Do smaller texture sizes result in faster render times?

[dylanlester1]

Just finished reading an old article about reducing render times and one of the solutions was to reduce your texture sizes. They said not to use textures bigger than your final image size?

So if I'm only rendering out images 1920x1080 - I probably shouldn't be using 3k textures? How much faster are we talking??

[Zdravko Barisic]

I would suggest you not to even think about it, nowadays in times of 10/20 core or more on deskotp.

That article was written under strong influence of PII/ PIII era, in that times that was near critical, but today, just forget it, press render and sit back and relax! You will not get more than 0.25-0.5%, and it is not worth of it.

Good luck!

[Francisco Penaloza]

I agree with @Zdravko, some tutorials are way outdated.

If anything that may still apply is only because loading times, and this may affect you only while doing animations.

Using large textures hits your RAM and loading times. But with today's technology or Gigabits networks and SSD drives, even those loading time can be reduced.

Other than that there are many other ways to optimize render times.

[Zdravko Barisic]

And this, I am not shore if it is still valid

 

http://area.autodesk.com/blogs/max-station/n74_using_the_bitmap_pager

 

Turning OFF bitmap pager is good idea.

[SkylineArch]

the minimum texture size I use is 4k, some are 8k or 16k for larger flooring areas or whatever to avoid tiling. Then if I get close to a texture it still looks crisp.

 

Project folder sizes get big, but it renders fine.

[dylanlester1]

Right but if i'm rendering images that are only 1920x1280, I wouldn't need a texture over 2k right? And if I'm rendering 4k images, then I'd use 4k textures... etc etc

[heni30]

In theory all you need is the size of your textured object at your printing resolution. So if you have a wood wall that shows up on 1/4 of your image, say a 2k image, then all you would need for that wall would be a 500 size map. With 2k maps you don't have to worry about anything.

[dylanlester1]

In theory all you need is the size of your textured object at your printing resolution. So if you have a wood wall that shows up on 1/4 of your image, say a 2k image, then all you would need for that wall would be a 500 size map. With 2k maps you don't have to worry about anything.

 

Gotcha! Cheers.