The new Vray 6 for Sketchup Features
Since its initial release in 1997 Vray has come a long way, making changes to its interface and updating itself with the changes in computer and software technology every few years.
Vray for Sketchup has been one of the most widely used rendering software in the last few years due to its easy-to-learn system and its convenient connection to SketchUp, along with its vast materials and plugin library. With the 6th edition of vray coming around the corner, there are some major changes that the software is making which will only help the designers take their virtual world to new heights of reality. Here’s everything that is new in Vray 6 for Sketchup Features.
Resumable Rendering
Finally, this long-awaited feature is available! The ‘resumable rendering’ feature allows you to pause and resume a render. To begin, specify a file location for the Vray output file and enable ‘resumable rendering’.
New Tags System
The new Tags system in the Vray Asset Editor will help you organize your models & scenes better. It can be applied to materials, lights, render elements, & geometries. This is a game-changer for all those who like to stay organized with your large Vray Scenes.
Interactive Rendering Updated
- A new interactive rendering workflow has been implemented. It is no longer necessary to toggle the Interactive UI and the production render settings are always visible. You can enable interactive rendering by clicking the Render Interactive button on the toolbar, in the asset editor, or in the VFB.
- In the Asset Editor and on the toolbar, all rendering-related icons have been updated.
Procedural Clouds
V-Ray Sky now supports procedural clouds. The clouds parameters can be changed in the project by selecting the Sun settings.
Distance Texture
- Distance Texture implemented. It can be used to restrict Fur generation or even as a displacement map based on the colour values generated based on object proximity.
- Dirt texture Exclude and Affected By options implemented. Exclude objects from the dirt effect or make sure they are ignored when calculating the proximity.
ACEScg Color Space
ACEScg color space management implemented. To ensure that V-Ray renders are in the new colour space, select the ACEScg RGB Primaries in the color management settings. In this workflow, sRGB Primaries should be used for most standard RGB bitmap textures.
Finite Dome
The Dome light source now has finite Dome parameters. This feature allows you to create fixed shadows for objects such as vehicles and buildings using the domelight. This ensures that it blends well with the HDRI surroundings of the domelight.
Camera Clipping
- Camera Clipping options added to the Advanced Camera Parameters rollout. Use the feature to clip nearby objects in tight spaces.
Enscape compatibility
The rendering of scenes set up using Enscape can now be done in V-Ray. When transitioning from the Enscape design stage to the high-end visualization in V-Ray, V-Ray will automatically handle materials, lights, and even Enscape assets.
General Updates
- SketchUp materials are no longer treated as full-featured V-Ray materials by default. In the asset editor, they are listed as Host Materials, which can be promoted to V-Ray shaders at any time. The purpose of this is to help with scene navigation and organization, as well as to make Enscape compatible with the new version.
- Optimized animation export. It is now more than 10 times faster to export SketchUp animations for rendering. The frame interpolation logic used by SU when evaluating camera or sun animations was re-implemented in V-Ray in order to accomplish this.
- It’s now possible to import any V-Ray shader using the updated V-Ray scene importer. The UI for shading nodes that aren’t supported is automatically generated – and it can still be edited. This feature is still in its experimental phase.
- It is now possible to apply multiple geometry modifiers to the same scene object. Combining Fur and Scatter is now possible.
Material Improvements
- GTR energy compensation is enabled for all V-Ray Materials. The option ensures more accurate reflection values for most blurry reflective materials using the Microfacet GTR (GGX) BRDF model.
- Thin Film parameters added to the V-Ray Material. Toggle the advanced parameters to see the Thin Film rollout.
- The rendered appearance as well as the UI of V-Ray Materials using the SSS Translucency are improved.
- Car Paint 2 material implemented. It replaces the legacy Car Paint in the UI and comes with an improved flakes and coating layers.
- Automatic Transfer Function mode added to the Bitmap texture. Note that the parameter previously known as Color Space is now correctly renamed to Transfer Function. It determines the gamma correction curve applied to the bitmap.
- Live preview for Decals implemented.
- Sphere swatch preview scene added for material assets. The preview is similar to the one used in Cosmos.
- The materials from the standard material library are now in Cosmos. The legacy material library will be phased out and Cosmos will remain the central, unified asset provider.
- Cosmos is updated to its latest version.
Vray Frame Buffer (VFB) Updates
- Panorama viewer implemented. Use the Panorama View toggle in the View menu to enable the new mode. Looking around after that is done by holding the middle mouse button and moving the mouse. The field of view can be altered by scrolling.
- Proportion Guides layer implemented to help you with the frame composition
- Batch image processing implemented. Use it to apply corrections to a set of pre-rendered images.
- Flip buttons implemented. Use the quick flip feature to have a fresh eye on the image composition and verify it works in all settings.
- Dither colors in the frame buffer to avoid banding with low-contrast gradients.
GPU Updates
- Added support for the Lighting Analyses render element.
- Improved performance and reliability.
- Improved trace depth limit handling.
- Improved round edges rendering quality.
Vray Vision Updates
- A new system for evaluating V-Ray textures is implemented. Vision now supports most of V-Ray’s procedural textures and texture corrections. Baking is required in order for this to take place, so raytraced or camera-based procedural maps (such as dirt, falloff, distance, edges, etc.) are not supported.
- Measurement tool implemented. The Z key enables the tool, and then you select the two points you want to measure.
- Depth of field support added. If you change the DOF settings in V-Ray, you will see an effect in Vision. Note that the defocus amount is limited in Vision.
- Orbit navigation mode hotkeys now match those in the host application
- Materials opacity has been handled in a new way. In frames with multiple transparent objects overlapped, visual artefacts are no longer visible.
- Vision now supports V-Ray Infinite Planes. The plane in Vision has a finite size, but will automatically resize based on the scene bounding box.
- Vision’s overall stability and reliability have been improved.
I hope this blog helped you.
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