Iray Plugin for iClone 7 and Character Creator 3


https://forum.reallusion.com/Topic374900.aspx
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By Miranda (RL) - 6 Years Ago
Hello everyone, here are some information to help you evaluate the Iray Plugin before the official launch date. 
If you have any questions, please leave a comment in this thread.

Compatibility

The Iray plugin supports both Character Creator 3 and iClone 7.
*Iray ready iClone 7 will be made available in the final quarter of 2018.

Hardware Support
  1. Iray supports any number or combination of NVIDIA CUDA GPUs and CPUs running within the same machine and gives you control over which are being used for rendering.
  2. AMD graphics card is not supported in this architecture. 
  3. NVIDIA CUDA GPUs System requirements
    • GPUs of CUDA compute capability 3.0 and higher are supported
    • The drivers needs to support CUDA 9.0
  4. Reference: NVIDIA Render Performance Benchmark
https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/54462b7b-eed2-46a4-8e3f-885e.jpg

Example: a system with two NVIDIA GTX-1080 graphic cards can almost double the render speed.
https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/b2931c36-5cc6-4eb4-8e22-bc54.jpg


Performance

Rendering speed for the Iray Plugin is on par with NVidia Iray.  We will perform more tests and provide users a reference report by the time of the official launch.

Animation Sequence Rendering

Multiple frame rendering is available for iClone's Iray plugin, while Character Creator will only offer single frame rendering.

Lighting and Shadow

iClone provides fine-grain control over real-time lighting and shadows which allow it to bend reality with the likes of Shadow Caster and shadowless lighting.
Iray is a raytracing system with physically based rendering wherefore any type of light source and emissive mesh must cast shadows.  

Example: iClone can support shadowless lighting while Iray can not.
https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/8ef0b0c1-c393-4165-8e57-9f64.gif

Example: iClone can cast shadows without a light source while Iray can not. This explains why there is a difference in the shadows for the WIP 1 video.

https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/6ccae5f2-2c80-43c7-9b6b-4a5e.gif


Supported iClone Post Effects

In the the first Iray PlugIn release, we will focus on Iray’s photorealistic rendering, iClone camera and light mapping, as well as the full MDL material support. We do hope we can deal with other post effects like LUT, HDR, or NPR in the near future. 


Compatibility to the Existing iClone Functions

Only the incompatible ones are listed: 
  • Heightmap Terrain -- will be supported in the next official release 
  • SpeedTree -- will be supported in the next official release
  • Water
  • Particle (e.g. PopcornFX)

Indigo Comparison

The implementation of Iray has superceded the feature sets of the legacy Indigo render system.

 IrayIndigo
CompanyNvidiaGlare Technologies
Available Render ModesInteractive & PhotorealPhotoreal
Supports CPU RenderingYesYes
Support GPU RenderingYesYes
Render SpeedFastSlow
Supports Disney PBR WorkflowYesNo
Supports Multi-passesYesNo
Material FormatMDL (Exchangeable)IGM


Iray Batch Render

iClone and CC will export and pass the scene to Iray Batch Render, which implies that users are allowed to render without iClone and CC running in the background. 

*The Development Team is looking into cloud-based rendering service, but we can't promise anything at this moment.

By Firepro - 6 Years Ago
"iClone and CC will export and pass the scene to Iray Batch Render, which implies that users are allowed to render without iClone and CC running on the background. "

Can you please elaborate on the iRay Batch Renderer?  Thanks!
By raxel_67 - 6 Years Ago
I don't mean to offend anyone but RL really needs to proofread their announcements, bad sintaxis, incomplete sentences, etc. In some cases it is a bit confusing
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
Thanks for the information.
I know we still have questions, and will continue to think of more, but every update is appreciated.  At least it sounds like Reallusion has been listening.



P.S.
I was not surprised at all to hear the Iray plug-in will not support PopcornFX.  At least not yet.
I believe I put that in my one of my very first don't-get-too-excited-yet posts when the plug-in was first released.

Oh, I am still excited, but I expected limitations, and assumed there would be some that will stop a lot of people from rendering their movies in Iray.  Some may have great success, but if PopcornFX is important to you, you'll continue to render in iClone.  SpeedTree?  How to control refraction, caustics, and subsurface scattering from inside iClone?  And we still need to learn a lot more about real-world performance.  But as I said above, all updates and bits of information are appreciated.
By Miranda (RL) - 6 Years Ago
raxel_67 (8/6/2018)
I don't mean to offend anyone but RL really needs to proofread their announcements, bad sintaxis, incomplete sentences, etc. In some cases it is a bit confusing

My bad! We will update a new version later.
By akuei2 - 6 Years Ago
PopcornFX Compatibility?

It's under evaluation. PopcornFX will not be compatible in the first release.


Sound's no good ...

PopcornFX was one point I continue using IClone7, and Iray Plugin purpose enhance DAZ Integrate result.
Hope Iray Plugin don't step back what's Indigo Plugin go-on.
By rollasoc - 6 Years Ago
"AMD graphics card is not supported in this architecture. "

Yeah, for me, bought a plugin I can't use..... (laptop has AMD graphics card, so can't change it).

By akuei2 - 6 Years Ago
Yeah,replace new nvidia computer Tongue
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
rollasoc (8/6/2018)
"AMD graphics card is not supported in this architecture. "

Yeah, for me, bought a plugin I can't use..... (laptop has AMD graphics card, so can't change it).


Iray will run on your CPU, just more slowly than on an Nvidia card.

So it now comes down to your patience...  for individual stills, you might be okay.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
Quoting myself from 4 months ago:

For the Iray plug-in... I really hope that everything works seemlessly...  Textures (PBR and traditional), lighting, camera, PopcornFX, SpeedTree, PopVideo, DOF... fog... etc...

There is a chaance the rendering speeds will be "acceptable" (at least to some people) assuming it incorporates the AI Denoiser (and I think it will), but if parts of your scene don't transfer correctly into Iray, then the speed becomes irrelevant.


We now know PopcornFX is not supported (for now, at least).

What about SpeedTree?  Fog?  PopVideo?
What about animated textures (video on the diffuse/base material channel)?
What about keyframed Substances?  Or Substances that are "animated" via the $TIME variable (great for water caustics, among other things)?

What else can we render in iClone that won't render via the Iray plug-in?


By animagic - 6 Years Ago
To have PopcornFX in your Iray renders you may be able to do something with compositing. I'm not an expert in compositing (I wish I was), but with some trickery you might be able to combine iClone and Iray renders.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
animagic (8/6/2018)
To have PopcornFX in your Iray renders .....  with some trickery you might be able to combine iClone and Iray renders.


True.  I'm simply trying to help caution people to manage their expectations.

You might not be able to press the magic "render in Iray" button and have your complete scene appear in Iray.

We recently learned your PopcornFX items won't render in Iray (no surprise to me).  I wonder what other shortcomings are lurking beneath the surface, waiting to be discovered.

If Reallusion knows of any other "not supported via the Iray plug-in" features, I hope they share that list with us very soon.  For some reason, I'm skeptical of "Fog" working well.

By illusionLAB - 6 Years Ago
As IRay is a "ray tracer" it needs polys in the scene to "trace"... as far as I can tell, PopCornFX is an overlay that only exists in the GPU using World Space/Normals/Z-Depth to simulate 'in scene' interaction.  So, in order for IRay to render PopCorn particles, the export would have to create geometry for the ray tracer to see (because it can't render something that's not actually physically in the scene).  It's also possible that the PopCornFX render could happen "in the background" and then be "overlayed" onto the IRay renders - much like LUTs, glares, blooms etc.  Both scenarios have many challenges Wink
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
animagic (8/6/2018)
To have PopcornFX in your Iray renders you may be able to do something with compositing. I'm not an expert in compositing (I wish I was), but with some trickery you might be able to combine iClone and Iray renders.


The problem is not so much in compositing as it is in GI -- assuming GI even works with iRay, by not having it available with Popcorn you are losing a LOT of capability.

(Now if it turns out iRay won't work with GI at all -- include me out (and I wish I hadn't even spent $50 for it))
By animagic - 6 Years Ago
I agree the lack of GI (permanently) would be a deal breaker as I use that a lot. I wished we had a clearer timeline...Unsure
By illusionLAB - 6 Years Ago
G.I., real reflections, real shadows, lighting on object particles (like the insects) will not render as part of the scene unless the PCFX particles are converted to textured polys.  I'd say you're safer assuming that it's unlikely to see PCFX IRay render support anytime soon... it's DNA is designed for "real time game engines", so the architecture is significantly different than a particle system designed for ray tracing.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
Re "Global Illumination" --- Did I miss something?  Did Reallusion say it's not supported?

I immediately thought to myself, that's an inherent feature of ray tracing.

This Nvidia article says, "Iray is a high-performance, global illumination rendering technology."


By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
I'm pretty sure Mark means GI for particles.
By Rampa - 6 Years Ago
Raytracing inherently has GI within it. The GI in game engines and such is a very basic form of raytracing that gives a limited amount of larger (think voxels) rays.

GI just means that the light rays bounce at least once, thus providing secondary lighting.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago

If the context was "particles," which aren't supported (since they have no geometry, and they aren't exactly lights either), then of course they won't produce any GI contribution.  I was briefly confused why there was a sudden concern about a lack of GI, so that explains it.  Other than cases like that, GI is a natural part of ray tracing, as I said earlier.

Iray supports volumetrics.  I wonder how iClone's fog settings will transfer into Iray.

On a positive note, Iray should do a wonderful job of DOF rendering.

By Ascensi - 6 Years Ago
Will purchasing an Iray plugin combo for CC3 also work for iClone once implemented or would we have to buy a different plugin for every Reallusion product?  I may have missed this note somewhere.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
.
Ascensi (8/7/2018)
Will purchasing an Iray plugin combo for CC3 also work for iClone once implemented...


Yes.


Was answered in another thread, and restated at the first begining of this thread.
Miranda (RL) (8/2/2018)

Compatibility

The Iray plugin supports both Character Creator 3 and iClone 7.
*Iray ready iClone 7 will be made available in the final quarter of 2018.


It is the same Plug-in.  You don't need to pay again for both a CC3 Iray plug-in and an iClone Iray plug-in.  Pay once, and it works in both places.  It will probably work with iClone 7.3, but it was mentioned that it could also be 7.3.1 or 7.3.2 or something like that.
By Ascensi - 6 Years Ago
Well just made the purchase then a few minutes later this caught my attention "*Iray render requires an additional paid plug-in which supports both Character Creator 3 and iClone 7. "

This statement is listed on 
https://www.reallusion.com/character-creator/production.html#iray  which is very confusing being listed on the plugin page and then stating an additional plugin is required. 

If only one plugin is required to work in both iClone and CC3 it should be stated for example: "This plugin is required for IRAY Renderer and works for both CC3 and iClone 7 
in Q4, 2018"


By toystorylab - 6 Years Ago
Ascensi (8/7/2018)
Well just made the purchase then a few minutes later this caught my attention "*Iray render requires an additional paid plug-in which supports both Character Creator 3 and iClone ...
Damned, you just bought the required plugin, where is the problem?


By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
For us, who are following closely with RL development it might not be a problem. But for new visitors it does sound a little odd. They indeed need to rephrase it.
By joel.lovell - 6 Years Ago
Anyone on the RL dev team able to say whether scenes with iRay shaders in DAZ will be able to be exported with those shaders intact into iRay for iRay rendering?
Will the 'convert to PBR' and substance shaders used work fine with iRay render? (I would think they would)
A thought / concern about animation rendering using iRay:

I have a Windows 10 system with 32GB RAM, Titan X 12GB GPU (Maxwell), and for me, DAZ iRay rendering is reasonably fast for still images. Animation though, is problematic. Even on this system a 4K resolution frame takes at least 2-3 minutes for a good quality still, so a 5 minute movie would be quite a few days of non-stop rendering. I hope they have some nifty optimization tricks if they are intending this to be used for animation..

For new shoppers of GPU's go for a GTX-1080 Ti. It has 11GB of RAM, and a price point very much lower than a newer Titan X and nearly the same performance.
DAZ has some excellent forum discussions about peoples experiences using various NVIDIA GPU's for iRay, including multiple GPU's.
By TonyDPrime - 6 Years Ago
I know that CC3 says single-frame render only, but Peter (RL) I think said something that there may be multi-frame rendering from CC3...  
And then people were saying they would like have turntable-renders for characters out of CC3 Iray, right?
  
By Miranda (RL) - 6 Years Ago
Hi everyone,

We just updated the post for the incompatible iClone features. For your reference.
  • Heightmap Terrain -- will be supported in the next official release 
  • SpeedTree -- will be supported in the next official release
  • Water
  • Particle (e.g. PopcornFX)

Miranda

justaviking (8/6/2018)
animagic (8/6/2018)
To have PopcornFX in your Iray renders .....  with some trickery you might be able to combine iClone and Iray renders.


True.  I'm simply trying to help caution people to manage their expectations.

You might not be able to press the magic "render in Iray" button and have your complete scene appear in Iray.

We recently learned your PopcornFX items won't render in Iray (no surprise to me).  I wonder what other shortcomings are lurking beneath the surface, waiting to be discovered.

If Reallusion knows of any other "not supported via the Iray plug-in" features, I hope they share that list with us very soon.  For some reason, I'm skeptical of "Fog" working well.



By toystorylab - 6 Years Ago
4u2ges (8/8/2018)
For us, who are following closely with RL development it might not be a problem. But for new visitors it does sound a little odd. They indeed need to rephrase it.

You're right...
It was late at night in Berlin Germany and my answer was somehow kinda rude. No intention to be rude Kiss
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
It looks like my early concerns were well justified for both PopcornFX and SpeedTree.  I did not consider any terrains to be a potential issue.
I am very glad to see SpeedTree and Heightmap Terrains are planned for the next release, though that clearly leaves plenty of work left for later updates.

THANK YOU for the additional information, Miranda.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
FYI...

From the Substance Painter forum:  https://forum.allegorithmic.com/index.php/topic,25046.0.html
Yes, you're right, I am having issues with Daz3D's rendering as well. I think it is related to nVidia iRay, since both substance painter and Daz use it.


For quite a while, Allegorithmic has been recommending an older set of Nvidia drivers.  (See link in the thread I referenced.)  Some people work fine with the new drivers, but many people need to run the older ones.  The "fix" is out of Allegorithmic's hands; it's an Nvidia thing.  Hopefully it all works great for us CC3 and iClone users.

Isn't technology fun?  Some days I have to remind myself that this is a hobby, and I do it for fun.  Rolleyes
By wires - 6 Years Ago
Miranda (RL) (8/8/2018)
Hi everyone,

We just updated the post for the incompatible iClone features. For your reference.
  • Heightmap Terrain -- will be supported in the next official release 
  • SpeedTree -- will be supported in the next official release
  • Water
  • Particle (e.g. PopcornFX)

Miranda


This makes the plugin totally useless for any, and all, outdoor scenes at the moment. As with the Indigo nightmare it would once again appear that RL are neglecting the needs (hopes) of animators and trying to grab the DAZ market share of pretty stills.
By akuei2 - 6 Years Ago
wires (8/9/2018)
Miranda (RL) (8/8/2018)
Hi everyone,

We just updated the post for the incompatible iClone features. For your reference.
  • Heightmap Terrain -- will be supported in the next official release 
  • SpeedTree -- will be supported in the next official release
  • Water
  • Particle (e.g. PopcornFX)

Miranda


This makes the plugin totally useless for any, and all, outdoor scenes at the moment. As with the Indigo nightmare it would once again appear that RL are neglecting the needs (hopes) of animators and trying to grab the DAZ market share of pretty stills.



Agree,improve real-time render engine will be better method (like eevee), unless develop half complete plugin.
By raxel_67 - 6 Years Ago
I can understand popcorn fx... But water and speedtrees? This are so BASIC! I would rather wait than get a half finished plugin
By animagic - 6 Years Ago
raxel_67 (8/9/2018)
I can understand popcorn fx... But water and speedtrees? This are so BASIC! I would rather wait than get a half finished plugin

Agreed. I don't really see the point either...Unsure

It would also be nice to have much better examples than with Indigo (once the plugin is mature) of sizable animated iClone scenes. With, like, you know, some action...w00t

Looks like I just saved $50. If I invest wisely, it may grow to the purchase price of the full-featured plugin once ready...Tongue
By lutz0815 - 6 Years Ago
Question, can the Iray Plug-in render 3D and Panorama?
By hattori kun - 6 Years Ago
Its a paid plugin? Like indigo? 
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
Yes and yes.  <g>.  Looks like the price will be around $100, or you can preorder now for $50 (with CC3).

Seems to me that for $50 it's worth a shot no matter what, although I don't hold out much hope for using it myself (but I did preorder it).
By hattori kun - 6 Years Ago
Oh I see. I'll pass. Indigo was never fixed. I'll stick with the realtime renderer.
By eternityblue - 6 Years Ago
i WISH THE ENERGY POURED INTO THIS WAS USED TO GET SUBSURFACE SCATTERING IN THE REAL TIME ENGINE. tHAT WOULD BE AN INCREDIBLE IMPROVEMENT TO IcLONE AS A PRODUCT OVERALL, AND MAKE NATIVE RENDERS STAND UP way better to commercial animation. (sorry caps lock) 
By TheOldBuffer - 6 Years Ago
This is whats coming next from Nvidia,
https://www.pcgamer.com/nvidia-unveils-turing-architecture-providing-a-glimpse-inside-the-next-geforce-cards/
By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
Not a lotta love going around for IRAY, however it makes easy / amazing renders in Daz. I get five minute plus movies with special effects not being practical with most home hardware systems however would short 5 - 15 second clips of talking heads / torsos with a still in the background be feasible?

Got burned with Indigo, don't wanna repeat that mistake, I assume CC3 and the IRAY Plugin fall under the 2 week refund policy after activation?

Gotta lot going on with other matters currently and wanna jump on the pre-sale offer but not sure I'll have time to actually use the new releases till October / November.

Thanks for any info..
By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
VirtualMedia (8/18/2018)
I get five minute plus movies with special effects not being practical with most home hardware systems however would short 5 - 15 second clips of talking heads / torsos with a still in the background be feasible?


Yes, sure and even longer. All would depend on the hardware at your disposal and consequently on how much wait time can you tolerate. I am myself impatiently waiting to get my hands on Iray in iClone implementation (I don't really care about Iray in CC3) and compare it with Indigo.The complain about Indigo I have now is frames built time and enormousness amount of disk space taken in a process. I want to see how Iray would be handling that. Lot of other questions like materials, how would iClone pass its PBR materials/substances to Iray and how much additional work would require to tweak them (if any?). And if I have to tweak, would it be done in iClone on in Iray settings panel?
Regarding the render speed, I think it would be neglect-able plus/minus difference compare to Indigo. Then again the main attraction is AI denoiser (Indigo has Clamp contribution). Though it looks they have a different approach they both eventually wash the render out. So the balancing approach is a must. And the lack or initial support for trees, water and terrain in Iray is quite discouraging. Those have to have support... fast.

Finally let me share this quick render in Indigo with stats. I'd be comparing this one with Iray first, when it's available. As you may see it is a fairly loaded scene with a mirror. Background is a city view behind the window, the rest are props.
I did render this 2K image 40 sec (no post work, just converted from PNG to JPG to save bandwidth). Full Clamp Contribution to get rid of "flies", 320 spp. Enormous, 370MB cache. Render speed 17 M sample/sec with 2 1080Ti GPUs.


https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/ccedaadd-f5d2-449a-b545-1441.jpg


By raxel_67 - 6 Years Ago
I have been learning substance painter for a couple of weeks, and it has iray included and material conversion is automatic and requires no tweaking so i guess it could be the case in iclone. Also it is stupidly fast, way faster than indigo 3
By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
So it is save to assume that at least the materials would be handled way better. Still the question, would all the textures be cached for each frame, or there would be some sort of "smart" routine to distinguish if the substance/texture is animated or not and based on that cache it only once or for the respective frames. Same goes to the mesh. There is no reason to cache static objects in the scene for each frame. Current ratio of the images/mesh cache folder sizes in Indigo is 60/40. So it is important that both have a "smart" cache for exporting animations. Otherwise it's going to be the "same old...". BTW Indigo 3 is a history, I was referring to 4.2.14.
By raxel_67 - 6 Years Ago
I know, but i stopped using indigo a Long time ago, maybe indigo 4 iss faster, but like you say the exporting process and poor material convertion kills it
By raxel_67 - 6 Years Ago
One discrepancy i have found between substance painter and iray is opacity, there is a mismatch between realtime renderer and iray. You need to be more agressive when setting the opacity, other than that the conversión is pretty identical.
By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
I have a Substance Painter and I keep saying to myself, I need to fire it up and start learning, yet I am still there Photo-shopping lol. So the opacity.. good to know Raxel Smile
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
VirtualMedia (8/18/2018)
Got burned with Indigo, don't wanna repeat that mistake, I assume CC3 and the IRAY Plugin fall under the 2 week refund policy after activation?


After "release" (for pre-orders), I believe.

By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
So I took 2 hours and made some tests. One would ask why am I keep coming back to Indigo, when Iray is knocking on the door?
I tell you why. Since it is still not clear how exactly the animation export would work in Iray, and there still time until it is integrated into iClone.
Maybe... just maybe someone from RL would read this and do some additional *easy* tweaks to the export routine.
But maybe it is already written the right way and all my findings are not so important anymore. But until it is all clear....

I do not want to make a video about this, but rather try to be brief writing my findings.

Simple setup in iClone:

3 primitive objects
2 objects are animated, one is static.
one camera - moving
a default 14MB hdri file.
1 second of animation 30 fps, 30 frames to render (60 selected)
2 seconds is set to animate each frame in Indigo

All set and ready for Export to Indigo format.

Those who tried rendering animations in Indigo would know, that a basic structure per frame includes .igs file and 2 folders for images and for the mesh.
That is what I have: 30 .igs files and 60 folders. Total size is 430 MB for 1 second of animation!

Next, I opened a first .igs file in Notepad++. It is a basic XML configuration file with path pointers to meshes and images.
Since there is no animated texture in the project, 29 images folders could be simply dumped! And that is what I did.
Even without writing any scripts. In first file I did *search and replace* ALL image paths in every .igs file to the folder for the very first frame. Just a few clicks.
Then I deleted all images folders except for the first one. Now I have total size of 15Mb compare to 430Mb initially.
Next I checked the mesh folders. Honestly, I did not modify anything there. But, as I expected, the mesh for 2 animated primitives differentiates (those are binary files),
while the mesh file for static primitive is exactly the same replicated 30 times.
I am positive if I'd deleted repeated mesh files and changed pointers in .igs, that would not break the format and rendering process either.

Anyhow, started render queue and got my animation in 60 seconds nice and smooth without any errors.

So the point of all this is to show how easy it would have been for RL developers to spend a little more time and make it right from the beginning...
i.e. scan the project *before* exporting and mark what is animated and what is not.
And then create a cache based on findings, thus saving build up time and gigs and gigs of disk space.

Thank you for your attention.

By akuei2 - 6 Years Ago
VirtualMedia (8/18/2018)
Not a lotta love going around for IRAY, however it makes easy / amazing renders in Daz. I get five minute plus movies with special effects not being practical with most home hardware systems however would short 5 - 15 second clips of talking heads / torsos with a still in the background be feasible?

Got burned with Indigo, don't wanna repeat that mistake, I assume CC3 and the IRAY Plugin fall under the 2 week refund policy after activation?

Gotta lot going on with other matters currently and wanna jump on the pre-sale offer but not sure I'll have time to actually use the new releases till October / November.

Thanks for any info..


Agree, most people are worry new iray plugin has bad behaviour to compatible current ( old ) Iclone content.
For safety 1st, we should wait after release & decide purchase or not(Yes,Indigo is nightmare)

By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
justaviking (8/18/2018)
VirtualMedia (8/18/2018)
Got burned with Indigo, don't wanna repeat that mistake, I assume CC3 and the IRAY Plugin fall under the 2 week refund policy after activation?


After "release" (for pre-orders), I believe.



Was afraid of that.. That's how I got burned with Indigo, RL's push of pre - purchases has got me several times. FOMO is a powerful drug :ermm

By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
4u2ges (8/18/2018)
I have a Substance Painter and I keep saying to myself, I need to fire it up and start learning, yet I am still there Photo-shopping lol. So the opacity.. good to know Raxel Smile


Thanks for the detailed replies, I'm also wishing I had the time to fire up Substance Painter and get a grip on it before the IRAY IC7 release. IRAY in CC will almost be pointless in my use case without export and animated renders in IC.

By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
@4u2ges,

1,000% agree.  Only the things that change need to be exported multiple times.

If you have a scene with a character walking and talking, the only thing that needs to be exported more than once is the character's mesh (body+clothing).  Even his textures only need to be exported one time.  I proved that to myself by editing some .igs files, just like you did.  Imagine how much faster the export process would be for a 5-minute clip.  (There are other efficiencies available to.  For things that move but don't deform, you just change their "position" without re-exporting the object's mesh.)  Talk about low-hanging fruit, eh?  A junior programmer should be able to implement a 90% solution in fairly short order.

I've explained the same thing to Reallusion,  In detail.  Many times.  I sincerely hope you have more success in your quest than I did.



It will be really interesting to see how Iray animation inside iClone operates.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
VirtualMedia (8/19/2018)
justaviking (8/18/2018)
VirtualMedia (8/18/2018)
Got burned with Indigo, don't wanna repeat that mistake, I assume CC3 and the IRAY Plugin fall under the 2 week refund policy after activation?

After "release" (for pre-orders), I believe.

Was afraid of that.. That's how I got burned with Indigo, RL's push of pre - purchases has got me several times. FOMO is a powerful drug :ermm


I FOUND SOMETHING OFFICIAL...
https://kb.reallusion.com/Purchase/52688/Can-I-refund-a-Character-Creator-3-Preorder-package
(I knew it.  I was just having a difficult time finding a statement from Reallusion.)


You still get time to test and potentially return your purchase.  But you are constrained more to Reallusion's schedule.  If it gets released when you are on a 2-week cruise, then you're sort of screwed  But as long as you are home and download it promptly after the release becomes official and available, you'll have time to evaluate it.
By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
Dennis, If I knew  you went through the same, I probably would not bother. But then again, I like to get to the bottom of things lol.
You said it about how easy it would have been to tweak and optimize the plugin. Lets hope they listen and do it right this time (if not already).
I am anxious myself to see how it would be worked out with Iray
By illusionLAB - 6 Years Ago
Yes, except iRay for iClone won't be ready within the 14 days - so no chance of evaluating of iRay animation renders from iClone.  All we know is that iRay "can" render animations - kinda like Indigo "can" render animations.  C'mon RL, if you have a 'great product' then you should be showing it off... a 5 minute demo of iClone rendering an animation with iRay is all we need to "feel good" about pre-ordering iRay.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
illusionLAB (8/19/2018)
Yes, except iRay for iClone won't be ready within the 14 days - so no chance of evaluating of iRay animation renders from iClone.  All we know is that iRay "can" render animations - kinda like Indigo "can" render animations.  C'mon RL, if you have a 'great product' then you should be showing it off... a 5 minute demo of iClone rendering an animation with iRay is all we need to "feel good" about pre-ordering iRay.


That's a good point.  You won't be able to test the ANIMATION functionality within 14 days of the CC3/Iray release.  Not if you pre-order it with CC3.
By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
illusionLAB (8/19/2018)
Yes, except iRay for iClone won't be ready within the 14 days - so no chance of evaluating of iRay animation renders from iClone.  All we know is that iRay "can" render animations - kinda like Indigo "can" render animations.  C'mon RL, if you have a 'great product' then you should be showing it off... a 5 minute demo of iClone rendering an animation with iRay is all we need to "feel good" about pre-ordering iRay.


I third that, either show us an animation rendering demo in IC7 pre-sale or allow us to evaluate in context for 2 weeks RL.. Please!


By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
As most around here know, I'm seldom an apologist for RL, but in this case I have to say -- perhaps it's a bit too much to complain about.  Let's face it -- we're talking $50 here.  I *realize* everyone has different economic situations, and I'm on a fixed income myself, but there's an awful lot of complaining for the price of (nowadays) seeing a movie with your favorite partner.  

The flip side is -- the total cost of the plugin is only $100.  So if truly you can't afford to take a chance with $50 then you can wait until it comes out and end up spending $100 for this fantastic gee-whiz thing.  Not a bad deal either way, IMHO.  

(Personally, I think iRay will be useless for animation.  But I paid the $50 because, well, the price of a movie, and I've wasted FAR more money on things that didn't pan out).  If iRay really is the cats pajamas for animation, folks are going to spend a TON more on GPUs to take advantage of it (the only reason I haven't sold my old 1080 is I'm waiting to see if iRay is worth it, because then I'll run dual cards alongside my Titan).

(Now, if you look back at my posts you'll see that I was the first to complain about them not showing any animation with iRay, and expressing my concerns about it.  However, that was before I knew the price.  As I said -- bigger things to worry about).
By hattori kun - 6 Years Ago
If the render process for animation is the same as Indigo, this new Iray plugin is pretty much useless in production.
The export process is the major issue with the Indigo plugin. It takes a huge amount of time to process each frame on a complex scene. Sometimes hours for a 300 frame scene. Forget the huge files it exports, hdd is cheap, but time is money and when you use Indigo with its flawed export process, you lose a lot during the export process. And then that's the time to render with the indigo engine after the export process. Indigo is very much behind compared to Redshift and Octane and its extremely slow at this point.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
@Reallusion,

Do you think it's about time to change the status of this Feedback Tracker issue from "Active" to "Assigned?"
https://www.reallusion.com/FeedBackTracker/Issue/Nvidia-Iray-Support

As far as I know, "Active" merely means someone at Reallusion as read the post, nothing more than that.  Certainly Iray support is past the "Active" point.

This is why I continue to have little faith that unresolved, but still valid, requests in FBT don't get carried forward to the next version.  But it's really stupid for us to have to re-enter all our 6.x requests and report them against 7.x.  Are older entries forgotten and abandoned or not?


ADDED...

Another FBT issue reported against iC6 that, I think, has bees addressed in iC7:  https://www.reallusion.com/FeedBackTracker/Issue/Physically-accurate-cameras-lenses/1/camera
Wasn't "real" cameras a big deal in a 7.x release, so shouldn't this FBT issue be marked as "Released?"
By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
Kelleytoons (8/19/2018)
As most around here know, I'm seldom an apologist for RL, but in this case I have to say -- perhaps it's a bit too much to complain about.  Let's face it -- we're talking $50 here.  I *realize* everyone has different economic situations, and I'm on a fixed income myself, but there's an awful lot of complaining for the price of (nowadays) seeing a movie with your favorite partner.  

The flip side is -- the total cost of the plugin is only $100.  So if truly you can't afford to take a chance with $50 then you can wait until it comes out and end up spending $100 for this fantastic gee-whiz thing.  Not a bad deal either way, IMHO.  

(Personally, I think iRay will be useless for animation.  But I paid the $50 because, well, the price of a movie, and I've wasted FAR more money on things that didn't pan out).  If iRay really is the cats pajamas for animation, folks are going to spend a TON more on GPUs to take advantage of it (the only reason I haven't sold my old 1080 is I'm waiting to see if iRay is worth it, because then I'll run dual cards alongside my Titan).

(Now, if you look back at my posts you'll see that I was the first to complain about them not showing any animation with iRay, and expressing my concerns about it.  However, that was before I knew the price.  As I said -- bigger things to worry about).


Mike I appreciate you frequently calling RL out when you see something out of line however.. I think you're missing the point on this, when RL or anyone else pre - sales something with a promise you expect the promise is kept. Seen this play out with RL many times before.
  1. Pre - paid for Goz in IC6 - never delivered
  2. Pre - paid for CT8 because it was going to revolutionize facial animation - never delivered
  3. Indigo - no need to explain..
It's not that it's 'just $50' it's principal and cumulative. I won't install CT8 or indigo because they waste space and resources on my pc and remind me of getting burned. Maybe it's just dinner and a movie with my wife but I'd rather have that experience with my wife in memory than getting taken advantage of.

Rant aside I'm an IRAY advocate and personally find it to be one of the main reasons for pre - purchasing Pipeline and Plugin. I don't think it's much to ask to see an IC animation render demo pre - purchase, considering the IC version won't likely drop till December when there will be no 2 week option to say 'not this time'.

Maybe in the 3rd Work in Progress..?
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
Well, it's unlikely I'll ever stop complaining about something RL has done (I'm sort of that kind of gadfly) and, yes, it's an odd position for me to be in here trying to defend them.  I understand what you say about history, and while I did buy CT8 for the facial creation thing (and still find it useful in that regard) I didn't get burned with Indigo or Goz, so perhaps if I had I'd be more cautious.  But I'm still confused by what folks are worried about here.  If you have such concerns about iRay based on your past experiences, then by all means pass it by and wait.  So you end up paying $50 more?  Isn't that worth it if it works as you want?

Let me see if I can explain it another way -- yesterday my wife was going back and forth about renting a car for her upcoming trip to visit her family in Iowa.  She was worried because there is a $50 cancellation fee (apparently pretty standard among car renters).  What she was worried about was she *might* not need the car if things work out a certain way (kind of complicated, but let's just say there's a fair chance she won't need it due to circumstances).  What I told her was this -- she HAD to have a car, and if it worked out that she had a car another way, then she was out $50 but she would then SAVE $200 (the total cost of rental was $250).  IOW, it was a win-win situation -- either she didn't lose that $50, or she didn't have to spend $250.

I see this exactly the same way -- if iRay doesn't pan out, so I'm out $50 (coincidentally, the exact same cost :>Wink.  If it does, then I save $50.  But just like a good deal for both parties, it works if you take either side of the bet (this, BTW, is how you know a bet is equitable to both parties -- structure the deal but then allow a person to take either side.  That ensures fairness).  In this case if you DON'T pre-order the plugin you're out an extra $50 but only if it turns out useful to you.  So you win either way.

I would take this kind of bet all day long.
By Peter (RL) - 6 Years Ago
Thank you all for the feedback. I will pass this on to the team for review. Hopefully we can get a demo video out soon to show how Iray works in iClone 7. Smile
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
Peter (RL) (8/20/2018)
Thank you all for the feedback. I will pass this on to the team for review. Hopefully we can get a demo video out soon to show how Iray works in iClone 7. Smile


With the understanding that "your mileage may vary," some animation times for iClone/Indigo/Iray would be nice to have.  What CPU/GPU/RAM are involved.  Maybe do at least two tests of a one-minute animation.  The "loft scene" would be a good one to consider.

For Indigo, they should report both the "export" time and the "render" time separately.  For Iray, well, that remains to be seen...
By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
Peter (RL) (8/20/2018)
Thank you all for the feedback. I will pass this on to the team for review. Hopefully we can get a demo video out soon to show how Iray works in iClone 7. Smile


Thanks for your efforts and understanding Peter!

Mike I appreciate your analogy however if you placed bets at a casino and won several but they didn't pay up would you continue going to that casino? I'd assume you wouldn't as you're clearly a deep thinker.  Just pointing out analogies can be explained or interpreted different ways. Wink 

I wanna place this bet I just want to be a little more informed about what I'm betting on, I can render stills with IRAY in DS.

Speaking of controversy, what ever happened to sn0000p?


By animagic - 6 Years Ago
I'm too lazy to find the reference, but Miranda has indicated that the mechanism to export from iClone is completely different for Iray compared to Indigo, in that it does not require a complete scene to be exported for each frame, which is kind of a silly way to go about things. So for Indigo the failure for animation is primarily the space requirements. Time is secondary, and Indigo 4 is faster than Indigo 3. I have given up hope that RL will fix the export plugin, but it is what it is. 

I'll probably gamble the $50 for the Iray plugin. I have had my disappointments too with RL, but I never pre-paid for Go-Z, and I doubt if many would have stayed with iClone 5 just because it wasn't included. I would still like to have face creation from a photograph in CC3 rather than having to go the CT8 route (which really was kind of a silly move on RL's part), but I will live with CT8 for now. For me the positives with RL outweigh the negatives, and I would probably not have gotten as far in animation as I have without iClone.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
Regarding Iray and *animation*...  I see it as a $50 gamble either way.

Option 1 - Pay $50 now for something that may not work for you, and you won't be able to get your money back by the time you find out it doesn't work for animation.
Option 2 - Pay $50 "extra" by buying it later, after the early-bird special expires but when you have a chance to evaluate it and keep it only if you like it.

So which risk do you prefer?  

Me?  I placed my pre-order, since I konw I will want to "play" with it, whether it's a viable animation tool or not.
By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
justaviking (8/20/2018)
Regarding Iray and *animation*...  I see it as a $50 gamble either way.

Option 1 - Pay $50 now for something that may not work for you, and you won't be able to get your money back by the time you find out it doesn't work for animation.
Option 2 - Pay $50 "extra" by buying it later, after the early-bird special expires but when you have a chance to evaluate it and keep it only if you like it.

So which risk do you prefer?  

Me?  I placed my pre-order, since I konw I will want to "play" with it, whether it's a viable animation tool or not.


You forgot option 3 - Peter gets us an example Tongue

Got my trigger finger on the purchase button and will likely push it. However on principal alone it would be nice to see a simple 5 second render of a stock avatar waving with specs. I'd bet it triggers a lot of pre - purchases.

By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
Right, Dennis has the example right (in your own example you pay $50 to the casino and IF you win you get another $50 back.   If you lose you lose $50.  This is, indeed, exactly the way casinos work, as I well know from spending 4 decades in Nevada :>Wink.

As I said, it's a win-win bet no matter which side you take.  Will Peter sweeten the deal (i.e. improve the odds of you finding happiness with the plugin?)  Yes, he might, but at the end of the day you pays your money and you takes your chances.
By VirtualMedia - 6 Years Ago
Kelleytoons (8/20/2018)
Right, Dennis has the example right (in your own example you pay $50 to the casino and IF you win you get another $50 back.   If you lose you lose $50.  This is, indeed, exactly the way casinos work, as I well know from spending 4 decades in Nevada :>Wink.

As I said, it's a win-win bet no matter which side you take.  Will Peter sweeten the deal (i.e. improve the odds of you finding happiness with the plugin?)  Yes, he might, but at the end of the day you pays your money and you takes your chances.


Gotta give you credit Mike, your persistent. But $50 of credit towards something you have to wait in line for hours to redeem and isn't practical to use isn't really considered a win-win. Tongue

I've invested $1000's in RL and will likely continue, so I don't think it's to much to ask for a demo, even if I place the bet it would be nice to know Santa's got a nice usable toy in store around Christmas time.

You clearly earned or invested well through life Mike and nor can I complain but it would also be nice to know ahead of time if it's worth researching for and investing in a new PC to make a Christmas gift from Uncle Reallusion worth it, which will be considerably more than $50.

I've got some decent hardware that could get me by for a couple more years depending on what it's used for, however if IRAY in IC rips with an I9 and a couple GTX 1180's it would be nice to know and consider investing in before hand.

Stating the obvious I'm aware Nvidia has documented specs on IRAY and hardware but they don't nor do we have a clue of how IC 7.3 will render with IRAY.  I can and do render stills with IRAY in DS which supported GoZ for years and don't need a duplicate of that.

Not trying to be Sn000000p here I just don't think most people here are in your financial position Mike. Purchasing a product from a reputable company should be based on integrity not a wager.

Peace..


By hattori kun - 6 Years Ago
animagic (8/20/2018)
I'm too lazy to find the reference, but Miranda has indicated that the mechanism to export from iClone is completely different for Iray compared to Indigo, in that it does not require a complete scene to be exported for each frame, which is kind of a silly way to go about things. So for Indigo the failure for animation is primarily the space requirements. Time is secondary, and Indigo 4 is faster than Indigo 3. I have given up hope that RL will fix the export plugin, but it is what it is. 


Time is primary in production. HDD is dirt cheap so space requirements don't mean much these days.  But that export process for Indigo was a BIG FAIL.
In complex scenes the export per frame could take longer than rendering the frame. Lol.  Or Iclone would freeze and crash.
By Stefos - 6 Years Ago
There has been plenty of updates concerning CC3 I pre-ordered it, because I have a good idea what I am going to get for my money! I would of liked to also pre-order the Iray plugin, but very little has been reported on this plugin. I want the plugin for animation, I want it to be fast and to give a good quality render. Indigo was a mistake and takes ages just to render a still. Please Reallusion make a plugin that will render animations with high quality and speed.
It looks to me by what people and RL is saying this will not be the renderer I am looking for.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
@Stefos - Any "ray tracing" renderer is going to be a real challenge for at-home animaiton rendering.

The sad math is pretty simple:
- Suppose a rendering speed of 2-minutes per frame, which would be great ray tracing performance
- Assume 30 frames per second of animation
- A one-minute animation requires 30 fps times 60 seconds, so that's 1800 frames per minute
- At 2 minutes per frame, that's 1600 3600 minutes, or 26.7 60 hours

So...  you are looking at a minimum of 24-hours 2.5 DAYS RENDERING PER MINUTE OF VIDEO.  Most likely much more than that.  And if you find any mistakes and need to re-render it...   patience is a virtue.  For a single "still," no problem.  For an animation, yeah, even a "fast" ray-tracing renderer is a challenge for people who don't have genuine rendering farms.

Keep in mind that was an optimistic view.  Ten minutes per frame is more likely, so that approaches almost 6 days of non-stop rendering per minute of animation.

Hey, I'm a bit of an Iray fan, and rendering in general, but that's the math. 

Honestly, with good textures and proper lighting, you can get some great results with the native IClone renderer.  And "story" still matters.
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
This is why, as always, RL needs to keep working on their native renderer and not spend much (any?) time on things like Iray (just IMHO, of course).
By sonic7 - 6 Years Ago

Glad you brought me to my senses Dennis!
I've been sitting here for the last hour or two, pondering whether I'd made a mistake buying JUST CC3 Pipeline and not the IRAY plugin as well. And I was starting to think *should I* change my order?. Now I'm the sort that would put-up with 24 hours of rendering to yield 1 minute of output. (Some wouldn't, but I would). But if it's too much 'north' of that figure I'd start to shy away. Plus only having a single GTX 1070 GPU - I think I'm probably 'dreaming' about getting anything *near* 1min/day renders. So I'm sort - of glad you posted just now .... (I think?) .... (I do hope your maths is correct! lol)
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
As Dennis said -- the iClone renderer is built for animation.  Everything else -- not so much.

One day (maybe even in my lifetime, although I won't bet on it) we'll see that kind of ray-trace performance in Real Time.  It will almost surely happen, because of gamers (who want that kind of thing).  The new RTX cards support a process that comes close (but iClone doesn't support that yet).  When that happens we won't even need special renderers, but we will need special hardware (that's almost surely where it will come, not in software).

In the meantime just enjoy the fact you can get such wonderful quality out of the iClone engine.  It's not perfect but it's pretty damn close.
By sonic7 - 6 Years Ago

You're right ... and there's always post (grading) - and with a few tricks you can make it look a million dollars ....
Of course Iray render times would depend on frame size, but I guess we're talking 1080p.
And outputting at 24 fps for the film look would knock 20% off the time. A few years back I played around with DAZ renders with Indigo? (forget now), and on a very basic PC I was getting a frame rendered out in a couple of minutes (using compromised settings) - but still it looked stunning !!!
By mtakerkart - 6 Years Ago
@Justaviking

If you said 1800 frames that tooks 2 min per frame , it means 3600 minutes , then 
60 hours to render 1 min video . 2 days and half.....
For me it's completely irrelevant today for a one man band with my age. Tongue
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
mtakerkart (9/14/2018)
@Justaviking

If you said 1800 frames that tooks 2 min per frame , it means 3600 minutes , then 
60 hours to render 1 min video . 2 days and half.....


Whoops... yes, I typed 1600 when it should have been 3600, and then carried that error forward.
Thanks for catching that error.

Gee, no wonder it wasn't sounding as bad as I thought it would.

Agreed:  The corrected "optimistic" rendering time is 2.5 days per minute of video.
By ultimativity - 6 Years Ago
I am considering a purchase of IC and Pipeline.  i have used Daz and rendered in IRAY, but it takes forever.  From this thread I am seeing alternatively that the IRAY plugin won't render animation and also that it will render animation.

Is there any final word on whether it will be stills only or animation?

Thanks
By Peter (RL) - 6 Years Ago
Animation clips can certainly be exported from iClone 7 using the Iray plug-in, but as with all ray tracers render times will be much slower than iClone's built in renderer. However we do allow batch rendering so you can render without iClone even running.
By Stefos - 6 Years Ago
justaviking (9/14/2018)
@Stefos - Any "ray tracing" renderer is going to be a real challenge for at-home animaiton rendering.

The sad math is pretty simple:
- Suppose a rendering speed of 2-minutes per frame, which would be great ray tracing performance
- Assume 30 frames per second of animation
- A one-minute animation requires 30 fps times 60 seconds, so that's 1800 frames per minute
- At 2 minutes per frame, that's 1600 minutes, or 26.7 hours

So...  you are looking at a minimum of 24-hours rendering per minute of video.  Most likely much more than that.  And if you find any mistakes and need to re-render it...   patience is a virtue.  For a single "still," no problem.  For an animation, yeah, even a "fast" ray-tracing renderer is a challenge for people who don't have genuine rendering farms.

Keep in mind that was an optimistic view.  Ten minutes per frame is more likely, so that approaches almost 6 days of non-stop rendering per minute of animation.

Hey, I'm a bit of an Iray fan, and rendering in general, but that's the math. 

Honestly, with good textures and proper lighting, you can get some great results with the native IClone renderer.  And "story" still matters.



Thanks for the info, I will be looking forward to Reallusion improving their internal renderer further...it is going in the right direction with ver 7, hope they keep improving it.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
Stefos (9/24/2018)

Thanks for the info, I will be looking forward to Reallusion improving their internal renderer further...it is going in the right direction with ver 7, hope they keep improving it.


Mtakerkart pointed out a math error, and I forgot to go back and edit my post (which I have done now).

The render time is actually 2.5x worse than what I wrote the first time (which explains why it wasn't as horrifying as I expected).

CORRECTED MATH:
At a render speed of 2 minutes/frame, and 30 frames/second, that works out to 2.5 DAYS RENDERING PER MINUTE OF ANIMATION.


Hopefully it all works as-desired on the first attempt, eh?
By eternityblue - 6 Years Ago
I'm just wondering who was clamoring for an IRay plugin. I get that it has uses, but the priority seems weird to me. But maybe with the new generation of Nvidia cards, the render times will be much smaller?
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
With the new generation of Nvidia cards, the render times will be "moderately smaller" for most people.

If you have an application which supports RTX, which iClone does not,  then the new cards will make a huge difference.

I'm not certain, but I do think Iray benefits from RTX either.  RTX seems to be a ray tracing "overlay" for games and similar renders with some aspects still be rasterized, whereas Iray is a complete ray tracing solution.  That's my understanding of it, which I cannot guarantee to be 100% correct.
By Alien Maniac - 6 Years Ago
the early-bird special for IRAY? can not locate it anywhere....... anyone have a link please?
By eternityblue - 6 Years Ago
It is one of the Cc3 pre-order deals. 
By animagic - 6 Years Ago
eternityblue (9/24/2018)
I'm just wondering who was clamoring for an IRay plugin. I get that it has uses, but the priority seems weird to me. But maybe with the new generation of Nvidia cards, the render times will be much smaller?

Nobody was specifically clamoring for Iray, but there was a need for a higher quality render solution that was also suitable for animation. 
By Alien Maniac - 6 Years Ago
So if this works for iClone why isn't it offered as a pre-launch as such instead of just for CC3? Makes absolutely no sense to do it that way. Guess they do not want to sell it to iclone only users? LOL
By Alien Maniac - 6 Years Ago
Is it FREE with CC3 for current iclone users as is CC 3?  So confusing RL.
By sonic7 - 6 Years Ago

@Space Rider ....  iRay is a paid plug-in. It works in both CC3 and iClone (same plugin).
So you can create an iRay render directly out from CC3 (as a still image) - OR - directly out from iClone (as a still image OR as animation).
But it will need a later version 7.3 of iClone in order to work for the iClone part (7.3 is due to be released in 4th quarter of 2018).
Source: https://forum.reallusion.com/374900/Iray-Plugin-for-iClone-7-and-Character-Creator-3?PageIndex=1
By Alien Maniac - 6 Years Ago
I get it but WHY isn't it offered as a pre-release for iclone?   Thats my point.  Makes no sense to only offer the pre-release price just to CC3 which we icloners will get for free anyway. Are they going to force us to pay a higher price after release? Whaaat? If it is a new plug-in and we have to buy it for iclone this makes absolutely no sense.
By Rogue Anime - 6 Years Ago
Space Rider (9/25/2018)
I get it but WHY isn't it offered as a pre-release for iclone?   Thats my point.  Makes no sense to only offer the pre-release price just to CC3 which we icloners will get for free anyway. Are they going to force us to pay a higher price after release? Whaaat? If it is a new plug-in and we have to buy it for iclone this makes absolutely no sense.

Hey Rider! I COULD be wrong here, but The difference IS, that if you buy the pre-release NOW, you save $, as well as getting the CC3 PIPELINE version. The 'free' upgrade will not have the 'pipeline' feature if I'm not wrong here.
It will be inside CC3, and the iRay will 'plug-in' to your iClone 7 much as the disastrous Indigo does now.  ~V~
(I do hope iRay is 100x better than Indigo - that was a total waste of money - and WORSE - HUGE amounts of time)

By Stefos - 6 Years Ago
Space Rider (9/25/2018)
I get it but WHY isn't it offered as a pre-release for iclone?   Thats my point.  Makes no sense to only offer the pre-release price just to CC3 which we icloners will get for free anyway. Are they going to force us to pay a higher price after release? Whaaat? If it is a new plug-in and we have to buy it for iclone this makes absolutely no sense.

It is being offered as a pre-release for iClone 7.3, as far as I know you do not need to have Character Creator for the plugin to work in iClone 7.3
You can buy the renderer on the software store under plugins.
By toystorylab - 6 Years Ago
Wow, ridiculous rumours you are forced to buy CC3 Pipeline...

BUT you can buy it without CC3 Pipeline here:

https://www.reallusion.com/store/product.html?l=1&p=ic


Yes, the price is a bit higher (+29,- $) BUT you don't buy it as a bundle, isn't it?

https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/9001ee3c-4a25-47e9-a965-fc4b.png
By Stefos - 6 Years Ago
toystorylab (9/25/2018)
Wow, ridiculous rumours you are forced to buy CC3 Pipeline...

BUT you can buy it without CC3 Pipeline here:

https://www.reallusion.com/store/product.html?l=1&p=ic


Yes, the price is a bit higher (+29,- $) BUT you don't buy it as a bundle, isn't it?

https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/9001ee3c-4a25-47e9-a965-fc4b.png

That's right, it costs a little more than the CC3 Bundle but you are still getting the renderer at a discounted price.
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
Do NOT buy the Iray plugin if you intend to do animation.
By animagic - 6 Years Ago
justaviking (9/24/2018)
 CORRECTED MATH:
At a render speed of 2 minutes/frame, and 30 frames/second, that works out to 2.5 DAYS RENDERING PER MINUTE OF ANIMATION.


Hopefully it all works as-desired on the first attempt, eh?

Well, you wouldn't design your scenes using Iray.

Like I figured, the renderer would keep up with me, because my average is 1 week for a one-minute scene (including set design, animation, sound, etc.). My main concern is actually how much work is involved to get iClone scenes working in Iray. I was never very lucky with Indigo. 
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
The problem, of course, is that it will be very difficult to use IRay to even design your scenes (impossible for me, since I use GI illumination almost exclusively -- so a show stopper).  You will need to at least do some tests, and using the native renderer won't tell you much, if anything, about the actual lighting in a scene.  Animation moving changes the light, and if folks are so good here they've never had to readjust lights after viewing a rendering you're a better man than I am, Gunga Din.

I don't see Iray as being feasible for animation unless you're going to live a LOT longer than me (well, almost everyone here will, so perhaps...)
By Stefos - 6 Years Ago
Kelleytoons (9/25/2018)
The problem, of course, is that it will be very difficult to use IRay to even design your scenes (impossible for me, since I use GI illumination almost exclusively -- so a show stopper).  You will need to at least do some tests, and using the native renderer won't tell you much, if anything, about the actual lighting in a scene.  Animation moving changes the light, and if folks are so good here they've never had to readjust lights after viewing a rendering you're a better man than I am, Gunga Din.

I don't see Iray as being feasible for animation unless you're going to live a LOT longer than me (well, almost everyone here will, so perhaps...)


Yes, Reallusion needs to continue to concentrate on improving the internal renderer, especially for animated scenes. They did a great job on version 7 but I am sure there is more that can be done!
By animagic - 6 Years Ago
I agree that without GI capability there isn't much point, whether stills or animation. 
By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
I'm sorry? What you guys mean no GI in Iray. Any ray tracer produces GI by definition. A true light bounding is a core of Iray and/or any other tracer engine and that is what GI is.
If Iray does not support those artificial iClone GI controls does not mean it does not produce GI. Not to mention IBL and controllable emissive lights support.
By illusionLAB - 6 Years Ago
Not sure how Iray doesn't have G.I. - are we talking about iClone's export to Iray?  It's a physically based raytracer - so, by definition, G.I. is integral.

snap! ;-)
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
I'm talking about iClone's GI -- the plugin will not respect this (and all I do is based on this).

So, no, it's a showstopper for me -- I ain't gonna completely redo my scenes for Iray when I then can't see how they would look for a quick render.
By 4u2ges - 6 Years Ago
Trust me Mike, you won't have to. Maybe a few tweaks here and there. But overall it would be looking the same... but I already know you don't do stills only animations. Wink
By Rampa - 6 Years Ago
A rather rough comparison of the two would be that in a raytraced image, each voxel is the size of a pixel.

Mike. Global Illumination means bounced light. To do it in realtime (for now) requires large chunks of light. That's what the voxels are.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
@Animagic,

Interesting comment that when you spend a long time working on a project, you have plenty of time to ray trace as you complete each section.  That makes sense in that case.  If someone puts together a 5-minute "dance video" in two days, and then spends 3 weeks rendering, then one might have a difference perspective.  In practice, I imagine I would test-render a few frames, and then the multi-frame render should have a reasonable chance of success.

I wonder what will take longer - rendering or exporting all the files?
By Kelleytoons - 6 Years Ago
In terms of workflow I can't imagine take *much* longer rendering than I already do -- oh, if I had something profound that I thought was going to make big bucks I'd be willing to spend a week rendering it, assuming IT WOULD BE PERFECT ON THAT RENDER PASS.  Something I have NEVER found to be true.  And rendering one or two frames would never show that to you.  You'd have to, at the very least, render two or three times with iClone's native one and then hope and pray the Iray version would be close.

But -- for those of you saying "oh, it will look the same" -- I was told not.  I was told, for example, it cannot use the GI for self-illumination (again, my ENTIRE workflow now).  So, leaving aside particles and trees and whatnot, are those of you in the know saying, "Oh, don't worry, Mike, it will look exactly like your setup now, using your existing self-illumination and GI and just be... better.  So much better."

Excuse me if I remain skeptical.
By sonic7 - 6 Years Ago

I must admit, I'm one iCloner whose done a 'back-flip' on iRay.
Several rather learned members have indicated the impractical nature of iRay for animation.
Part of me took heed and I was actually prepared to sit back and wait.
But then 'another' part of me thought 'oh why not just grab it at the discount price'.
So I weakened - and did ... Blush

I'm honestly optimistic (I have to be - since I've bought it lol Tongue).
Sure - it's not going to be the best choice for everyone - but for those wanting iRay quality (most likely dealing with 'shortish' running time animations), and 'direct from iClone' (if that's your preferred workspace), then this is the opportunity
By wires - 6 Years Ago
It could be very possible that rendering animations, and maybe even stills, in Iray could give the old saying "Patience is a virtue" a totally new meaning and may encourage users to take up a new Hobby - such as watching paint dry, or for Nature lovers watching Grass grow, while waiting. w00tSmile
By sonic7 - 6 Years Ago

Oh Gerry - you're a scream ... lol Tongue
By wires - 6 Years Ago
sonic7 (9/26/2018)

Oh Gerry - you're a scream ... lol Tongue


Time will tell, and I may be the one not screaming.  Whistling
By eternityblue - 6 Years Ago
Not to go too far off topic, but how complex is the iClone>Unreal pipeline, and what do you need to buy in Unreal to make it work well, like water shaders etc?
By donald.dade - 6 Years Ago
The problem that I've found is not the rendering time, but rather what others have already alluded to: you cannot completely switch render engines and expect scenes to look similar. One does have to adjust.
The thing that really makes raytracing for animation a deal-killer for me is the fact that all the IRay settings that work beautifully in one part of the scene may produce lots of fireflies if the character takes a small step to one side. The raytracer is doing exactly what it was designed to do and it is quite susceptible to changes in the distribution of light in a scene because it is so physically accurate relative to other models. Getting all that right for the entire length of the scene when it may take hours or days or even weeks even with dual a GTX 1080ti setup is just not practical.
By ninjarama - 6 Years Ago
The coolest thing I saw in Iray was that it used both of my GPU's!  Although some software out there (like Adobe) claim to take advantage of multi-gpu processing, this is the first time I've actually seen both of my GPU's working their @$$ off in a non-SLi configuration.  Finally, multi-gpu usage isn't just a unicorn!
By AlikiN - 6 Years Ago
Has anyone tried Iray render plugin inside of Iclone 7?

By Stefos - 6 Years Ago
It has not been implemented into iClone 7 yet, only in  Character creator 3 and in that it is slow.
By PandaFriend - 6 Years Ago
So I also updated to iClone 7.3 and CC 3.01 with iRay-Render-PlugIn.
In CC it works good for me but it seems that the iRay-PI was not intergreated in iClone 7.3
Why not? If I understand it right so should the PlugIn work in CC as well as in iClone.
Every one any ideas?
Thanks.
By justaviking - 6 Years Ago
@Klaus,

As stated in the post right before yours, even the very latest iClone patch (7.2) is not yet compatible with the Iray plug-in.

There is another iClone patch planned for "later this year" that will be compatible with the Iray plug-in.
a) No additional cost if you already bought the plug-in for CC3
b) No, we do not have a specific date yet.  Could be late November.  Could be early December.  Could be late December.  We don't know.
By Stefos - 6 Years Ago
sonic7 (9/26/2018)

I must admit, I'm one iCloner whose done a 'back-flip' on iRay.
Several rather learned members have indicated the impractical nature of iRay for animation.
Part of me took heed and I was actually prepared to sit back and wait.
But then 'another' part of me thought 'oh why not just grab it at the discount price'.
So I weakened - and did ... Blush

I'm honestly optimistic (I have to be - since I've bought it lol Tongue).
Sure - it's not going to be the best choice for everyone - but for those wanting iRay quality (most likely dealing with 'shortish' running time animations), and 'direct from iClone' (if that's your preferred workspace), then this is the opportunity

I got it as well, I am like an alcoholic in a free for all bar!
By eternityblue - 6 Years Ago
I do hope it proves useful in the long run. Right now it serves to remind me how much the native renderer needs updating. I waste a lot of time playing with IRay. 
By PandaFriend - 6 Years Ago
@justaviking
Thanks, but I know that the IC release 7.2 is not compatible with IRay-Render Plugin.
I was talking about IC 7.3 and it was/is mentioned that the Iray-PlugIn is ready for CC 3.0
AND IC 7.3.
This is a bit confuse because. You can only install the IRay-Plugin after you have installed
IC 7.3 first. You can not install the Plugin with only an active IC 7.2 (via Reallusion-Hub).


By keeperprancis - 6 Years Ago
When iray for iclone 7 release?
By Postfrosch - 6 Years Ago
1. The IRay plug-in is NOT usable with IClone 7.3.22
2. The announced date 4 Quartla (2nd half of December) 2018 has been postponed
2. IRay will first be implemented in IClone in the first quarter of 2019 and then be usable with IClone 7.3XXX
https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/ff5638c8-0aea-4dc6-a695-d02e.jpg
1st quarter 2019 = 01.01.2019 - 03.31.2019
Since not so impatient - Christmas is yet to comeBigGrinBigGrinBigGrinBigGrin

Greets from Germany
Postfrosch
By keeperprancis - 6 Years Ago
hhh ok thankyou
By toddprice775 - 5 Years Ago
could someone please tell me how to install iray plugin for iclone 7. bought iray render and install plugin but cant find the new plugin any where in iclone 7.

thanks todd
By justaviking - 5 Years Ago
Not released for iClone yet.
Delayed into "First Quarter" of 2019.
By eternityblue - 5 Years Ago
Just a little hint to Reallusion, but some sort of "thanks for understanding" token gift for those that pre-ordered would be kind of cool. I'm just talking from a PR perspective, there must be some stuff that is essentially laying around in inventory not making money anyway, toss something like that into PR. 
By 1 Million Monkeys + Keyboard - 5 Years Ago
toddprice775 (1/1/2019)
could someone please tell me how to install iray plugin for iclone 7. bought iray render and install plugin but cant find the new plugin any where in iclone 7.

thanks todd


I don't think it is possible to see it inside iClone yet. You can see it in Character Creator however (like in the first video tutorial here: https://www.reallusion.com/render/iray/tutorial.html).

Once after the "Iray ready iClone" is available then you should be able to see it listed in the iClone tool bar (presumably under the Plugins menu).
By helponhand - 5 Years Ago
is there a proposed date for the integration of the iray plugin with iclone 7 ? I thought I had something set-up wrong with my rig, as I was expecting this to be working last quarter 2018 and now in first quarter 2019.
By Peter (RL) - 5 Years Ago
helponhand (1/27/2019)
is there a proposed date for the integration of the iray plugin with iclone 7 ? I thought I had something set-up wrong with my rig, as I was expecting this to be working last quarter 2018 and now in first quarter 2019.


Unfortunately, there was a delay in releasing the Iray Plug-in for iClone. The reasons for this were given HERE. However, final testing is now taking place and we hope to release the plug-in very soon now.
By rightdecis - 5 Years Ago
Sounds great! Any idea of when that will be? Sometime in February maybe?
By wires - 5 Years Ago
I can't wait. 4k 60fps rendered in real time, Wow! 😂🤣😅
By justaviking - 5 Years Ago
wires (1/28/2019)
I can't wait. 4k 60fps rendered in real time, Wow! 😂🤣😅


Are you feeling okay?  Did you bump your head?

(Don't worry, I did notice the smilies.  Wink )
By ourdailyplanet - 5 Years Ago
hello!  i keep on getting "iray shaders not yet defined" or "...undefined".  but when i check Auto Convert it seems like the PBRs have been converted.  HELP PLS!  thanks in advance!