutes to render a 720x576 image.
Is this normal?
If so, then it'll take about a month to render a whole sequence.
If not, then anyone with help or explanation please

thanks

I've always had this sort of rendering time and I have no reason why and no other thread has been able to help me which is a shame because I do have a Tradesman Insurance (http://"http://www.publicliabilityinsurance.org.uk/liability-insurance-quote.html") computer normally but not when it comes to rendering,

I hope you find the answers you need though :)
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: JimB on April 09, 2009, 09:55:43 AM
Render times can usually be reduced by splitting a sequence render over all of the processors, using either a render manager, or simply running ( in your case four) instances of TG2 on a single CPU each. It can actually have quite a dramatic hit on animation render times. This also applies to some other renders by the way (Mental Ray for instance), and not just TG2. I've seen TG2 render times almost halved, and certainly a third cut from the render time, but it also depends on what's going on in your scene. Some quality improvements and elements in a scene can cause a whole lot of variables.

If you think of TG2's renderer as a super-dooper displacement renderer, that should give you an idea of why renders can take so long compared to Mental Ray as an example.
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: PG on April 09, 2009, 11:04:01 AM
Are there any specific render managers that work? Only render managers I managed to find that work on windows are Squidnet and Smedge although they say nothing of TG2.

They're listed here by the way
http://www.highend3d.com/downloads/tools/render_managers/
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: JimB on April 09, 2009, 01:48:24 PM
I know for a fact that you can get Rush to render TG2 on LINUX. I believe it's a tad difficult to configure, but works fine once you get over any initial hurdles.
Title: Re: Very slow rendering
Post by: Matt on April 09, 2009, 07:13:04 PM
Smedge will work with TG2, and most others will too. As long as they allow you to write custom render scripts, it's usually as simple as making a one line script based on the syntax in command_line.txt in the TG2 docs folder.

Matt