OVERVIEW

Rendering is a processor intensive system that translates the constructed geometry in a 3D scene into media files, i.e. it exports the low quality images seen in the viewport to high quality final images. The final renders can be exported into a number of file types, the most popular being QuickTime movies, AVI files, TIFF image sequences, JPG images sequences, and Bitmap image sequences. Renders can be sequences or still images and contain calculations of textures, effects, blurs, depth of field etc…

When I began rendering my scenes I exported them as a sequence of still 720 x 576 TIFF images that could be laced together in Adobe Premiere. The main advantage to this was that each frame would be rendered separately and immediately saved on the hard-drive so that if my computer crashed or there was a power cut (which happened more than once!) I would not lose any information up to that point. Also the quality of TIFF images is almost flawless as no compression is used so later on when compressing in Premiere the quality will still be very good.

Although rendering to TIFF images was possibly the better option, I knew that because of the length of my film and the number of rendered scenes (over 125) my system would struggle to cope with all the TIFF images once put in Premiere. Each TIFF image (one per frame) rendered between 1MB and 2MB. So I decided to experiment using QuickTime movie files at a size of 360 x 288 and found the rendering time and file size were far easier to work with. Although my initial intention was to experiment with the QuickTime output format, I soon found myself with the fight scene fully rendered as QuickTime movies and decided to keep on doing using this method to deliver my final artefact.

In retrospect, if I had more time or a more powerful system, I would use still TIFF image sequences instead, because I found that compressing twice (once in 3D Studio Max and once in Adobe Premiere) effected the quality of the final movie quite considerably.

Using the Default Scan-line Rendering System ----------------------------------------------------------------

In researching 3D Studio Max I came across a rendering system called ‘Brazil’ by Splutterfish which I was told was an extremely useful rendering tool as it rendered using a bucket system so that a number of different quality renders could be achieved. Unfortunately I was unable to purchase a copy and had to rely on the default rendering system in 3D Studio Max which is not as bad as one might think.

Many of my scenes used ‘raytracing’ a global illumination algorithm that is used to create photo – realistic images. Although my movie was not intended to be realistic, it still required a sense of realism e.g. the underwater globe, the gun, the figures at the end, the child’s room all used raytraced rendering. Raytracing calculates the image by tracing the light rays in the scene and analysing the effects of the lights rays on the surface of materials and determines any reflections that may be created. To activate the raytracer the ‘Global Ray Antialiaser’ must be ticked and the maximum depth and cut off controls set. Below is an example of a scene with raytracing.

Rendering to 360 by 288 (image aspect 1.3) ------------------------------------------------------------------

As I have already said I would have liked to render my film to TV size with no original compression to enable me to create a DVD full screen copy but unfortunately my system would not have coped. So I chose to render to 360 x 288 pixels. The intention of this initially was to make a test version of my film but soon found that most of these scenes would takes over 15 hours to render so I could not afford to re-render at a larger size and an inevitable greater rendering time. The output size was a smaller version of the PAL - D1 (video), 720 x 576, so maintained the same 1.06667 pixel aspect ratio. The scenes were exported as high quality QuickTime movies with Sorensen 3 compression applied. Although this meant reduced rendering time it also meant a slight reduction in quality. Below shows the comparison between the viewport image and the final render.

Time Management ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The rendering process was extremely long so I started rendering as early as possible to ensure all the scenes would be complete in time. This however did have its problems. For example I would render a scene in January and in March find a more efficient and better looking way of rendering the same scene, so all of the rendered scenes would have to be replaced with new scenes that made use of the new rendering technique. Most of the scenes were worked on in the day and rendered overnight so my system would almost constantly be turned on with 3D Studio Max loaded. I gave it a break every once in a while and worked on other modules. I also had to sometimes restrain myself from working on little details that I had spotted in a final render which no else had, such as the lighting being too bright (but most of these were ultimately altered).

The key scenes were rendered as a draft initially so I could check the fluidity of the animation and the lighting and texturing. This increased the rendering process but also meant that I could check the scenes before committing to extensive rendering times. Although I purchased a new computer specific for the project I still had problems with the rendering and because I had only one workstation it also meant that my time was managed around the rendering times. Even if I was spending a number of days away from the project I would still set up a render a night to ensure all the storyboard scenes I had planned would be rendered.