ratGPU : OpenCL raytracing renderer

jogshy

Hi,

I've just uploaded ratGPU here
http://www.ratgpu.com

( yep, you'll be redirected by now to an xNormal's subdomain... I'm just lazy )

ratGPU is a free progressive OpenCL ray tracing renderer for 3dsmax. It currently works on Vista/7 and NVIDIA cards only.
I've also tested it with ATI cards, but for some reason I cannot understand well, ATI does not include the OpenCL.dll in their drivers... so, in theory ratGPU should work with ATI cards... but, in practise, not.

.. and, nope, it's NOT at all optimised, before you ask :poly122:

I'll support WinXP soon, I need to solve some problems with the f%%&&##g XP's watchdog.

I also plan to port it to Maya, once all is more or less stable.

You can currently render normals, material colors and ambient occlusion by now.
I'll implement path tracing soon...

A friend recorded a video showing how to use it ( and , pls, excuse the english! )
http://vimeo.com/12413621?hd=1

Thx!

commander_keen

oooohhhh very cool.

renderhjs

very nice, this whole openCL stuff seems to be the future for this kind of stuff.

Nysuatro

Never heared about OpenCL, hmmm
This sounds very interesting

EDIT: hehe woeps, wrong type from me

jogshy

Nysuatro wrote: »

Never heared about OpenGL, hmmm
This sounds very interesting

OpenCL, not OpenGL :poly124:
OpenGL is a graphics API like Direct3D.
OpenCL is a GPGPU API like CUDA ( but multivendor, so it will work on ATIs too ).

ps: Hah! The 0.0.1 will be 20x times faster... lol, what a bug I had :poly136:

Nysuatro

lol, that is a big difference What was the bug if I may ask?

jogshy

Nysuatro wrote: »

What was the bug if I may ask?

I was updating 20 consecutive times the 3dsmax's preview... so I wasted a 90% of the time painting already-painted pixels :poly136:

elte

This is awesome Santy, but will there be version 4.0 of xNormal or u're already bored with it? :P

MattLichy

Oh damn.... I need to try this out.

THANKS!

jogshy

elte wrote: »

This is awesome Santy, but will there be version 4.0 of xNormal or u're already bored with it? :P

ratGPU is really a residue of the xn4's tech :poly124:
I had to make a stop to learn OpenCL for xn4 so that's ratGPU, just a temporary stop. xn4 is pretty alive

MattLichy

I tested it out quick,

I'm running on Max 2010 64bit, Intel Core 2 Quad 2.67GHZ, Win 7, Nvidia GTX260 Overclocked, 8GB of DDR2 1066mhz ram, but even doing a 256x256 render is going extremely slow..

Maybe I am doing something wrong? It looked like in your video yours was going quite fast.

jogshy

MattLichy wrote: »

I tested it out quick,

I'm running on Max 2010 64bit, Intel Core 2 Quad 2.67GHZ, Win 7, Nvidia GTX260 Overclocked, 8GB of DDR2 1066mhz ram, but even doing a 256x256 render is going extremely slow..

Maybe I am doing something wrong? It looked like in your video yours was going quite fast.

It's bugged. Actually is like 20x slower than it should be hehe. Well... you can execute it, that's what matters by now :poly124:

I'll try to post the v0.1.0 the next Monday.

oXYnary

Did you ever know your my Hero?

Are the ATI drivers in their Stream SDK?

http://developer.amd.com/gpu/atistreamsdk/pages/default.aspx

jogshy

oXYnary wrote: »

Are the ATI drivers in their Stream SDK?

The current problem of ATI and OpenCL is that their Catalyst drivers don't include the OpenCL DLL. I'm forced to statically-link it to my .exe, and that sux because ,then, the .exe won't work with NVIDIA cards. I really hope ATI could fix that soon.
I've tested ratGPU with their SDK and works... I'm just waiting for them to solve that little big problem.

renderhjs

well ATI seems to be the sucker anyway when it comes to drivers, I am not surprised that they are last or 2nd with openCL, they really need to address their driver issues.

MattLichy

Sounds good jogshy, thanks

jogshy

I've just uploaded the v0.1.2, which should be a lot faster than the original one.
Also solved a problem rendering a frame of time.

next: vertex normals with smoothing groups and irradiance.
thx

MattLichy

Sweet, will try it out when I go back to WA. Am back home visiting for a bit... don't have my desktop of course.. xD

Junkie_XL

This is pretty cool jogshy. I'd love if you could get this working working with max render to texture.

jogshy

Some progress on pathtracing:

jogshy

I've just uploaded the v0.2.1 with path tracing support ( diffuse, reflective, refractive, fresnel, mesh lights ) and other enhacements.




Btw, the new FW 257.21 seems to be broken. Better stay with the 197.XX.

thx.

pior

I have the feeling this is about to blow Hypershot, Mental Ray and Vray out of the water, for simple beauty shots!

I suppose you will support HDR cubemaps ?

Loving unbiased renderers ... cant wait to play with this.

Thegodzero

looking very sexy!

ZacD

You should post some render times with those pics.

jogshy

pior wrote: »

I suppose you will support HDR cubemaps ?

Yep, the skymaps is on the high-priority todo list together with anti-aliasing and textures.

ZacD wrote: »

You should post some render times with those pics.

Nah, ratGPU is still not optimized. I hope to reach 10X speed soon.
I'm concentrating first in developing the key features, then I'll optimize it.

Btw, I'm thinking about writting a progressive mode instead of a tile preview, but it's complicated due to the 3dsmax's architecture. I should just open my own window and do the computations there, yep.

jogshy

I'm preparing the 0.3.0 with some optimizations but I'm waiting for OpenCL 1.1 to come.
OpenCL 1.0 has some problems, the drivers are not yet very mature and the current ATI's implementation is a bit scary.

designamyte

Hi, nice work and a great integration into the 3d apps. Would like to know, if there are any plans to get it availible for other 3d progs like cinema 4d? cheers de.

bugo

Santiago you never stop amazing me. Great job my friend. Do you have plans and is it easy implementing this in Maya somehow?

Another question is. Do you have plans of creating this RT pathtracing into a GI function and perhaps a baking tool later?

jogshy

designamyte wrote: »

any plans to get it availible for other 3d progs like cinema 4d?

Do you have plans and is it easy implementing this in Maya somehow?

Yep, I plan to port it to Maya once the basic things are implemented in 3dsmax and it's more or less optimized.
About Cinema4D I'm afraid I have no idea how to write a plugin. I've never used its SDK.

Another question is. Do you have plans of creating this RT pathtracing into a GI function and perhaps a baking tool later?

Yep, maybe. I'm considering to allow the user to bake the lighting for xn4 too.

planaria

it looks cool , but i wont be able to try it out since i use blender.

If you did feel like supporting blender i would love to try it out though

SHEPEIRO

awsomeness...

kio

very interessting

designamyte

Ah, ok. This is a pity. But i can understand it, a lil bit.
Can only say: Don´t be afraid ...and i am curious
about further developments of ratGPU and Xn4...


greets
de.

jogshy

Uploaded ratGPU 0.3.0 with ATI support and some speed improvements.
Some important notes ( as I mention in the web page ):

1. The Forceware 25X broke ratGPU. Use the FW 197 instead while they fix the drivers.

2. If you want to execute in an ATI card you need to download the huge ATI OpenCL SDK v2.2 ( I know, a pain ).

3. The speed on ATI is not good ( probably because the algorithms I'm using don't like large GPU SIMD processors ).

4. The speed of GeForce 8/9 cards are not even comparable to a GT200(GTX260/280) or Fermi card(GTX 460,465,470,480).

5. You need an Internet connection because I'm developing an update system and I want to test it.

jogshy

I've just uploaded the 0.3.1 with some bugs corrected and a new example scene ( yep, programmer's art, I know ):

bugo

that is awesome!

pior

Wow!! That looks promising.

Programmers art or not, Ive always loved that kind of curly shapes in threedee. Would you mind explaining how you crafted them ? I am really, really interested in this process. ("Parametric 3d")

renderhjs

programming can be art, and that looks very nice. I would be interested in some video demos showing the performance with the right hardware.

jogshy

I would be interested in some video demos showing the performance with the right hardware.

Mwhaha! I just doubled the speed for ATIs today hacking their compiler with a super-dirty trick ( but it's still a lot slower than NVIDIA...). Incomming 0.4.0 soon with hybrid-CPU support also ( you'll be able to use the CPU + GPU, the current version uses only the GPU ).

Currently only the NVIDIA's true GT200 series(GT240/260/270/280/285/295, not the rebranded G80s) and probably Fermi(I don't own one) render at good speed.
I included an .ODF document with some benchmarks results with the 0.3.1b but I still need to improve a lot the performance. The drivers/SDKs are very immature too ( ATI's SDK is a pain and the NVIDIA's Forceware 25X broke my implementation ... )

I'm impatient to get a Fermi card to see how it can perform... In theory, will be 2-3x faster than their GT200 equivalents.

Well, currently I'm touching 1000 things a day so any tutorials/docs I could write gonna be deprecated fast. I'll make a video explaining all after I'm more or less happy with the speed and the things are a bit more stable ( probably after the 0.4.0 )

Would you mind explaining how you crafted them ? I am really, really interested in this process. ("Parametric 3d")

You can use this program:

http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/~sequin/SCULPTS/scherk.html

it's very easy to use: just play with the parameters and export the result as .STL ( a format that 3dsmax and Maya can read ).

jogshy

I've just uploaded the 0.4.0:

- Doubled the speed with ATI cards ( still very behind NVIDIA )

- Added WinXP support ( remember to disable the primary GPU or the watchdog will pop... or use the CPU only )

- Enabled hybrid rendering ( you can use both GPU + CPU simultaneously to render... although if the CPU is much slower than the GPU can slow a lot the rendering... )

- Fixed some bugs

DerDude

too bad it´s max-only right now
Are animations possible to render in Max?

jogshy

DerDude wrote: »

too bad it´s max-only right now

Yep, I plan to release a Maya version... but I'm still not very happy with the speed.

Are animations possible to render in Max?

Yep

DerDude

thanks for the answer Jogshy
is there something like a schedule when maya could start? this year?

commador

jogshy wrote: »

Yep, I plan to release a Maya version...

it's a longshot but, maybe XSI? (Softimage if you prefer the Autodesk nomenclature) I know you can't support everyone's favorite app, but it never hurt to ask?

jogshy

commador wrote: »

it's a longshot but, maybe XSI? (Softimage if you prefer the Autodesk nomenclature) I know you can't support everyone's favorite app, but it never hurt to ask?

The more platforms I port the better... but first I must develop a solid core... and currently I'm not happy with the speed. All is under heavy R&D.

I'll port it to other programs once I'm happy with the results and the core is stable enough.

DerDude

jogshy you´re awesome, our crew use x-normal heavily in production.

ZacD

Is it ever going to be released as a stand alone app like xnormal?

Is the render engine going to be implemented into xnormal?

Is it possible to use it for baking light maps?

jogshy

ZacD wrote: »

Is it ever going to be released as a stand alone app like xnormal?

Yep. The idea is to integrate it into 3dsmax, Maya and XSI but I also will make an stand-alone app + batch mode and SDK.

Is the render engine going to be implemented into xnormal?

I developed ratGPU basically to improve my OpenCL skills but also because I wanted a renderer to perform beauty shots in xNormal 4, so yep, definitely.

Is it possible to use it for baking light maps?

Not currently, but I could adapt it very easily to render to texture just changing a few lines of code.

However, I still need to do a lot of R&D before all that. All is very experimental yet.

ZacD

Really awesome news, sounds like your first priority is speed.

I could see animation/vfx/visualization studios being interested if you can beat V-Ray RT to the punch.

With 3point shader and quality normals becoming popular here (and hopefully in other big studios and engines) is there a possibility of rendering out 3ds max style normal maps with gpu acceleration that would with quality normals?

jogshy

ZacD wrote: »

With 3point shader and quality normals becoming popular here (and hopefully in other big studios and engines) is there a possibility of rendering out 3ds max style normal maps with gpu acceleration that would with quality normals?

I've found a little problem integrating all this into 3dsmax: the background viewports are slowing the GPU rendering a bit and the memory used is a lot because the meshes need to be stored in system-RAM, DirectX-VRAM and OpenCL-VRAM.... so I really think is much better to use an standalone app to increase the speed and the polycount.

Btw, I've just uploaded the 0.4.1 with improved speed for ATI cards ( around 30% ), but still far from NVIDIA.

jogshy

I've just uploaded the 0.4.2 with several improvements and a stand alone renderer/benchmark.