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Could some please tell me how to get PhotoLux it the ProRender to work in Wildfire 2.0. Is this a special extension and if it is how much will it cost me.
photolux does cost extra money. I believe when you get photolux, it works much the same as the standard photorender, but all the greyed out menus will be available.
I am evaluating a copy of PhotoLux as we speak. The cost is
$995. The interface is the same as PhotoRender with added
features. You can add depth of field, lenz flairs and fog
effects.
It seems to work pretty well. The rendering time is good (about
twice what photorender is). PTC really needs to work on the
interface in relation to the room.
Photolux is actually the ARX rendering extention. It took me about a week to figure this out as PTC does not provide any documentation or real support for ARX. The cost is $995.00 but after using it, I recommned that you spend the money on another renderer. Even with this extension, rendering in Pro is tedious and not very good.
I am looking at alternatives now and am thinking about Rhino with the Flamingo extension since this program is used widely in product design. There is also Carrara and This will also give me a fast modeler for concept generation. Most of the other rendering engins are design for the web and digital animation.
I would also like to hear from anyone that hasdealtwith these issues and has advice. I need quick near-photorealistic images. I can model anything is Pro but could use something faster to produce concepts for complex (surface) forms.
you can get very good images out, though its very haphard and its a bitch to use compared to something like flamingo. Its a bit odfd but the renderer in Pro/concepr is better than that in wildfire. To be fair Photolux in WF2 is the first time i've seen astep forward in the rendering capabilities of proe.
Im in product design and we model in pro and generally use lightwave for rendering. Seeing as they us the same engine I hope that PTC can address this. More and more industrial designers seem to be using pro now, esp cos of ISDX and CDRS being discontinued.
It is annoying to lose the parametric facilities of proe to have to use lightwave. Animation/rendering could be all encompassed.
I actually use 3D Studio Max for all my rendering work. I export
my models out of Pro and import them with a Max plugin called Power
Translator by N-Power Software. The imports are non-triangle
based geometry so they render great. 3D Studio is so much easier
to use than ARX. PTC is getting alittle better with this offering
but it is still a long way away from being useful. They really
need to reevaluate the whole room issue. It is very combersome to
set up.
Another few very capable apps people might be interested to take a look at for rendering purposes are Alias Maya Complete (USD1,999.00), Alias ImageStudio (USD1,499.00), Softimage XSI Foundation (USD495.00).Those threeapps are using the mental ray rendering engine (Maya has also it's own rendering engine).
Maya and XSI are very deep apps that give lots of control - so it might be an overkill for some. ImageStudio is a very simple app to use and setup renderings - at the loss of all the controls found in the aforementioned apps.
ImageStudio and XSI exist as a 30 day trial. Maya has a Personal Learning Edition availablefor free.
I actually use 3D Studio Max for all my rendering work. I export my models out of Pro and import them with a Max plugin called Power Translator by N-Power Software. The imports are non-triangle based geometry so they render great. 3D Studio is so much easier to use than ARX. PTC is getting alittle better with this offering but it is still a long way away from being useful. They really need to reevaluate the whole room issue. It is very combersome to set up.
Could you please private messenge me all the information I will need to transfer a model from Wildfire to 3DS. I would really appreciate it. I have lightwave but I cannot figure out how to transfer a model from PRO/E into it. There doesnt seem to be any similar file formats between the two. I have been rendering with Wildfire for a while now and I like to think I know all the ins and outs of it. I am on a few 3D forums and though I get good praise for my models, my renders cannot touch those from lightwave and 3DS. I think I have pretty much extracted everything out of Wildfire rendering I can but its still subpar to the big dogs.
Also, to the guy who said that you render pro-e models in lightwave, how are you uploading a model from pro-e to lightwave? I downloaded a program once that changed IGS files into some other readable file for lightwave but the models loaded in all screwed up. From my past experience with 3DS, it just seems much more user friendly. Reguardless, I would like to use one of the two for my rendering needs but need help getting there.
As an example, this is a very simplistic model but about as realistic of a render I can produce with wildfire. I still need to figure out my xtop.exe problem so I can render with more scans, I know that will increase the detail greatly so I am hoping to do this very soon. TINAGE is helping with this right now.
This model is much more complex which makes rendering even more annoying when you wait for 30 minutes and then the program faults out. The lines and detail in this render are so poor because I cannot boost the scans. I am still yet to see what it will render out as with 64+ scans but I am hoping to be wowwed.
laughable... really. I can't see how PTC renders out these silly
plastic images and calls them Photorealistic. It took them 3 years of
having Photorender before it could do lens flares, which I could do
better in Photoshop.
I do renderings for my company and my arsenal includes:
- XSI is extremely powerful but the render tree will make the
novice nervous, and Foundation carries no technical support other than
through the forums
- trueSpace has forever been the underdog, but with version 5 or
6 it integrated the Lightworks render engine (highly sought after in
the arch/vis sector) and recently announce V-Ray for version 7 and
V-Ray seriously kicks butt.
- Carerra I don't know much about but is a reincarnation of Ray
Dream designer or something. Supports HDRI and seems to make decent
renders.
If you can afford a little more, jump up to Lightwave, C4D or the mid Maya/XSI blend.
Lastly, its the artist NOT the software that really makes the image.
Almost any one of apps will turn out a great render but some are faster
than others but ultimately they feed on input. So garbage in, garbage
out.
Most of the entries are created using Maya and Alias Studio. Check it
out!<br style="">
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ABOUT Pro/PHOTORENDER
Photorender simply needs some dedicated interface designers to write deeper
into the code. It is a trade off
to export to another program however your results are consistent. Would
be very nice of PTC to add some resources to the development of that tool. And we don
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