Its done first week 2004-01-28 - By Kris
Back
At 08:41 AM 28-01-2004, Bobby Ray wrote:
>"A lot of the time, that's what produces good results- not the super
>high-end renderers."
>
>So Joel you telling me that tS can stand up next to Maya and Sofimage with
>it current Engine and produce Realistic Images as if it was spitting out
>popcorn seed.
Er, I don't know about the first, tho' I've seen some images that look
rather realistic to me. But I doubt whether even Maya can "spit out"
realistic renders like popcorn, unless it's running on something like a
$20K SGI workstation, or whatever is the current equivalent. On a PC
running under Windows, I doubt that any program can fire realistic images
off that fast.
>This is like saying that Mario Andretti can win the Indie 500 with a
>Factory Engine. Less face it Rendering Engine combine with experience
>Artist make good Photo Realistic Images.
As with all things, it's part technology, part strategy, and part
talent. As I've said in the past, if someone is an
Artist-with-a-capitol-"A", s/he can produce great art with ground minerals,
animal fat, and a frayed stick - IOW, what many of these arguments boil
down to is mainly technology, with no focus on the intent or the end-use of
an image or animation. If you're trying to seamlessly blend reality and
3D, yes, you need both top-notch technology *AND* top-notch 3D people.
Films do require photorealism - just think of how dreadfully awful the
"surfing the explosion-generated ocean wave" scene was in the last James
Bond movie - it was so incredibly pathetic that it was painful. And in
many films, the 3D-generated parts are rather obvious. I'm sure the
studios have the best technology and the best programs...are some scenes
just rushed, or it it a matter of needing more Artists rather than more
technicians?
Other question is, could tS produce a film-quality result that would not
make me cringe if I saw it in the theater? I don't know because I don't
know whether it's even been attempted. Could tS produce something that's
look good on the average television set? Again, I don't know. Unless both
are tried by top professionals in the field, people can argue 'til the cows
come home and all it'd result in is hot air, because the proof is in the
pudding as the saying goes. Otherwise, arguing technology is like arguing
whetehr avian or mammalian brains are inherently superior - IOW, different
technologies may or may not be capable of producing comparable results, but
the only way to tell is to produce results that can be compared. And even
at that, it might turn out that one is better for some things, while the
other is better for other things.
That's why I get so dang sick of these arguments. The simple fact (which
IMO ought to be patently obvious) is that nobody knows anything until a
head-to-head comparison is done, until a *top notch* body of work is done
on both tS and the other programs, **using the SAME level of
technology**, that can then be evaluated side-by-side. I stress the same
technology, because many graphics businesses cannot afford anywhere near
the level of hardware technology as can the film industry. To do an
equitable comparison, then, requires thatthe playing field be as level as
is humanly possible, not only in terms of the technology used in the
comparison but also in terms of the human component (i.e., the skill,
artistry, concentration, etc. of the people participating in the comparison).
Or, to be even more level, use an identical scene and simply render it in
the various engines, **with no plug-ins**. Lets see the proverbial Steel
Dice (and/or shiny spheres or whatever) done in Maya and in tS. Then move
the scenes upwards in complexity, and let's see precisely where and how the
quality differs.
Until this is done, all the arguments are nothing more than hot air.
- Kris
- Kris M. Krieger
http://www.pterochromics.com
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