Output to Piranesi

[Dave Jochum]

I'm trying to save a 3D view out to Piranesi for the first time and struggling with finding the optimum settings. I need an image 3K x 1.7K pixels with maximum anti-aliasing and with materials attached (for material lock), and shadow casting, but do not care about the rendering of the materials, as it will be completely painted over in Piranesi. I'm using the LightWorks engine and the following settings: Method: Normal - Effects: Smooth Surface only (Curved building), Shadow casting: by lamp settings - Antialiasing: Best.

This produces a monster file that takes hours to render and one that is a pain to share due to its size. There has to be a better way--what am I missing? How can I save out the smallest possible file that will have all the info I need?

Also, what is the BMP file created when saving the EPX file and how does Piranesi use it?

[Anonymous]

Dave,

I think some/most of your question has been answered by Karl Ottenstein in the forum before. Search for "Saving format for Piranesi" and see if that thread helps. If not, let us know!

[Dave Jochum]

Greg wrote:
Dave,

I think some/most of your question has been answered by Karl Ottenstein in the forum before. Search for "Saving format for Piranesi" and see if that thread helps. If not, let us know!

Thanks Greg. I read all of the previous posts prior to posting, and they do not deal with the issues I've raised. I'm looking for a strategy for getting all the info I need in the file, but no more so as to keep the file size at a minimum.

[Anonymous]

Dave,

Karl had said the following in a post on the subject:
"If your intent is to do most of your work in Piranesi, then choose rendering settings in ArchiCAD that are super fast."

You mentioned you have antialiasing set to best and shadow casting on. Have you tried turning off shadow casting and notching down antialiasing?

I'm wondering if those might give you a more nimble file in Piranesi without affecting the rendering quality.

[Karl Ottenstein]

Hi Dave,

As Greg mentions, if you are not doing a photorealistic rendering, you want the fastest rendering from ArchiCAD possible to generate your epix file.

In particular, if you do NOT need shadows, reflections, etc., just use the internal engine with the fastest settings to get the material and depth channels with an ugly RGB channel to paint over.

If you need some of those things, then use LW, but use only the settings you require.

A trick for a high pixel result is this: the material and depth channels are the same no matter how you render - rendering settings only affect the RGB channel. So... generate the desired pixel size epix using the fastest rendering settings (internal at night = black for example).

Then, generate a normal LW render - at half the pixel dimensions (which is really 25% of the pixels) - which will be faster. Upsize it in Photoshop - doubling is rarely extremely noticeable, especially if you will be over-painting. Then in Piranesi use the Import RGB feature to bring in this upscaled RGB image to replace the lousy one. Do a Render to replace the 'restore RGB' channel and you're good to go. A bit of extra steps that only makes sense if the actual rendering process is required but is too slow.

(Also, as Greg mentions, if you require a LW render, dial down antialiasing and quality a notch as described by Dwight so that all cores can be used - at highest settings, rendering uses only one core.)

Cheers,
Karl

PS Was just in your neck of the woods this week in Petaluma - probably drove right by you on the 101 on the way to Muir Woods and Mt Tomapais on Monday. Beautiful.