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I agree; that's far too limiting. Right tool for the right job at the right time.
64-bit support was added to Lenscare a few years ago, another DOF plugin that some folks I know like:
http://www.frischluft.com/
That looks good. Cheaper too.
DOF Pro works in PSP and Elements (both 32 bit of course), which usually means it'll work in GIMP too. Download the demo and try,
A question just for my own amusement, why do you have 64bit PS when you're not really familiar with it? Yes I am jealous.
Here is an example of the difference between raytraced and filtered DOF in Carrara. I know which I prefer to look at but it takes 16x longer to render. I've only really used it on images as straightforward and as small as this where I can balance it against an equivalent time saving in post work.
Because it is Just Not Right running 32-bit on 64-bit! %-P
Or, more likely, I've been scarred with memories of people running 32-bit SQL Server 2000 on 64-bit hardware and the weird behaviours that exhibited...
No doubt that DOF adds a realism to a render no matter how it is acheived.
I like your image, good design!
(post deleted because I know it would just make everyone like really upset...)
:)
is it just me or do depth of field images just look like someone had the f-stop set wrong on their camera and too slow a film emulsion for the lighting situation?
I get great depth of field in RL now that I need reading glasses!!
lol! I am SO just not arty enough and simply use blurry background images with shadowcatcher in my videos!
btw Rogue Pilot, I like the first one. . . . . . hope that was the raytraced 16x longer one ;-P
Joe, you did not have to go and delete your Carrara render!
RoguePilot, like Wendy, I like the first image better. I am assuming that's the Raytraced DOF?
I don't know about still images, but I do think Carrara's DOF has an application in animations. I like to render one image with, say, the good guy in focus in the foreground, and the background way out of focus. Then a second image with, say, the bad guy in focus in the background and the good guy out of focus in the foreground. Some call this a "background reveal", used for dramatic effect. And you can use a dissonant sound ... but I digress ...
If you don't move the camera and the characters are not animated, you only need the two frame renders, then use a crossfade in the video editor. Simple stuff, but sometimes effective.
I haven't tried a postwork approach to this, but I guess it could be done.
:coolhmm:
I don't know about still images, but I do think Carrara's DOF has an application in animations. I like to render one image with, say, the good guy in focus in the foreground, and the background way out of focus. Then a second image with, say, the bad guy in focus in the background and the good guy out of focus in the foreground. Some call this a "background reveal", used for dramatic effect. And you can use a dissonant sound ... but I digress ...
If you don't move the camera and the characters are not animated, you only need the two frame renders, then use a crossfade in the video editor. Simple stuff, but sometimes effective.
I haven't tried a postwork approach to this, but I guess it could be done.
:coolhmm:
The built in DOF may work better for animations where the viewer's eye is more focused on the animation and may only be peripherally aware of the effect.
Other way around I'm afraid. I prefer the second one. Just goes to show.
DOF is an inevitable consequence of the way a camera lens works in Real Life.
It happens in the human eye too but the brain processes it out. (Best render engine in the world). You have to pay attention to what you're not looking at to see it.
So, for those seeking reality based rendering, it's not an artistic choice, it's required.
I think that is correct. The eye does not have time to compare the still image to the "real world", but the effect can be ... ummm, effective. I used it in this animation contest entry that people (including judges, for once) seemed to like (the "reveal" is at the 5:00 point, the "surprise" character is the non-humanoid just to the right of mid-frame):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GN1pXYvEqIc&list=UUlMEK10oWdfqx6NaNAGJtFA&index=16
I really don't see how. If you are using the ray traced render it will be much slower than using after effects and for animation the quality is less important than with a still -- its the overall effect that matters. With a still, that's all you've got. The viewer sees that same frame, and keeps seeing it, and seeing it, and seeing it without change instead of only seeing it for a fraction of a second.
And if you don't use the ray traced DOF then it's quick, but what you get is a pre-dialed effect so you lose any control like you might use in post work.
I really don't see how. If you are using the ray traced render it will be much slower than using after effects and for animation the quality is less important than with a still -- its the overall effect that matters. With a still, that's all you've got. The viewer sees that same frame, and keeps seeing it, and seeing it, and seeing it without change instead of only seeing it for a fraction of a second.
And if you don't use the ray traced DOF then it's quick, but what you get is a pre-dialed effect so you lose any control like you might use in post work.
I'm not sure I understand your comment, it sounds pretty much like what evilproducer is saying.
In any case, if there is no camera motion or animation, you can render only the two frames and use a crossfade in the video editor (as I mentioned a couple of messages back). Admittedly this is fairly limiting ...
Except where its not :)
He suggests that the Carrara built in DOF is okay for animation when I disagree. For animation you would want to use post working, preferably something like after effects, though even photoshop batch mode would work. I then gave a detailed explanation of why Carrara's internal DOF is not suitable for animation.
Carrara's ray traced DOF is suitable for stills where quality is desired. There's a lot of "eye of the behold" stuff going on around here and that's fine. If someone dislikes Carrara's ray traced DOF, great. If its too slow for them, great. But it is only *really* slow for very large renders (say 6000x4000, or larger like Dart was doing) or when significant blurring is over a significant portion of the image.
For some scenes the added time cost really isn't that much, and to get equivalent results in post would require doing the DOF effect from scratch. For example, the image and depth map I posted earlier in this thread. The depth map has basically no information (almost entirely black or white, very little grey) so any post work using it is crippled from the start. In that particular image the DOF effect significantly helped the final image -- not just a measure of believability with it having such a range of depth, but because the texture map for the tree wasn't really intended for anything that close. Nor was the tree: some creative displacement mapping and adding noise to the diffuse channel really helped.
Your specific case could, in principle, be handled by one image plus a depth map and some work in post. Not something I've done, but that is exactly the kind of thing post work is good for (doing blur for different depths in the map in different frames).
It's easy to support an unending argument about what is "suitable" or "okay" in an effect when you have no standard to compare it to. And that's what typically happens here. People have differing views on what "good" is, so there is no right answer.
Again, what people fail to do is try to match results to a real world example. Never once seen it done here. Which means there's always a "he said, she said" argument.
Some are fine with Vaseline. Some are fine with some kind of fuzziness. Some want a particular effect given by a particular type of lens that makes the viewer feel a certain thing. Some want a lot of control in their effect so that they can not only reproduce reality but enhance it. Some don't mind 6 hour renders. Some like playing with software so the result doesn't really matter.
Until people decide what "good" is, then everyone is right, and everyone is an expert. And also nobody is right.
Your specific case could, in principle, be handled by one image plus a depth map and some work in post. Not something I've done, but that is exactly the kind of thing post work is good for (doing blur for different depths in the map in different frames).
OK, thanks for the elaboration. I do have a fairly recent version of AE and so I am interested in your comments. OTOH, my perspective is seriously warped by my participation in the 48Hour Film contest, where "time is of the essence", as the lawyers say. So a couple of renders in Carrara and a crossfade in the video editor is OK. Getting a third app involved is not generally a plus.
But yes, most animations are not done in two days. Probably almost none. So I appreciate the tips.
OK, thanks for the elaboration. I do have a fairly recent version of AE and so I am interested in your comments. OTOH, my perspective is seriously warped by my participation in the 48Hour Film contest, where "time is of the essence", as the lawyers say. So a couple of renders in Carrara and a crossfade in the video editor is OK. Getting a third app involved is not generally a plus.
But yes, most animations are not done in two days. Probably almost none. So I appreciate the tips.
Well, as I said I haven't done that -- but I understand the principle. I don't have AE at all, but I have used photoshop to batch process frames. It wasn't until a previous DOF discussion on the forum that I seriously tried Carrara's DOF capability. Before that I'd tried the quick Carrara DOF and had been very disappointed, and then turned off by the slow render time of the ray traced variation.
Even though I didn't set out to do so, the scene I created as a result of the discussion was very good at showing the weakness of relying on depth maps. All I wanted was something that naturally had DOF, not from being forced. Hence using a really great range of depth in the image.
As it turns out, the greater the range in depth in your image the more useless depth maps (Carrara's "fast" option, or doing a depth map pass and using post processing) are. With a range of only 0 to 255 there just isn't much granularity. If your image has one spot that "goes all the back" (e.g., to the sky) then your foreground will all be a single depth as the 255 gets stretched to whatever value carrara uses for "indefinitely far away" with some middle ground getting the grey in-between.
To alleviate that, even if the final render will include the background, mask out the background with an object at whatever depth you want as the limit for a depth pass. It requires a separate render with the object, but you can then plug that into whatever post processing workflow you have. From what I understand of AE, you should then be able to select the depth of focus at arbitrary frames and use the depth maps with that. Doing the same with Carrara's "quick" version would require setting the focus depth at those frames, then a full render with a single threaded DOF effect and then reviewing the result to ensure it was good. In AE, the DOF effect is multi-threaded and if you need to tweak the focus depth for a frame its just a fast recalculation rather than a re-render.
However, if I was doing animation and wanted DOF I would *only* do it through post processing with a depth map. Even if you were fine with taking the first result of the Carrara rendered DOF, it is just too slow (even the "quick" version thanks to being single threaded, the time adds up with the number of frames). I would just ensure that I had usable depth maps :)
I really don't see how. If you are using the ray traced render it will be much slower than using after effects and for animation the quality is less important than with a still -- its the overall effect that matters. With a still, that's all you've got. The viewer sees that same frame, and keeps seeing it, and seeing it, and seeing it without change instead of only seeing it for a fraction of a second.
And if you don't use the ray traced DOF then it's quick, but what you get is a pre-dialed effect so you lose any control like you might use in post work.
Not sure where you picked up on the ray traced thing. I never said ray traced DOF would be good for an animation. I said that the built in DOF may work better in some animations. Since the default setting for DOF in Carrara appears to be the post effect version, that's what I'm taking about.
Where you may have issues using postwork DOF for an animation is if you have something in your scene such as splats or billboards. I haven't used all the render passes available in Carrara, but the ones that I am familiar with don't seem to respect alphas. I can see this causing problems in cases where there are billboards to speed render times.
I've never understood what one did with the DOF pass image to create, let alone control, the blur in an image editor.
Any hints for a clueless one?
Excellent question...
In fact, in many ways it's a pretty complicated answer.
Here’s the short answer: You tell the “blur-er” application the name of the depth pass image and it will use that to do the blurring
And here’s the long answer: In its simplest form, Depth of Field is just an indication of how "in focus" each part of an image is. So if you have an image and want to make it look like there are parts of the image that are out of focus due to the DOF effect, somehow you need to tell your "Blur-er" application how far each element of the image is from the rendering camera.
In fact, you need to tell the "Blur-er" how far each part of each underlying object in each pixel of your image is from the lens of the rendering camera. You do that by generating an image that, in this case, is basically a greyscale image where the brightness level of each pixel of that greyscale image reflects the relative distance of that part of the underlying object from the camera lens. That is the depth map image you generate in the render pass.
So in effect the greyscale image becomes a code where the brightness level of each pixel gives the relative distance between the underlying object and the rendering camera.
Now in the application you're using to determine how to blur your image, it needs to know how much to blur each pixel. There are many ways to tell it that information, but one way is that the Blur-er application will allow you to specify the greyscale "depth" image that you got as one of the render passes when it asks you how it should do the blur. So there will be some way to say to the "Blur-er" application "okay, I want you to blur this image based on this greyscale I generated as one of the render passes".
Now, that doesn't mean that you NEED a render pass to generate a depth map. All you need is a a greyscale image where the brightness of each pixel reflects a relative distance. In fact, in many cases you can very easily generate your own depth maps. This will give you a lot more artistic control, and often give you better and faster results.
How? Well the simplest depth map is simply a black-to-white gradient drawn from the bottom of the image to the top of the image. Bottom of the image is the floor under your feet, and top of the image is stuff off in the distance. Or, if you have a character standing in front of the camera you can cut out that the character part of the image and paint it full black (which means it’s close to the camera), and have the rest of the image be blurred based on your simple gradient.
Or you can use your artistic creativity to generate a freestyle depth map, using spherical gradients or whatever you want. The sky is the limit.
However, in real life the DOF effect is really quite complicated, and is nothing like a simple blurring. DOF is due to the physical characteristics of cameras and lenses, and can be quite complicated if you want to reproduce those characteristics. And often it is very important to reproduce them accurately, because humans are very used to seeing DOF and related effects, so they are very attuned to what they expect.
In practice, the blurriness of the image due to the DOF effects is a function of how “zoomy” the camera view is (how much zoom/magnification the lens has and how close it is to the subject) as well as how dark the scene is, since it is a function of how open the aperture is. Zoomy-er lenses that are close to the subject in low light levels generally have the most blurry (shallow DOF) images.
But the actual visible effect is also a function of other things, and it’s not just a simple blur. It depends on the shape of the aperture, for example, which can affect the overall look of the blur and its highlights. There are a number of related lens effects that can be considered connected with, and related to, DOF. Which is one reason why I suggest people don’t rely upon simple DOF blurs that are designed to merely give a simple approximation to something that is often very complicated and interesting. Very often it's those subtle little complications that make viewers subconsciously suddenly realize "hey, that's REAL !!" and they instantly believe your premise.
If you have one, that is...
You sure about all that?
There are no billboards, etc., in the example image I posted. I've already explained with depth maps don't work for it and how that could be worked around (as long as you are only after blur in the foreground). Notice that all the images posted have a near background.
DOF in post is a good idea when:
* speed matters
* control matters
built in ray traced DOF is a good idea when:
* accuracy matters
* large depth range is involved
For the latter, the interest is primarily in effect. I believe it was one of yours earlier where you described editing the depth map. More power to you, post work allows you to have more control over it. And, in practical terms, a large depth of range does not appear to normally be involved. Its no wonder people prefer doing it in post.
Photoshop has a lens blur function for which you load the depth map. Outside of that it can be used as a mask for blurring. That's the short of it anyway. If you google for it you should be able to find tutorials (which is what I did when I started on exploring this from the previous thread, but I don't recall any URLs).
You sure about all that?
Hey JM!
Thanks for the in depth explanation! There's a lot to chew on here.
I really appreciate this!
Excellent question...
In fact, in many ways it's a pretty complicated answer.
Here’s the short answer: You tell the “blur-er” application the name of the depth pass image and it will use that to do the blurring
And here’s the long answer: In its simplest form, Depth of Field is just an indication of how "in focus" each part of an image is. So if you have an image and want to make it look like there are parts of the image that are out of focus due to the DOF effect, somehow you need to tell your "Blur-er" application how far each element of the image is from the rendering camera.
In fact, you need to tell the "Blur-er" how far each part of each underlying object in each pixel of your image is from the lens of the rendering camera. You do that by generating an image that, in this case, is basically a greyscale image where the brightness level of each pixel of that greyscale image reflects the relative distance of that part of the underlying object from the camera lens. That is the depth map image you generate in the render pass.
So in effect the greyscale image becomes a code where the brightness level of each pixel gives the relative distance between the underlying object and the rendering camera.
Now in the application you're using to determine how to blur your image, it needs to know how much to blur each pixel. There are many ways to tell it that information, but one way is that the Blur-er application will allow you to specify the greyscale "depth" image that you got as one of the render passes when it asks you how it should do the blur. So there will be some way to say to the "Blur-er" application "okay, I want you to blur this image based on this greyscale I generated as one of the render passes".
Now, that doesn't mean that you NEED a render pass to generate a depth map. All you need is a a greyscale image where the brightness of each pixel reflects a relative distance. In fact, in many cases you can very easily generate your own depth maps. This will give you a lot more artistic control, and often give you better and faster results.
How? Well the simplest depth map is simply a black-to-white gradient drawn from the bottom of the image to the top of the image. Bottom of the image is the floor under your feet, and top of the image is stuff off in the distance. Or, if you have a character standing in front of the camera you can cut out that the character part of the image and paint it full black (which means it’s close to the camera), and have the rest of the image be blurred based on your simple gradient.
Or you can use your artistic creativity to generate a freestyle depth map, using spherical gradients or whatever you want. The sky is the limit.
However, in real life the DOF effect is really quite complicated, and is nothing like a simple blurring. DOF is due to the physical characteristics of cameras and lenses, and can be quite complicated if you want to reproduce those characteristics. And often it is very important to reproduce them accurately, because humans are very used to seeing DOF and related effects, so they are very attuned to what they expect.
In practice, the blurriness of the image due to the DOF effects is a function of how “zoomy” the camera view is (how much zoom/magnification the lens has and how close it is to the subject) as well as how dark the scene is, since it is a function of how open the aperture is. Zoomy-er lenses that are close to the subject in low light levels generally have the most blurry (shallow DOF) images.
But the actual visible effect is also a function of other things, and it’s not just a simple blur. It depends on the shape of the aperture, for example, which can affect the overall look of the blur and its highlights. There are a number of related lens effects that can be considered connected with, and related to, DOF. Which is one reason why I suggest people don’t rely upon simple DOF blurs that are designed to merely give a simple approximation to something that is often very complicated and interesting. Very often it's those subtle little complications that make viewers subconsciously suddenly realize "hey, that's REAL !!" and they instantly believe your premise.
If you have one, that is...
Photoshop has a lens blur function for which you load the depth map. Outside of that it can be used as a mask for blurring. That's the short of it anyway. If you google for it you should be able to find tutorials (which is what I did when I started on exploring this from the previous thread, but I don't recall any URLs).
Thanks Thoromyr!
I'll have a look out for that lens blur function.
great thread Evil, thanks for starting it
Thanks Thoromyr!
I'll have a look out for that lens blur function.
It's under blur and it seems to work quite nicely.
Just an FYI:
I have used Photoshop 7 and then my nephew moved into the other side of the duplex in which I live, and he let me use his Photoshop CS for quite some time. I ended up spending quite a bit of time over there with my handy-dandy usb hard drive optimizing images and such - which helps to explain why I often did all of my effects within Carrara, attempting to go for "No Post Work" images. When we promote our products, here at DAZ, we are supposed to use images that haven't been altered by post filters and such - so that the customer knows what to expect, out of the box.
Photoshop CS is still a bit out of my reach. Sure, I could go without allowing my family to eat for a month and buy it anyways... but I opt to not torture my loved ones in such a way. So I've been using TheGimp, which truly is an outstanding piece of software, and it's free! I'll never go without it in my toolbox. But I recall Rogue Pilot mentioning techniques he's used in PaintShop Pro several times here and there. So recently, I decided to look into it. PaintShop Pro, many years ago, was the first software I've owned that allowed me to use layers for editing. I still have that somewhere around here, and was planning to hunt it down and install it again, but Corel (my version was before Corel took it over) was offering it for their anniversary special at the low, low price of $29.95 USD - and I could get it in it's X5 (latest at the time) version PLUS the VideoStudo Pro X5 (not the latest, as X6 has just come out at the time) for a low-cost bundle, so I bought that. Already having Sony Movie HD, I looked pretty deep into VideoStudio Pro before adding it to the buy, and sure enough, it has some great feature to bring to the table that I don't otherwise already have available.
Anyways, I'm still getting used to PaintShop Pro X5. So I'm catching some critique on some of my images that (I know) actually came from my post work attempts, rather than entirely due to my rendering qualities. I know, big deal, right? That's how I look at it. We're all friends here - and I don't mind if I post something that you guys feel is substandard. We all learn together, right?
Well what drew me into PSPro over getting Photoshop Elements (their cheaper version, which is also available in a handy bundle with Premier Elements for a sweet deal), is that it can merge HDR Images from Exposure shots, as explained in Phil Wilkes Advanced Training, and Elements, I was told by a rep at Adobe, does not. I would need to get Photoshop CS for that.
Well I'm finding that Corel has really implemented some great learning aids right into the software - that I find to be superb. Utilizing "Help" in some software doesn't always get you very far on the ol' learning curve. Well Corel offers (even via pop-up until you choose to not see the popup again) for $4.99 each, different levels of training that you can add to the interface - which I'm not planning to get. That stuff seems aimed more towards users who really need help getting started in photo editing software for the firsat time - which I think is super-awesome. $5 is really cheap for a really good "Getting Started" video learning aid, and there are several levels from which to choose. So after 'opting out', I opened X5 again and just checked the Help menu, which already has an extensive set of "Getting Started" material, which give a handy bit of info on how to access the features you're looking to use, which then offers a "More Info" button that launches your browser on the subject. Pretty neat!
But Help also includes a guide to your Keyboard Shortcuts, user manual and other learning tid bits.
I haven't even begun to try VideoStudio Pro yet, but it is advertised to have the same sort of helpful interface as well - something that originally drew me into purchasing Sony Movie HD as well. I like it when I can learn software within that software. That's what really gave me the idea to include tips and such in my EnvironKits packs.
And I'm sure you all already know about how much I think that Project Dogwaffle Pro: Howler is just Cookies and Cream for Carrara animation endeavors - and stills alike!
Interested in the great line of Corel products for post work? Here's a link to their friendly, easy to navigate site. Helpful to the end. I like that in a software company. And here's a video about the Photo/Video suite I bought
Oh... and additionally, PaintShop Pro has a handy popup when opening the software where you can get answers to questions you may have, and also download and install many free 'content packs' to further your post work experience. Each pack that you may download and install as such, also has a information button where you can access instructions for use of that pack. Now that's service!
I am also ultimately impressed at how intuitive and easy to navigate their site is. They have a multitude of products that will aid us in our post-working endeavors. Helpful tutorials, written and video, can be fully accessed prior to purchase. I wasn't really expecting PaintShop Pro to be quite as robust a software that it is. And, sure, you can likely do much more with Photoshop CS. But it's just amazing what a great value this software truly appears to me to be.
Just hoping to help some who may be looking for options - as I find this to be an excellent choice! ;)