Render Timings

With the deadline in mind, i took some time today to consider the possible render times of each frame for differant lighting and rendering techniques. Although not an experienced lighter, i decided to take three basic techniques that were easy to set up in Maya and note the times it takes to render them. In total we have anywhere up to 5000 frames in the film and whilst understanding that some frames could take anything up to 8mins to render, i started to pull my hair out.

A provisional look at some Maya Software render options, i noticed that i would be looking at a maximum of 1 minute per frame, due to the shadows only relying on depth maps rather then Ray tracing etc. However the renders had an albeit crisp, but very CG side look about them and seemed to be missing, for lack of a better word, substance and depth (Fig.1)

(Fig.1)

The final Gather pass that i did (Fig.2) looked pretty good, although in my opinion wouldn't be much good unless we used object lighting, due to the environment being enclosed (still need to do some tests for that). Never the less, i thought i should consider the option for time management and get a rough, intial, idea of how long that may take. The quality, i felt wasnt what we wanted, however, without textures in the scene and it being only one light, its difficult to judge. Personally, this type of rendering is a big no no!! The Final Gather renders took an average of 2 minutes per frame.

(Fig.2)

Another test i did with a new technique i found out from Jenny, was Sun and Sky simulation; a mental ray node that uses a directional light and preset settings, utalising a combination of final gather ray tracing and possibly abient occlusion to simulate an exterior atmosphere. Although refinement would be needed, the below render (Fig.3) gives an idea of quality and style. One which i think is a potential for our jungle environment lighting. However a much more ambient style of lighting is going to be needed for the inside of the temple. The Physical Sun and Sky renders took an average of 3 minutes per frame; when noting thats without textures, i'm not to optimistic that we'll have enough time to render these frames, but we'll see.

(Fig.3)