Table of Contents Show
Why don’t you show us what it looks like in practice?
To illustrate this, a small outdoor scene is to be rendered in which, for reasons of simpler compositing and optimisation of render times
render times, the elements are to be calculated separately and with different render presets. The scene shows a ground level with grass and a sandpit in which a playground wobbly horse is standing. Lighting is provided by a handful of light sources that simulate both direct sunlight and its scattered light as well as the light from the sky above the scene. The lighting of the scene therefore looks quite believable even without GI, although numerous obscurations on the rocking horse could also benefit from a GI calculation. With the grass and the 3D plants in the background, however, the GI calculation would probably not be of much use and would also take quite a long time due to the very fine structures. We therefore decide to split these image elements into different shots in order to be able to select different quality settings. As usual, we start with the completion of the basic image.
To save work later, the scene should be modelled, textured and illuminated as completely as possible before further shots are created. Elements can still be added or modified later, but this makes it unnecessarily time-consuming to keep track of the necessary overwrites in the subordinate shots. We therefore start by giving the rocking horse a render tag in order to be able to render a simple clipping mask for it and add a new shot to the project. When activated, recordings work in exactly the same way as cameras or render presets. Clicking on their name shows all the settings behind them, but does not yet activate this element. A separate icon in front of the name of the recording is responsible for this. Only when this is displayed in white is the corresponding recording actually active. This means that only now are all the changes saved in the recording actually transferred to the scene and the editor views and managers also display the actual status of the recording.
Once the first sub-shot has been created and activated, we switch to the object manager and first check the objects that we may not need for rendering the horse. This is also the only point of criticism of the system, because as the recording manager and the object manager occupy the same area as tabs, only one of them is visible by default. One solution to this problem would be to open a copy of the object manager as a separate dialogue, which of course takes up additional, valuable space on the monitor. It is therefore often better to use the Editor HUD, as this offers a new option in the view preferences that allows the name of the currently active recording to be displayed directly in the view windows and even switched there. This means we can always be sure that we are actually working in the desired recording without having to constantly switch between the object and recording manager. Very practical! Now that all effects and objects that are not required for rendering the horse have been switched off (such as the grass in the background or the grains of sand under the horse in the sandpit), we take a look at the render presets and first check the image resolution and the desired calculation methods. This time, GI is to be simulated and physically rendered.
You can also directly select the desired multi-passes that could be relevant for compositing. You can also select this render preset directly for the horse shot in the shot manager. If there is only one camera in the scene, you do not need to select this camera separately for the recording, provided that this recording has been activated for rendering. The next step is a new shot in which the horse is made invisible to the camera via a render tag, for example, but still casts shadows. In addition, the GI calculation is deactivated in a new render preset and the previously deactivated grass and sand objects are reactivated. This may also require the hair renderer to be reactivated in the render presets.
