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...well, yes, I know that Halloween was a week back (and not a single kid appeared on my doorstep so I ate all the sweets myself), and no, it's actually not a real Halloween image but a fur test with a model from a while back. It's just spooky when the eyeballs are missing.
Unfortunately, a new issue has arisen: VRay for C4D is changing hands, and now it's rental-only software with an outrageous price tag. Sorry, but a thousand bucks a year (every year) for my config is just not the thing I can or want to afford. And VRay was the only renderer so far where I had managed to get flicker-free fur for animations.
Now the quest is on again. Currently trying Cycles (for C4D) in the hope that there are some settings that will generate a flicker free fur. If that doesn't work, there are little options (there are many renderers but they all come at a hefty price or unacceptable conditions); if GI and fur cannot work together in the way I want, it's back to simple GI-less rendering and maybe separate fur renders and composition. Feh!
Unfortunately, a new issue has arisen: VRay for C4D is changing hands, and now it's rental-only software with an outrageous price tag. Sorry, but a thousand bucks a year (every year) for my config is just not the thing I can or want to afford. And VRay was the only renderer so far where I had managed to get flicker-free fur for animations.
Now the quest is on again. Currently trying Cycles (for C4D) in the hope that there are some settings that will generate a flicker free fur. If that doesn't work, there are little options (there are many renderers but they all come at a hefty price or unacceptable conditions); if GI and fur cannot work together in the way I want, it's back to simple GI-less rendering and maybe separate fur renders and composition. Feh!
Category Artwork (Digital) / All
Species Fox (Other)
Size 930 x 810px
File Size 181.6 kB
I know that feeling. :C Maya went subscription only and it also has a ridiculous price-tag per year. Thankfully I have a perpetual license on my version, but that means I'm stuck with the 2015 version, Mental Ray, and XGen. I've heard good things about Blender and I'll probably have to move to that one day.
Any idea what causes the fur to flicker?
Any idea what causes the fur to flicker?
That's essentially three different things:
1. Cycles doesn't do full radiosity but approximates results by sampling (like most renderers). That introduces a random factor into the pixels which comes out as noise. You can smooth it out by using more samples (but that increases render time).
2. Cycles has a switch to randomize the samples between animation frames. This apparently makes the remaining noise look better to the human eye, as static noise is more noticeable, and you can get away with less samples. For hair however this adds one more layer of noise. Fortunately you can switch it off and get static, repeatable noise. You need to turn up the samples however so flat, even surfaces won't get noisy. (But you have to do that anyway for issue 1.)
3. Hair has a natural high-frequency pattern of light and shadow. No way around that except making hair coarser, and you don't really want that because then it gets wiry and less soft. High antialiasing settings and careful addition of the denoiser does often help, but not always.
Ultimately, you can't get around some noise in the hair (except by blurring), but it is controllable.
Another interesting point is the texturing. The Cycles materials are node-based, and you have to mix diffuse, hair reflection, and hair transparency and get it all together playing nice. Most important point I found is that the hair reflection should not be based on the fur pattern texture, but needs to be fed a pure white, or else the highlights will be colored, which looks metallic instead of hairy.
1. Cycles doesn't do full radiosity but approximates results by sampling (like most renderers). That introduces a random factor into the pixels which comes out as noise. You can smooth it out by using more samples (but that increases render time).
2. Cycles has a switch to randomize the samples between animation frames. This apparently makes the remaining noise look better to the human eye, as static noise is more noticeable, and you can get away with less samples. For hair however this adds one more layer of noise. Fortunately you can switch it off and get static, repeatable noise. You need to turn up the samples however so flat, even surfaces won't get noisy. (But you have to do that anyway for issue 1.)
3. Hair has a natural high-frequency pattern of light and shadow. No way around that except making hair coarser, and you don't really want that because then it gets wiry and less soft. High antialiasing settings and careful addition of the denoiser does often help, but not always.
Ultimately, you can't get around some noise in the hair (except by blurring), but it is controllable.
Another interesting point is the texturing. The Cycles materials are node-based, and you have to mix diffuse, hair reflection, and hair transparency and get it all together playing nice. Most important point I found is that the hair reflection should not be based on the fur pattern texture, but needs to be fed a pure white, or else the highlights will be colored, which looks metallic instead of hairy.
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