LuxRender v1.2RC1

[jeanphi]

Hi all,

Here we are again with a new test release for the forthcoming v1.2 release. The provided LuxBlend exporter is compatible with Blender 2.65 and is not backward compatible. You'll find a summary of the changes just below, the development pace has been incredible since v1.1 and you'll find lots of bug fixes, new features and improvements.
We'll do our best to answer your questions in the forums or in the bug tracker. Help us make a great v1.2 by testing this RC and reporting issues.

Packages or installers for most platforms have been made available from our downloads page. Some exporters have been packaged in the installers depending on the platform, otherwise you'll be able to get them from the download page or the repositories.
Note that for pylux on Windows (as described in the included readme) you need the VS2010 redistributables. This is a change from last release. For convenience:
32 bit: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download ... px?id=8328
64 bit: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download ... x?id=13523

Changes since v1.1:
- hybrid rendering modes are now available even on non OpenCL builds
- SLG bidirectional implementation with vertex merging or hybrid mode
- fixes to SLG sun light
- fixes to bounding boxes causing instances objects to sometime disappear or be clipped
- tile rendering with SLG
- more advanced GPU memory management with SLG
- SLG core is now a library
- port of some more Lux features to SLG core
- user driven sampling and noise aware sampling (still experimental with bidir and metropolis combination)
- all scenes rendered are now added to the queue so you don't have to choose between single render and batch rendering
- improved queue handling
- fix dispersion using SPPM rendering
- new woven cloth material
- WARNING: backward compatibility break: the displacement direction when using loop subdivision has been reversed to match general expectations and to be consistent with microdisplacement or bump mapping
- improved dispersion handling with path and bidir
- much faster bloom filter
- fix a memory leak that could be dramatic when using hybrid rendering
- fix for projector light not applying transforms correctly

In LuxBlend25:
- improved preview
- add new LuxRender features
- be compatible with Blender 2.65 (not backward compatible)
- primitive proxy support to allow exporting of more LuxRender native shapes like spheres, cylinders, ...

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Source Code

People who want to download the source code can download the v11 tag files of our HG source code repository here:
http://src.luxrender.net/lux/file/512032ae7307
LuxRays is now a very strong requirement to build LuxRender even when not using OpenCL:
http://src.luxrender.net/luxrays/file/7fbe66a4b17b

LuxBlend (2.65): http://src.luxrender.net/luxblend25/file/69829cedcf07

---------------------------

Cheers,

Jeanphi

[J the Ninja]

Also, for those folks not using Blender, there has been some good work on the Softimage and Max plugins in the past few months too, so be sure to pick up an updated version!

Congrats to everyone, this has been a pretty fast-moving few months around here.

[cwichura]

While there are networking updates since 1.1, I don't believe the I/O timeouts is one of them. LordCRC has done work towards the foundation for I/O timeouts, but it's still highly experimental and I believe not even included unless explicitly #defined in, which has only been with test builds direct from him, or if you've built it yourself from source.

Still, there is good stuff in 1.2!

[SATtva]

Great work guys!

[Lord Crc]

While there are networking updates since 1.1, I don't believe the I/O timeouts is one of them. LordCRC has done work towards the foundation for I/O timeouts, but it's still highly experimental and I believe not even included unless explicitly #defined in, which has only been with test builds direct from him, or if you've built it yourself from source.

Correct, I've removed that point. The code needs better error handling before I can turn this on. I hope to get some time to implement this soon.

[tomb]

Wohoo

[SATtva]

FYI: viewtopic.php?p=90217#p90217

[giuliojiang]

nice work!
how does the new noise option in queue tab work? does 100% mean that render will stop when there will be no noise?

edit:
I tried it, but the convergence and threshold always remained at 0% after 10 minutes. Or do I need to wait longer.

[J the Ninja]

nice work!
how does the new noise option in queue tab work? does 100% mean that render will stop when there will be no noise?

edit:
I tried it, but the convergence and threshold always remained at 0% after 10 minutes. Or do I need to wait longer.

It doesn't check the noise amount continuously, only at the samples per pixel interval you set with convergencestep. The default interval is 32s/px. Convergencestep sets the first interval, subsequent updates will be at doubles of that value. So the next check is at 64s/px, then 128, then 256, etc. It won't be able to have a completion percentage until after the second update, so if you didn't lower convergencestep, it will be at 0% until you cross 64s/px.

[Pilchard123]

Why does it check at doubles of the original rather than eg 32s/px, 64s/px, 96s/px, 128s/px?