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Why the EIAS is GOOD
Posted: 07 July 2008 09:28 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 16 ]  
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Hi Jens, all,

Well, I’ll share my little story…

I recently finished work on an animation that we were given after a different 3D company had a go at it, but couldn’t handle the size of the project. Working on it for us, were Al (modelling), and myself (everything else).

It’s not the prettiest job (I personally think the renders are a little ugly), but when you see the scale of it, I think you’ll understand why I was glad we were able to do it at all.

http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/1.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/2.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/3.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/4.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/5.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/6.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/7.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/8.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/9.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/10.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/cake_or_death/lbstills/11.jpg

Project statistics:

Polygons: 11.5 Million.
Group count: 8500.
Plug-in instances: 1500 (NO 3rd party anything, with the exception of Proxy*).
Rendering: Full Ray-Tracing and GI, 200 rays, GI sampling grid at 4x4.
Anti-Aliasing: Oversample 4x4, Sampling 2x2.
Resolution: Pal
Number of frames: 4500
Render time: 2.5 - 3.5 minutes per frame

*Proxy is estimated to have saved us 5000 additional groups. All houses, cars and trees are proxies (with the exception of the Smart Car.

Only in EIAS.
Ian

PS. The animation was for planning-permission NOT marketing. The scheme won planning permission today.

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Ian Waters
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EI Technology Group, LLC.

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Posted: 08 July 2008 02:01 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 17 ]  
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noone else? common…

Jens

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Posted: 08 July 2008 04:50 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 18 ]  
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Give me some time.. lots of new things to post

Tomas

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Posted: 08 July 2008 05:35 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 19 ]  
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Hi All

We glad to see this thread, but, maybe, bounds/limits of “just a single thread” are too narrow for the theme? IMO it (at least) deserves a new sub-forum (like Soonica etc)

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Posted: 08 July 2008 05:54 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 20 ]  
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Hi,
Igors i agree with you . Costumers real world situations and experiences with EIAS. I do not know why it hasn’t been done already.Kind like Feature Artist page.If you go to Softimage website they have a pretty good option.Hope it helps.

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Posted: 09 July 2008 12:37 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 21 ]  
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Hi Tomas,

Even if it is a bit elder I would love to hear some production notes on your “Get Down” video… And if you have it in highres somwhere, make a movie and post it wink

Jens

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Posted: 09 July 2008 07:04 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 22 ]  
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Well, here is the story of EIAS and me smile

Since 1989 I worked with the programm, first for a communication agency,
we were creating all the exhibition stuff for VW, and from 1992 in my own company
for different clients.

In all these days EIAS was a lifesaver and a workhorse and we could create all the needed
pictures, clips, footage, background, foregrounds, what ever you name it, to satisfy our clients.
Not only the quality/look of the images was the main benefit, mostly the feasibility and
speed to get the job done was one of the main things.
And: no job failed in 18 years, no client get lost in all these stormy 3D times and 3D weathers!

Here are some examples from the past 18 years:

EIAS 1990_1991

EIAS 2000

EIAS 2008

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If we can dream it, we can make it…

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Posted: 10 July 2008 01:11 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 23 ]  
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help a dummy out Jens, what IS photon GI? and why would more than 3 people be interested in it smile

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http://web.mac.com/finaleffects

Scott Novasic
SuperNova
Animation & Visual Effects
Los Angeles Ca.
Phone :213.221.7640
Cell :312.502.5151

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Posted: 10 July 2008 07:51 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 24 ]  
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The goal of Photon Mapping is to provide much improved lighting solutions for building interiors and enclosed scenes. Another huge benefit of Photon Mapping is that once a Photon Map is generated, it can be saved and re-used - meaning vastly improved speed and quality for Global Illumination animations.

Best Regards,
Phil Martin
EITG Sales

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Posted: 10 July 2008 08:01 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 25 ]  
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Scott, you can call yourself lots of things but dummy is not one of them…
Because of the hinted messages of photon mapping in EIv8(?) I Googled some information. This is interesting:
http://www.ypoart.com/tutorials/photon/intro.php

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Posted: 10 July 2008 09:52 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 26 ]  
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The current GI system only supports a few bounces. Each bounce tends to be more and more time consuming, and artifacts are possible.
Photons can bounce many many times (well over 20) and remain pretty fast. (EIAS has photons now- they are used for caustics- and these are VERY fast). So (in theory) these photon samples could be fed to the GI engine as pre-calculated sample points. This would provide a much more robust system, with more realistic lighting, and some serious speed enhancements for architectural fly-throughs and such.

My fingers are crossed!

Dave wink

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Work Hard, Render Fast, Retire....er...Render Some More.

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Posted: 10 July 2008 10:19 AM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 27 ]  
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Hi, Phil, Richard

We’ve not too much new to add to your comments above - in fact you said all essential. Yes, photon mapping technique is a common place for advanced renderers in recent several years (at least). And now it’s tme to add this technique to Camera as well. The basic idea is very simple: light is approximated with “particles” (known as “photons"). Om this way the count of light interreflection is practically unlimited with “russian roulette” mechanism, (no any national bravity - it’s just a standard CG term grin

More details: of course, “technique” = just technique - in 3D everything works in limits.  For example, it’s not a good idea to fill a landscape with many milliards of photons = slow and ineffective. But for a closed room - oh, yes!!

Just a next step forward

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Posted: 10 July 2008 03:48 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 28 ]  
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well, evidently my question about Photons has been complained about.  Even with my smiley face and calling myself a dummy, I still upset some people.  :(
.........
I am truly sorry to anyone that felt the need to report me to EI, I wish you would have emailed me and I would have apologized to you directly.  I intended no offense to anyone, I will try not to be so ‘cute’ with my questions in the future.  Sorry again......
.........
Thank you for the great descriptions, all who posted them, I really mean it.  Thank you Igors as well.
.........

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http://web.mac.com/finaleffects

Scott Novasic
SuperNova
Animation & Visual Effects
Los Angeles Ca.
Phone :213.221.7640
Cell :312.502.5151

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Posted: 16 July 2008 02:14 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 29 ]  
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OK. Here is mine. A short film I completed a few years ago. Here are two scenes from it. All 3D was EI. Compositing was done in After Effects.
http://www.jkdigital.com/galleryss.html

Here are two spec spots I did while a student at the Art Center College of Design. Again, all 3D was EI, compositing was AE.
http://www.jkdigital.com/galleryspots.html

To me, the speed of Camera plus the film-like quality, have never been matched. I have used 3ds Max with Mental Ray for a while (yuck!) and, most recently, Modo. I love Modo’s modeling tools. It’s renderer is pretty good but, you really have to crank up all of the sampling and AA settings in order to get good results and that really bogs it down. Plus, it is a huge memory hog - not nearly as efficient as Camera is. I am seriously considering moving back to EI.

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J. K. Digital

Great spirits have often encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds --Albert Einstein

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Posted: 16 July 2008 07:03 PM   [ Ignore ]   [ # 30 ]  
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Hey J,

I liked your work.. you did a lot of compositing too CGI+live action… nice

Thanksss

Tomas

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