V3D HDR Creator: problems with rendering of .exr

The product in question: https://www.daz3d.com/v3d-hdr-creator

After a couple of last updates of Daz3d Studio, rendering of HDRI images by V3D HDR Creator doesn't seem to work well. These are the Render Settings:
- Min Samples: 100
- Max Samples: 5000
- Max Time (secs): 7200
- Rendering Converged Ration: 100%

The render process seems to be going ok. One would expect the render engine to go on untill 5000 samples or 2 hours minimum, but it stops after hitting 100 samples (around 50 minutes), resulting in an .exr of approximately 100kb, which is not really usable.
This problem could be probably solved by increasing of Min Samples, but Daz Studio doesn't allow values higher than 100 there. This is not handy by the way in general terms, but at least rendering images works well.

Another thing is that it worked before, but not anymore, that is why I mentioned the updates of Daz3d Studio.

Am I missing something or doing something wrong? Can anybody help?

Comments

  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 101,013

    And is the image noisy? You can check the log file (Help>Troubleshooting>View Log File) to see why it stopped. Image size on disc is a function of size in pixels and how much it compressed, how big is the image in pixels?

  • felisfelis Posts: 4,344

    I don't have the product.

    If you look in the log file, Help > Troubleshooting > View Log File, can you then see why it has stopped?

  • Thank you for your prompt reaction. Logs that might be relevant:

    2024-03-30 11:20:06.334 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend info : Received update to 00100 iterations after 3668.871 s.
    2024-03-30 11:20:06.336 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend progr: Convergence threshold reached.
    2024-03-30 11:20:40.721 Iray [INFO] - IMAGE:IO ::   1.0   IMAGE  io   info : Saving image ",,,.exr", pixel type "Rgb_fp", 4000x2000x1 pixels, 1 miplevel.

    So, the resulting image is actually 4000x2000px as well.

    I tried to render 3 times - exactly the same result. Strange thing is that "Convergence threshold reached" always by 100 iterations, whatever that means

    The .exr is very dark by the way, could it be that the scene is missing lights? I never added any lights before when rendering worked well, but I will try tomorrow again with lights and also try to render a different scene.

    If you have any thoughts meanwhile, please let me know..

  • felisfelis Posts: 4,344

    If you look in Render settings > Progressive Rendering and find Rendering Converged Ratio. Default is 95%, meaning that Iray has determined that 95% of the pixels has reached their final value, and thereby the render is finished.

    If you do not consider it finished you can increase the level or increase render quality.

  • jjoynerjjoyner Posts: 618
    edited March 30

    mariopirlo96 said:

    The product in question: https://www.daz3d.com/v3d-hdr-creator

    After a couple of last updates of Daz3d Studio, rendering of HDRI images by V3D HDR Creator doesn't seem to work well. These are the Render Settings:
    - Min Samples: 100
    - Max Samples: 5000
    - Max Time (secs): 7200
    - Rendering Converged Ration: 100%

    The render process seems to be going ok. One would expect the render engine to go on untill 5000 samples or 2 hours minimum, but it stops after hitting 100 samples (around 50 minutes), resulting in an .exr of approximately 100kb, which is not really usable.

    This problem could be probably solved by increasing of Min Samples, but Daz Studio doesn't allow values higher than 100 there. This is not handy by the way in general terms, but at least rendering images works well.

     

    As desired/needed, you can change settings of most parameters and settings in Daz Studio by clicking on the gear icon in the upper right corner of the parameter or setting.  See the first image below.   Once in the setting panel, either, you can change many things including the Max or Min setting as desired or uncheck the Use Limits box.  See the second image below.

    I have the product but am still using Daz Studio version 4.21.

    Parameter Settings 1.jpg
    677 x 317 - 67K
    Parameter Settings 2.jpg
    1154 x 690 - 179K
    Post edited by jjoyner on
  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 101,013

    The convergence ratio is the proportion of pixels that have reached s table value - how tightly that is defined is set by the render quality. Your 100% ratio means that the render stops, after completing the minimum nimber of iterations, because all of the pixels are good enough. If the image is still noisy to your eyes then you can increase the quality level to make it fussier, or just turn the quality off entirely. However, that isn't going to make much if any difference if your concern is that the image is too dark. You really need to explain how the .exr is failing as an HDR.

  • Answering to @jjoyner - I know about this possibility to change min and max values, but as I said in the first message, this option is not available for "Min Samples". It is probably disappeared after one of the recent updates. Hope that Daz puts it back again.

    @Richard, the .exr is only 100kb, the "good" .exr's I rendered before, are 30Mb and higher. See the attached screenshot: this is how it shows in https://viewer.openhdr.org
    Maybe "too dark" is not the right way to describe it, but as you see, this is not what you would expect from an HDR image.

    I tried to render with lights, and default render settings (Min Samples: 5 and Rendering Converged Ration: 95%). Exactly the same result.
    2024-03-31 10:01:59.674 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend info : Received update to 00028 iterations after 824.195 s.
    2024-03-31 10:03:05.280 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend progr: 100.00% of image converged
    2024-03-31 10:03:05.327 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend info : Received update to 00030 iterations after 889.852 s.
    2024-03-31 10:03:05.327 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend progr: Convergence threshold reached.
    2024-03-31 10:04:12.812 Iray [INFO] - IMAGE:IO ::   1.0   IMAGE  io   info : Saving image "...exr", pixel type "Rgb_fp", 4000x2000x1 pixels, 1 miplevel.

    Tried to render another scene, it results in a similar "dark" .exr.
    2024-03-31 10:42:58.198 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend info : Received update to 00028 iterations after 953.725 s.
    2024-03-31 10:44:12.419 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend progr: 100.00% of image converged
    2024-03-31 10:44:12.452 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend info : Received update to 00030 iterations after 1027.971 s.
    2024-03-31 10:44:12.454 Iray [INFO] - IRAY:RENDER ::   1.0   IRAY   rend progr: Convergence threshold reached.
    2024-03-31 10:45:30.944 Iray [INFO] - IMAGE:IO ::   1.0   IMAGE  io   info : Saving image "...exr", pixel type "Rgb_fp", 4000x2000x1 pixels, 1 miplevel.

    So, in both cases it goes no further than 30 iterations.

    Any ideas? Does anybody has the same problem with V3D HDR Creator?

    exr.jpg
    1857 x 837 - 92K
  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 101,013

    Yes, the histogram certainly shows that it isn't capturing the full colour range - even for an 8-bits-per-channel image.

  • mariopirlo96mariopirlo96 Posts: 30
    edited March 31

    I tried to render other scenes with 100 Min Samples and they came out a little better, but still unsuable. Render engine stops too early - this is the only conclusion I can make.
    Anybody knows why it happens and how to avoid it?
    Otherwise, increasing minimum samples to, say, 500, would solve the problem, but this option is not available. Maybe there is any hacks to do that?
    If I understand correctly, scripts for Daz3d could be written in regular javascript. Is increasing or disabling the limit for Min Samples possible via Daz3d API?

    Post edited by mariopirlo96 on
  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 101,013

    What are your full render settings?

  • I just set them to NVIDIA Iray Defaults before the last attempts, except for Min Samples, which is set to 100 (also tried with default 5).
    Daz Studio Version 4.22.0.16 Pro Edition (64 bit).

  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 101,013

    What are the actual values in the Editor tab of Render Settings in the Progrssive Rendering group?

  • mariopirlo96mariopirlo96 Posts: 30
    edited April 1

    I was affraid you were gonna make me write down all settings ;) Here are the values in Progrssive Rendering group:

    Min Update Samples: 1
    Update Interval (secs): 5.00
    Min Samples: 100 (also tried default: 5)
    Max Samples: 5000
    Max Time (secs): 7200
    Rendering Quality Enable: On
    Rendering Quality: 1.00
    Rendering Converged Ration: 95.0% (also tried 100%)
    Post SSIM Available: Off

    Post edited by mariopirlo96 on
  • felisfelis Posts: 4,344

    What do you actually have in your scene and how is it lit?

  • mariopirlo96mariopirlo96 Posts: 30

    I tried with this product amoung others:
    https://www.daz3d.com/fh-sci-fi-chamber-room

    No additional lights added.

  • FishtalesFishtales Posts: 6,119
    edited April 1

    mariopirlo96 said:

    I tried with this product amoung others:
    https://www.daz3d.com/fh-sci-fi-chamber-room

    No additional lights added.

    There is that much light in that scene I had to go in and turn them all down :) Attach your scene file and I will load it and see what happens on my machine. Nothing else as I have the product. I don't have the HDR product though but I can render it as an HDRI and save it as a .tiff and see what happens.

    Post edited by Fishtales on
  • mariopirlo96mariopirlo96 Posts: 30

    Fishtales said:

    mariopirlo96 said:

    I tried with this product amoung others:
    https://www.daz3d.com/fh-sci-fi-chamber-room

    No additional lights added.

    There is that much light in that scene I had to go in and turn them all down :) Attach your scene file and I will load it and see what happens on my machine. Nothing else as I have the product. I don't have the HDR product though but I can render it as an HDRI and save it as a .tiff and see what happens

    I don't have anything else in this scene exept this product itself, which you already have I guess. The reason I use HDR Creator is to create HDRI of the environment, which I can use in future scenes.
    Do you already have HDRI of this scene? And how do you render HDRI's in Daz by the way, if you don't use the HDR Creator?

     

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