Should all renders from everybody be done as EXR? In short, no. If you are happy with your renders, which, until now in the native renderer couldn't be EXR anyway, then PNG sequence or AVI all day long. I only speak for myself, and view the renders I get from Iclone to be the start of the post process, so the flexibility of a 32 bit render is what I want. My original question was if the Reallusion implementation of EXR uses an 8 bit frame buffer, or a higher precision, floating point buffer. If it's the former, then we don't have any more advantage in post really than rendering PNG. If it's the latter, for me at least, that's a huge gain in post. Is it a deal breaker? Nope, I can still get results like I want in Blender. It would just save me a few steps and streamline the process.

Intel Core i7-13700F - 32GB Memory - NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 TI. Iclone 8, Character Creator 4, Blender, Davinci Resolve studio, Fusion studio

Well, I'm really at a stage in life where I'm not going to do much post work anymore, even to color grade.  I just use whatever comes out.

But I have to admit that the idea there is a greater dynamic range there means (in my mind, at least) that it will look better on screen.  Unlike a still image, though, I can't very well set up a situation to compare final renders when it comes to outputting an MP4, for example.  I dunno - can I get something approaching HDR using that approach?  Again, at my limited life (left) I want to keep it as simple as possible.  If all I have to do is to just render to EXR (versus PNG) then I'm on board.

I guess I'll have to make some tests to see if these (old) eyes can see a difference.

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Alienware Aurora R16, Win 11, i9-149000KF, 3.20GHz CPU, 64GB RAM, RTX 4090 (24GB), Samsung 870 Pro 8TB, Gen3 MVNe M-2 SSD, 4TBx2, 39" Alienware Widescreen Monitor
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

Hey Mike,

The TLDR version is that if you do any kind of post work an EXR file will provide greater dynamic range, prevent color banding and gives you more flexibility when doing render passes, color grading and the like…

Intel Core i7-13700F - 32GB Memory - NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 TI. Iclone 8, Character Creator 4, Blender, Davinci Resolve studio, Fusion studio

Oh, I should add that switching layers back and forth in PS (to see) there definitely IS a difference - the EXR image looks "brighter" but I'm guessing that's because it has more dynamic range, right?

Hmmm - I have to ponder this all out.  Should we ALL be using EXR from now on?  

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Alienware Aurora R16, Win 11, i9-149000KF, 3.20GHz CPU, 64GB RAM, RTX 4090 (24GB), Samsung 870 Pro 8TB, Gen3 MVNe M-2 SSD, 4TBx2, 39" Alienware Widescreen Monitor
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

Okay, the EXR file (in Photoshop, at least) is 32 bits, which also includes the alpha channel.  Does that answer your original question?

I put a PNG image on top of the EXR one (in PS) and there is definitely a "difference".  Here is what the PNG image looks like:



And here is the "difference" (this layer set on top of the EXR image with "difference" selected):



Now - what the heck this means I have zero idea.  Looking at the EXR image I can't visually see any difference but clearly there IS some.  So what I want to know is - how would this make things better in an animation?  I'm guessing I can import the EXR images in to, say, Premiere, and then render out that way, but what does that buy me?  (Other than the EXR images are twice the size of the PNG ones).

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Alienware Aurora R16, Win 11, i9-149000KF, 3.20GHz CPU, 64GB RAM, RTX 4090 (24GB), Samsung 870 Pro 8TB, Gen3 MVNe M-2 SSD, 4TBx2, 39" Alienware Widescreen Monitor
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

Originally developed by visual effects powerhouse, ILM, the EXR format is designed for photorealistic rendering, compositing, and digital intermediate use cases. All the things an Academy Award-winning visual effects company would need from a file format.

Some of the format’s technical aspects make this heritage obvious

• Up to 40 f-stops of high dynamic range
• 32-bit floating point depth
• Lossless compression
• Alpha channel
• Multi-pass and multi-channel images
• Extensive additional metadata support

Warped Reality VFX.

Don't know the answer but could you please explain to this old man what EXR output even is?

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Alienware Aurora R16, Win 11, i9-149000KF, 3.20GHz CPU, 64GB RAM, RTX 4090 (24GB), Samsung 870 Pro 8TB, Gen3 MVNe M-2 SSD, 4TBx2, 39" Alienware Widescreen Monitor
Mike "ex-genius" Kelley

When rendering with EXR in iclone, does this result in an 8 bit EXR file or is the output buffer for Iclone’s native renderer higher in resolution now?

I sincerely hope it’s the latter, but I’m happy with the direction this is going…

Intel Core i7-13700F - 32GB Memory - NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 TI. Iclone 8, Character Creator 4, Blender, Davinci Resolve studio, Fusion studio