You don't need a "true renderer" when you want realism, check the Unreal engine or Unity for instance.

Lots of new iCloners do not understand that what iClone has been made for at first is to create animated movie with near realtime render times, in the machinima spirit.

If we want what other DCC tools offer then we use other DCC tools, there are already plenty of DCC tools with "true renderers" on the market to bother using iClone with lot of features missing compared to those DCC tools.

What makes iClone unique is its relative simplicity and speed and we would like to keep that even for final rendering, but with a quality on par with current (near)-"realtime" renderers.

The more iClone will tend to become like the other standard DCC tools (even with its unique features) the less movies will be made with it. This will be the death of the "iDirectors" and "iMovies". We wiil then have to wait for another product or initiative, or let it go and try again in another life.

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guy rabiller | GOETZIWOOD STUDIOS
"N.O.E." (Nations Of Earth) Sci-Fi TV Show, Showrunner.

On Mocap,  does this means that Kinetic for Xbox one may not be a necessity in the future.?  Was just planning to look for one but they are unavailable since they have been discontinued 

Look forward to the updates , keep up the good work

I understand where you are coming from.  Realism and near realism is certainly subjective though.  Having a true renderer, ray traced and better integrated with IClone would not take away from the ease and simplicity of IClone for those who just want to use the real time renderer imo.  It's not like they are planning to get rid of their real time rendering currently in use.  It's another option and it is a smart option that opens up another avenue for IClone if it's integrated well.  For my definition of realism, it is not achieved with IClone's own rendering.  The real time rendering is nice, has a definite purpose, and certainly has come a long way from the old days, but I and many others want better with IClone and it looks like we're on the path to be getting what we want thankfully.

I use other tools that have all the scripting I want and choice of renderers I need.  However, I'd personally be willing to sacrifice the real time rendering to have the realism I desire in IClone as long as the other features could remain similar to how they are now.  But I understand one of the main selling features for IClone is how nicely it renders in real time.  Looking at the sample images side by side though is night and day from my perspective, so a well integrated true renderer is much welcomed.


4x gtx 980ti, 2x xeon 2550v4, 512gb RAM, 1tb m.2

Of course it is much welcome but you didn't get my point. What's needed is Reallusion to "upgrade" their realtime renderer to align its rendering qualities and features with nowadays state of the art realtime or near-realtime renderers, Doing "iMovies" has the advantage of not needing to render at 60fps, so if, for instance, you take the Unreal engine as a reference, imagine the advantage, features and quality a near-realtime (2s per frame max) renderer would have over Unreal. This is where iClone should be today.

If this was already the case then having a "true* renderer would be irrelevant because we wouldn't need one.

But you will experiment that when you will start to make movies with iClone. "True" movies I mean, 2h long without a renderfarm, 172 800 images at 24fps. 2sec max render time means 96h of rendering, 4 days. If you use "true" renderer, it means at least 20s to 2h (sometimes even more) rendering time per frame. 40 days to 40 years of rendering time in all. Perhaps that's not your goal to make "true movies" of that length one day as lot of new iCloners who prefer to create stills, or are in the game business. But there is still a group of peoples here who are after that and that's why they bought and supported iClone and Reallusion in the first place. And without this group of peoples, not sure Reallusion would still be alive today.

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guy rabiller | GOETZIWOOD STUDIOS
"N.O.E." (Nations Of Earth) Sci-Fi TV Show, Showrunner.

I really don't disagree with your assertions about where the real time renderer could/should be, but it's not there yet as you state, hence the need for a well integrated ray trace renderer in my opinion.  Perhaps they'll eventually be able to improve the real time renderer where a ray trace or similar type renderer is not needed or wanted by some people as you allude to.  It obviously is not an easy thing to develop for them.

I don't think it is necessary that they only focus on improving the real time rendering at the cost of having a true renderer unless they were certain they'd be able to improve the real time renderer to a point where a true renderer was not needed, which has not been the case.  I want it and others do too based on how the real time renderer is and how it has progressed.  Some of us like to use IClone and have the resources where we don't have to render on a single desktop.  We all know how long rendering can take on a single machine (although I've had some decent results with Red Shift in the past in Maya on a single machine with several gpus).  So if a renderer can be well integrated, perhaps that will satisfy some of their customers while they improve the real time renderer to come closer to that near realism the masses of users will find acceptable.  I'd love to see the real time renderer improved too.

Thanks for your perspective.


4x gtx 980ti, 2x xeon 2550v4, 512gb RAM, 1tb m.2

Obviously, iRay is capable of PBR rendering.

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guy rabiller | GOETZIWOOD STUDIOS
"N.O.E." (Nations Of Earth) Sci-Fi TV Show, Showrunner.

@KLS_PROD
With all the resources you have, why are you using iClone, actually ?

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guy rabiller | GOETZIWOOD STUDIOS
"N.O.E." (Nations Of Earth) Sci-Fi TV Show, Showrunner.

No its not