Someone please make the case for Fryrender

[Michael J. Brown]

I just (today) discovered Fryrender and was quite frankly blown away at the level of detail and realism achievable with it. My questions about it are really too many to list and expect good answers to here on this forum. I'd be much better served just trying the software demo - which I intend on doing in the near future.

 

I guess my main question about it though is how fast is it? I know that is a very open-ended, general question. But would you consider it fast enough to feel comfortable rendering a 1080x608 2 1/2-minute moderate to highly detailed interior animation with natural and artificial scene lighting? That is, without having to sacrifice the next two weeks to the render gods while your workstation remains unusable for any other purpose.

 

Thanks.

[AJLynn]

No. Fry (and Maxwell) by their nature sacrifice speed for quality and are not good for animating. (Even for exteriors - and interiors render a lot slower.) 2 weeks would not be enough time to do that animation.

 

What you want is something like mental ray or Vray that has the ability to save a lighting solution and use it on all frames, and to cut some corners for speed.

 

Fry (and Maxwell) are good for stil frames that require extremely good quality and can be left to render overnight (or longer). They do have some really cool features, like the ability to change light levels and exposures after rendering and Fry's new material switcher.

[Michael J. Brown]

Thanks AJ.

 

And now onto my next forum - V-Ray - to unlock the secrets of quick render times. Because the 2 1/2 hours I'm averaging right now with V-Ray stills needs to be skinnied WAY down for animation purposes.

[AJLynn]

Does the 2.5 hours include the GI calculation? When you learn how to reuse those you'll save a lot of time. Also there are some corners you'll need to cut - in the sampling and use of glossies and raytraces.

[Michael J. Brown]

Does the 2.5 hours include the GI calculation? When you learn how to reuse those you'll save a lot of time. Also there are some corners you'll need to cut - in the sampling and use of glossies and raytraces.

 

Yes, it does include GI calcs. But those only eat up a few minutes (though, they could stand to be eliminated). In order for the saved solution option to work well, would I need to render keyframes along the length of the animation (say, every 50 frames or so) in order for the GI solutions to be all encompassing of the different lighting conditions along the cameras path?

 

Sampling, glossiness and raytracing are definately areas that are wide open for belt-tightening. I've just got to rersearch how to handle and adjust those last two.

[Tommy L]

Do you have a farm?

[Michael J. Brown]

No. No render farm. Not even one machine to network to.

[Tommy L]

Then if its for production, forget about Fry. Forget Maxwell too. Also, you can probably forget about doing HD 1080. Go with Vray or Mental Ray and consider investing $1000 to get two quad-core boxes as power for DR.

[Billabong]

Hey Tommy, can you recommend any good quad core boxes pre-built for DR

[Tommy L]

I got mine built by the cheapest company I could find on ebay. This has been discussed at length on these boards.

However, here are the specs for mine:

 

Q6600 (with a $30 cooling upgrade)

4gRAM

80G 7300rpm hard drive

Cheapest motherboard you can get.

Cheapest (or on board) graphics card you can get.

XP64

In the cheapest case possible.

 

Thats it. There may be a more up to date processor for the money, I havent kept up with the news. I bought 7 of these at $650 each (including OS and delivery) which gives me a whopping 28 extra buckets for DR.

I know the green fanatics (of which I consider myself one) will not be happy about this, but I consider hardware disposable. As such, I bought the cheapest components possible from the cheapest company, with no after sales service. Nothing has broken yet, even with the brutal hot Chicago summer and no AC and moving studio.

Im sure you could get the same now for around $500 a piece.

 

This was the best solution for me. Not the best for everyone, but I was starting a business on a very tight budget and the power/price was important.

[Tommy L]

Hey Tommy, can you recommend any good quad core boxes pre-built for DR

 

Sorry, I didnt really answer your question.

I think any machine built specifically for 3d tasks will be expensive compared with the euivalent that is built for mass consumption (ie: aimed at home computing or the gamer market). The components perform how they perform. Putting them in a super cooled box with flashing lights doesnt make a hard drive any faster or increase the amount of ram. It may add 10% to the processor, but who cares. My advice is buy the cheapest, it makes business sense.

[Michael J. Brown]

Great advice Tommy. Buying the cheapest (near cheapest) components with no frills does seem that it will give the biggest bang for the buck. Especially in a situation like yours (and mine too, for that matter). A heck of a lot better and more economical (long run) than farming out every single animation job.

[Billabong]

Thanks for taking the time Tommy