Render-time Calculator ..............


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By sonic7 - 7 Years Ago

Thought I'd make this available for anyone wanting to get an idea of 'how long' your rendering time is likely to be....
I made this primarily for 'Animation' render times (for when iRay works in iClone).
This chart is based on 24fps and won't work for 30 or other frame rates.

You simply 'time' how long ONE 'typical' frame takes to render and then locate that figure in the left-side column.
Then read off your scene (or project's) 'running time' along the top.
Where the two *intersect* (column with row) - that's your approximate rendering time ....

Bear in mind this is a 'ball-park' figure because it assumes that the single frame you timed is truly 'representative' of the rest of the project - of course this may not always be the case. But if you've chosen to render 'by time' in the render panel options - then the results should be fairly accurate....

https://forum.reallusion.com/uploads/images/83b4e796-f896-44e9-b929-b800.png

Please bear in mind that it simply wasn't feasible to include every incremental time value - otherwise the chart would've been massive. But here's the work-a-round ....
Say you find that 4 min 30 secs is 'typical for your single rendered frame, then, since 4.5min isn't on the chart - just use the next HIGHER figure - ie: 5 minutes instead. So 5 minutes per frame (for your 30 second render) shows an estimate of 60 hours on the chart ....

Finally, I just want to say that these figures were calculated the 'long way' ie: not with a calculator or program. So I cannot say it's 100% error free - but hope it is ....  Oh .... and fyi there are 168 hours in a week .... (24 hr clock). -- so the lower-right of the chart is in that territory ....
By akuei2 - 7 Years Ago
wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee ...  My response after looking this chart.
By Dr. Nemesis - 7 Years Ago
Good work, Sonic.
By charly Rama - 7 Years Ago
Thank you for this Sonic
By VirtualMedia - 7 Years Ago
This certainly put render times in perspective, love IRAY but damn those are some serious render times.

Thanks..
By Zeronimo - 7 Years Ago
I wonder if the duration remains the same for all frames of an animation or if the duration can be variable from one frame to another depending on the complexity of the scene seen in the frame ?
By Alolu - 7 Years Ago
Nice!!! :D
By justaviking - 7 Years Ago
A simple Excel spreadsheet would be great, too, because you could enter in frame rates etc., but we'd have to cheat with the file extension to attach it to the forum, and decide what version of Excel to use.

But I don't want to detract from Sonci's gift.  THANK YOU for the chart.  :)
By animagic - 7 Years Ago
Nice table. 25 fps would be a bit more and 30 fps 25% more. 

When animation was hand-drawn they would often double (or even triple) frames, i.e., show the same frame twice in succession. So that would help...:P

Also, in a professional environment rendering is farmed out over many computers, so to do high-quality rendering on a single system is a challenge.
By musicaz - 7 Years Ago
   no thanks Animagic i will just use  Blender Evee, Unreal , or Unity . And btw folks imo , there isnt that many people that want the render engine improved in  Iclone as we can improve ourselves with what we have  now seems to be the prevailing opinion.  This is all like deja vu where a few people wanted the render engine upgraded in iclone and there were posts like what i read lately . And wish lists , etc, etc.   Only a small percentage have any real issues with the rendering in Iclone right now so why would it be fixed. Not to mention for all the praises for the Iray plugin , that seems to be mostly for still images. I would imagine when most of your customer base is mostly satisified with the present renderer and its not likely any sales will be lost , there would be no incentive to change anything . Why not just create more still image based plugins , they will be praised and purchased and everything will be lovely.   Correct guys ?  Also they can add more blippity blap and blappity blip features  for Iclone and super  fragalistic features  that wont make the final render any better quality and there shall be praises and joy in here . yes ? oh yeah and flicker , flicker , flicker , flicker !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ha ha ha
By AutoDidact - 7 Years Ago
While your effort my be somewhat useful as general baseline,
The  problem with any "render time calculator" is that it is usually based on static analysis.
such analysis cannot possibly predict the many variables that would 
severely effect the render times. such as camera movement ,reflective & 
emissive  surfaces, refractive Glass  with caustics ,materials with 
subsurface scattering  ,low light  night time scenes etc.

Does anyone know if this version of IRay for Iclone/CC3 at least  has a "branched path tracing" mode???

Blender cycles has optimization options in "branched" path tracing mode
so the user  for  example  can  decide:"Hmm I dont really need 12 ray 
bounces for that silverware on the table behind my main Character actor 
bogging down  my renderer, so I will reduce the bounces to four.
"
If this build of IRay in Iclone /CC3 Does not have these  optimization options( As Daz does not)
you will have to sit and endure the vicissitudes of unidirectional ,brute force,unbiased path tracing until your render is done and Denoised.
 
Once people start trying to produce final quality animations of any length 
with IRay they will have to be prepared for a radically "different" film 
production work flow........ to put it Charitably .
By justaviking - 7 Years Ago
musicaz (10/14/2018)
And btw folks imo , there isnt that many people that want the render engine improved in  Iclone as we can improve ourselves with what we have  now seems to be the prevailing opinion.


I see your point, but respectfully disagree.

Although there have been a lot of improvements in the iClone native renderer, I think a significant portion of the iClone user base would also really appreciate subsurface scattering (SSS), improved volumetrics and fog (along with "god rays"), motion blur, anti-aliasing, and then basic improvements in efficiency and reduced rendering times.  The "toon" shader needs attention also, I believe.  Most people appreciate doing as much within iClone as possible.

Having said all that, the ability to expand the pipeline for people who have particular artistic needs (and the corresponding ambition} is a great value-added capability for iClone users.
By animagic - 7 Years Ago
I don't understand where the impression comes from that we don't want the real-time rendering in iClone improved. It's just that any improvement that RL implements is dismissed by some. Those that don't see the improvements that have been made over time need a new pair of glasses.

BTW, I look forward to all the beautiful animated work that will no doubt be created with external renderers. 
By 3DPiXL - 7 Years Ago
I certainly look forward to higher res rendering in iClone. Musicaz don't assume because it's not something you want that all our opinions are the same. I use Blender but i don't want to do everything in that software, I want to create 3D models and bring them back to iClone for the ease of animation, having a descent render option is a BIG plus for iClone. 
By musicaz - 7 Years Ago
of course i want , but i gave up a long time ago and my new home is with Unreal 4 and possibly later on  Blender Evee .  All i care about is high end graphics , for me the story is nothing without the graphics , if graphics are not important i would just read a good book . !
By sonic7 - 7 Years Ago

Musicaz .... I can totally understand what you're saying .... and I'm some-one who would really love to have high-speed iRay (or similar) - direct out of iClone. I've always wanted to achieve everything in one place, namely, inside of iClone - simply because of it's animation strengths.
I think there's quite a few folk that would really like a fast, iRay quality render engine but who simply won't / don't make mention of this wish simply because they doubt that it's likely to ever happen .... I can understand that viewpoint.
There are folk who see the overall merits of working totally within iClone as beneficial enough - so they're prepared to live with the fast native render engine.  I can understand that viewpoint as well.
For the 'quality at all cost' perfectionists who aren't happy with either the look of iClone's native render OR the protracted iRay render times, these folk will utilize other external render engines after exporting out of iClone. I can understand this viewpoint too.

Then there's other people who either can't figure out how to use other external render engines (or it's too much trouble), so have to stay inside iClone. They much prefer the look of (the likes of) iRay, so are prepared (somewhat begrudgingly) to put up with ridiculous render times ..... I fall into this last category - hence why I produced the chart...
By musicaz - 7 Years Ago
well Sonic7  all i can say is i am gratefull to people like you being on this forum and you  are  definitely appreciated and a credit to this forum =)
By sonic7 - 7 Years Ago

Aww ... :blush:  thanks musicaz .... that's the nicest comment I've ever had ..... I do thank you (very much) ..... :)