CineRender Everything is Blue!

[Gus]

I'm trying to render an interior view with CineRender in ArchiCAD 18 and everything is blue. Any ideas why this might be?

[Anonymous]

No experience with CineRender yet but is it doing this for all views? Just wondering if your camera is slightly outside a window or something else.

[Karl Ottenstein]

What are your scene settings? Light sources?

[Gus]

This "blueness" occurs in all photo renderings regardless of where the view is. It's not looking through a window or anything.

There are so many variables, I don't know how to answer the question "What are your scene settings."

I don't believe I changed any settings. This was however an ArchiCAD 17 model before converting it to 18. Also, I'm using Bobrow's Master Template if that makes any difference.

[Karl Ottenstein]

Got it. You can't just open an old file and expect a render to do something useful without setting up the render settings.

With CR, the render settings are saved in "scenes" that can be quickly recalled (or adjusted and saved with new names) ... and which are then memorized as part of the views in 18. A view from 17 will not magically get a scene that is meaningful for it.

See attached screenshot. If you have no ArchiCAD lamps for internal illumination in your interior, then try the Indoor Daylight scenes shown there which should let sun/sky light enter via the windows and at least illuminate something.

If you have LightWorks sun/sky objects in your project, you'll want to get rid of them. Since your materials (surfaces) are also coming from 17... they won't be tuned for the CR render engine as the materials in the 18 template are... and so you may next run across issues related to glass transparency, etc.

Try a daylight setting and let's see what you get.

PS The black rectangle at the top of the attached Render Settings dialog is a fast preview window. Just click in it to get a quick preview of what your render might look like to see if you've left the blue behind with these new daylight settings...

[Karl Ottenstein]

The scenes in the list are not at all exclusive. They are starting points set up by Graphisoft which should be fine for many scenarios.

[Gus]

OK, that is better.
The Daylight Fast one worked
The Daylight (physical) one was very very dark.
Attached here is the Daylight Fast one.

[Karl Ottenstein]

Definitely looking better even if quite dark. Some realistic shadows!

It seems that there is no sun coming through the windows, so moving your time of day/date may help to get some sun into the room to bounce around. And/or turn on some lights. Use the lamp tool and see 16 Electrical 18 for general (invisible) light sources. (An advanced option is to make the lenses for fluorescent lights use a light-emitting surface material.)

If using the Physical render, it uses camera-like settings. See attached for the default settings for the Indoor Daylight Fast (Physical) scene as created by GS. Just as a real camera, you probably have to boost the ISO and/or use a lower f-stop and/or use a slower shutter speed to get more light into the virtual physical camera to brighten up the image.

[Karl Ottenstein]

I just took a look at the Indoor Daylight Fast (Physical) scene settings and verified the darkness you saw, Gus. And, changing camera parameters didn't fix it.. was still black outside the windows.

Graphisoft made an error in setting up this scene it seems. It should have only turned on the physical renderer, but it also changed the intensity of the Global Illumination settings for the worse.

The interior 'fast' settings had Detailed Settings > Global Illumination > General settings of 200 for primary intensity and 400 for secondary intensity. The delivered 'physical' version of interior fast had 120 for each. Not enough light bouncing around.

You can either select the physical settings and adjust the GI to 200/400 and then further adjust camera settings... There's a balance between over-exposing the sky and other exterior elements and having enough exposure on the interior.

Or... try loading Indoor Daylight Fast and then, with detailed checked, check the box for Use Physical Renderer and try the attached values for f-stop, etc and adjust from there, clicking the preview image for a quick preview before doing a render.

What has other people's experience been so far with the default scene settings?

[Anonymous]

If I may "piggy back " off this subject, my colleague was trying to use CineRender for his interior renderings, but the interior rendering image(s) are all black. I tried using different cameras, making new cameras, deleting certain materials or objects, adding lights, tried different setting w/CineRender, etc. The only time interior renderings work is when the "use White Model Effect" box is checked or using a different rendering engine. Now the outside cameras for CineRender rendering are working fine. Any suggestions? (No pics cause there all black, lol) Thank You John A