Which renderer for show-reel?

mikhga

Hi!

This might not be the right sub-forum for this type of question, but I hope so.

My question is, which renderer do you guys use for rendering out portfolio and show-reel stuff? This summer I'm going to University and I'm going to apply to a few game-development schools, and in the application you are required to show previous 3D/2D related work, where 3D is an obvious merit.

So I thought I'd send in a demo-reel, I mailed one of the schools and they said a demo-reel would be optimal, but I wonder about which render to use.

I could use Marmoset, but I find it rather difficult capturing a decent resolution video in real-time without any lag. I have also begun rendering out some models with Mental Ray and VRay, since but the render times sometimes reach 30 min per frame.

So could you guys give me some tips how to render out a professional reel?

Also, if I use Mental Ray or VRay for the rendering, would that be looked down upon since it's pretty far away from real-time quality?

If you think I should use scanline, could you please give me a few instructions about lighting and render-settings, since I just use my standard studio-lighting scenes with VRay and Mental Ray and I haven't got much experience with rendering or lighting rigs at all.

Help would be greatly appreciated, and please forgive my incoherent writing.

ceebee

Just use marmoset. Set the rotation rate on your character slow and have a screen recorder record at like 10fps, then speed the video up.

Mark Dygert

The only people that should really put any effort into a reel are animators and thats because you have to see their stuff move. Everybody else should display still shots rendered in realtime. UDK, Source, Marmoset Toolbag bla bla bla even 3dsmax 2012 does a good job of rendering things in a realtime viewport.

90% of the reels for environment and character art do a horrible job at doing what still images do fantastically well.

30min in MR or Vray is horrible for simple objects. We use Vray at work all the bells and whistles and on the super heavy environments it takes up to 10min per frame.

Uly

What mark said. If you're not an animator, employers don't want to see a reel. Save yourself and your prospective employers' time and take some nice screens.

mikhga

Ok, thanks for the answers. But if you had to chose between Marmoset and 3DS Max, which one would you use for realtime rendering?

Please forgive my stupid questions, but I'm fairly new to this.

Uly

Both are pretty great. I would personally use Max and the 3Point Shader for simplicity's sake, (keeping it all inside one art package.) but Marmoset will produce its own, distinctive, good look. It's up to you, either looks fine.

http://www.3pointstudios.com/3pointshader_about.shtml (3point shader)

mikhga

Ok, thanks. One last question if you have the time, would you prefer 3Point Shader over Xoliul's Viewport Shader? I know it's a pretty subjective opinion, but I'd like to know what you guys would use.

Ace-Angel

Both are pretty much the same, but 3Point has more options. Thinker with both of them and see.

Xiouli's strength is the simplicity and quick setup (as well editing power if you know your stuff) while 3Point is more of a closed package which has the more tools to play around with.

Spicypixel

I personally prefer 3point, and if a future update includes a small tool for rendering out sequential frames from the viewport I will love them forever. I know its possible with other scripts but that's not the point