studioGPU

Photo realistic rendering in MachStudio Pro?

There has been some discussion in the forums about the ability of MachStudio Pro to do photo-realistic rendering.

I guess some of that confusion has come about because many of the examples shown in our video tutorials and showcase are from real CG animation production projects where the look and feel was intended to be stylized (PlayMobil), mech (Bionicles) or illustrated (Princess Twins), rather than photo-real renderings.

I've read several comments in which, although artists were amazed by the performance and quality of MachStudio Pro, they were specifically searching for a solution to replace their offline photo-realistic rendering engines. A typical comment was something like: "Well V-Ray/Mental Ray/Brazil renders this architectural/automotive/product image like this. How close can MachStudio Pro get to this kind of photo-realistic render?"

Well it was a reasonable question, so Yoni (our chief scientist) got hold of some of the architectural models people were referencing as examples and ran them through MachStudio specifically with the intent of showing photo-realism and emulating the style of V-Ray.

Putting it to the test

The best way to evaluate how it turned out is to take a look at a few of the renderings. (note: unlike many renderings you see, these were not doctored in PhotoShop. They are the actual final renders.)

Click on the links for the two images and one video below. (will open in a new window)

Modern Exterior - rendered at 1200 X 1469 at x36 samples anti-aliasing in 84 sec.
This was accompanied by an 8 sec., 200 frame MP4 video at 850 X 480 rendered in about 2 hrs.

Airport Terminal - rendered at 1000 X 1200 at x36 samples anti-aliasing in 51 sec.

Side-by-side

Do a quick side-by-side comparison below. While you can see differences between the two images, which is V-Ray-rendered and which is MachStudio Pro-rendered is not as obvious as you might think. Beyond academic comparisons, in a production environment you need to evaluate if the difference in the images, justify the orders of magnitude differences in render times and differences in creative control by the individual artist.

Examples of photo-realistic imaging.

Photo-realism you can adjust on the fly

Now what makes these images especially interesting is that I (or anyone with MachStudio Pro) can change the materials, lighting, DOF, cameras, HDR exposures in a few minutes or even seconds, simply by moving some sliders. Try new variations, add additional lights, create new camera angles, change color grading - all with immediate feedback. If the level of reflections does not meet your requirements, change them - and not by waiting hours to see a new render. Creative control and production is completely non-linear.