Paul Griger Posted April 16, 2003 Share Posted April 16, 2003 ART is preparing to release their new Chief Architect 9.0 and it looks to have a lot of nice features. But one feature that baffles me is that their rendering package in this CAD program claims to do this: 3D and Render Views Advanced, photo-realistic rendering using the latest Ray-tracing technology. Ray-tracing includes reflections and radiosity , providing the most realistic images available in the CAD software market http://www.chiefarchitect.com/PDFs/Chief-Architect-9.0-Feature-List.pdf ~ I’m sorry, but when did Raytracing “include Radiosity" ? And I look at their samples of this package that provide the “most realistic images available in the CAD software market” and it all looks Raytraced to me. http://www.chiefarchitect.com/products/chief9/samples.htm Am I missing something here? :shrug: Paul Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ernest Burden III Posted April 16, 2003 Share Posted April 16, 2003 But one feature that baffles me is: Ray-tracing includes reflections and radiosity :shrug:Paul I think that just means "we can a radiosity solution, then raytrace the results" like everybidy else. If its a new feature they might as well say it. But I don't read that to be anything like realtime radiosity, or a solution that includes raytraced effects. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Griger Posted April 16, 2003 Author Share Posted April 16, 2003 Originally posted by Ernest Burden: I think that just means "we can a radiosity solution, then raytrace the results" like everybidy else. ~ Hi Enrest, Hummm, I guess I don't really understand that statement, no offense. When you say like everybody else do you mean like Viz 4 or Lightwave for instance? Because the pictures on the link for renderings on their site don't seem to look like radiosity was used. I always understood radiosity to be used to calculate light bouncing off of different surfaces whereas raytracing to be able to let the camera to see bounced light [images] on reflections and through transparent objects, and had nothing to do with lighting a scene. like here: http://www.cg.tuwien.ac.at/research/rendering/rays-radio/ Do you think that is the case with this software based on the images on their site? Maybe I just misunderstood the way radiosity can be used when describing a software's abilities? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 perhaps it does have a new feature that calculates radiosity, but i doubt it's true radiosity. Radiosity and GI are 2 different things, even tho they are a usually the consequence of the same caluculation. GI is bounced ambiant environmental lighting whereas radiosity is the immediate light heat value reflecting off another surface, the faint colour bleed effect we see in renders. sounds similar but renderings can be produced with one and not the other. (may have my terminology mixed up there ) and like you, my understanding is they are calculated together in a different way than raytracing, which is based on purely straight line rays. but look at C4D, you can nicely fake radiosity in there by adjusting the material's saturation level. this isn't true radiosity as C4D's radiosity renderer calculates this, but it is a good workaround for plain ray tracing. perhaps this is what is going on here in this new cad proggy. so who knows, there may be a spot of radiosty going on in those images, (definately not noticable, looks more like poor jpg compression to me), but there certainly aint no GI in them. i think the day when true radiosity/GI is rendered as fast as raytracing is some way off yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Craig Ramsay Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Im sure I someone told me that ART are developing new software that will use max's radiosity somehow :???: Im sure David Pinington tests ART's software, maybe he could give us a bit of info if it isn't confidential? Cheers Craig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Craig Ramsay Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Doh forget what I just said, I thought you meant ARD as in Advanced Rendering Technology (the guys that make renderdrives) :ngelaugh: Too many beers last night Craig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kid Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Certain GI/radiosity algorithms do use raytracing methods to calculate how much and where light is going (direct and bounced), so I guess they could be right, sort of, slightly... More likely, their marketing dept. just felt like throwing a whole load of buzz words on the box, without knowing what the hell they meant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Originally posted by kid: More likely, their marketing dept. just felt like throwing a whole load of buzz words on the box, without knowing what the hell they meant. i agree Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Griger Posted April 17, 2003 Author Share Posted April 17, 2003 Well, I got a speedy response from ART which is really nice. They always were really good about being personally involved with the end users. Basically ART says that they do use radiosity in their rendering calculations. As proof, he gave me two renderings showing the rendering with and without radiosity. He said that the radiosity pic was at a “medium” quality setting. I guess the proof is in the pudding: w/out radiosity: w/radiosity: I then showed him a quick 4-minute radiosity rendering in C4D: I replied and said that their CAD software looks promising but tried to kindly tell them that their radiosity engine really doesn’t measure up to industry standards and it still looks like a flat scanline render to me :shrug: Iit was kind of them to reply so quickly, and the raytracing feature is a nice upgrade for Chief Architect users. I will give the CA 9.0 demo a try though for the modeling and archi aspect. You can do specify custom designed profiles for the window and door casing, plus base, rakes, which would be handy. Plus CA 9.0 has a huge residential library which would come in handy for quick archi renderings that could be exported into C4D for final rendering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Dollus Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Since when does C4D calculate board feet and give you cut sheets for the construction process? For crying out loud, this is NOT a rendering/animation program you are talking about. It is a tool designed for builders, contractors and developers in mind. As a side note, the stochastic algorithms used in popular rendering engines today such as Brazil, Vray and Max's own radiosity rendering option is based on stochastic ray-tracing which used 'random' ray sources to give the ambient look to the images. This is as opposed to a detministic approach to ray-tracing where a single source is used to generate the rays. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Griger Posted April 17, 2003 Author Share Posted April 17, 2003 Well, I got some more feedback from ART. POV ray now has added radiosity to its engine. And ART FWD me a few more pics; I have to say that I am rather impressed! BTW John, yes I am fully aware that Chief Architect is mainly a CAD package for builders and architects. I have been using it almost 10 years now minus a break I took to use ArchiCAD which I currently use. If Chief 9.0 can do radiosity comparably well, plus it comes with a 8,500 item residential library [yaaa, less custom moulding ], plus great window and door abilities for custom casing and custom user grids, and now it does custom rakes, eaves, moulding, and automated section CAD details. The base version comes for under $1000, and the full version for $1,500; to me it sounds like a steal. Plus I already own a previous license, so it'll cost just the upgrade fee for me to pick it up. I'll have to try the demo and see how close one package comes to doing it all. It just may be the package to have for simple, quick, and pretty renderings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greg Hess Posted April 17, 2003 Share Posted April 17, 2003 Paul, What speeds are these images being produced in? (Seconds? Minutes?) Images look nice, but I'd also like to hear about speeds...especially considering apps like Maya 5 are now boasting of hardware GPU rendering capabilities. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Griger Posted April 18, 2003 Author Share Posted April 18, 2003 Originally posted by Greg Hess: What speeds are these images being produced in? (Seconds? Minutes?) I'm not sure, but I'll see when the demo is out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Dollus Posted April 18, 2003 Share Posted April 18, 2003 Sorry, Paul. Too much caffeine that day. Just tired of people comparing one or two features of a product and not seeing the whole picture. I am glad you are an imformed consumer and am looking forward to your review of the demo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Griger Posted April 18, 2003 Author Share Posted April 18, 2003 No problem John, And to be honest, my titling of this thread certainly could be classified as confrontational. I’d like to attribute that to me being a former user of CA and then leaving it because of it’s shortcomings, and now seeing that CA has many of those CAD problems resolved plus other improvements. Hey, it’s never easy seeing your ex-gf looking better years later than when you dropped her The grass always looks greener on the other side of the architectural fence for me I gotta keep reminding myself that it’s the artist, not the [CAD or rendering] software. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ingo Posted April 19, 2003 Share Posted April 19, 2003 Oh c'mon, Paul an informed consumer. He was only attracted to ChiefArchitect because of the program name :ebiggrin: BTW, that was Minicad's biggest problem for years and the reason its now called VectorWorks. Happy Eastern :ngelaugh: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now