will HDR lighting render with just CPU?
daveso
Posts: 7,896
in The Commons
i see Colm's HDR sets on 60% off, but I do not have nvidia gpu in my system. Will it render with just CPU rendering. I note product description and other things I have read indicate it requires nvidia gpu?

Comments
Iray renders are much faster using an NVidia GPU like the 980 and up, but aren't required. I rendered for a couple years with CPU only, but it was painfully slow on my 8 year old computer. From the description of Colm's PRO-Studio HDR Lighting System: "All the HDR's in this package will provide you with the best specularity and eye reflections that can be achieved in Daz Studio and will render incredibly fast with an Nvidia graphics card."
Those are HDRI for Terradome 3 but I use other HDRI all the time with just CPU. When clicked on the TerrDome 3 sky HDRI is loaded into the Environment Map of the Iray Dome and works without having Terraome 3 loaded, I just tried it :)
this set ..plus two since
https://www.daz3d.com/pro-studio-hdr-lighting-system
Reading the synopsis they should work as HDRI with the lighting set into them and loaded into the Iray Dome. HDRI wont slow a render down that will depend on what else is in the scene.
...if you are just looking for skies with a sunlight there are these: (on sale right now)
https://www.daz3d.com/ibl-skies-perfect-skies-bundle
You made the same mistake as me. The ones that the OP is looking at are Studio lights for portraits.
..ah, never mind then.
yes, mainly portraits ...

I did pick up the HDR set #2 ... https://www.daz3d.com/pro-studio-hdr-lighting-system-2
My usual set is 3 point light ... i applied one of these HDR and I coul dimmediately see much better lighting, although using CPU render, it is taking actually longer to render. Either way isn't exactly a short time though
So usually around an hour or so for simple portrait with 3 point light .. am now at 25 minutes for 15% ... but I like the result a lot. Very crisp and clear ... I will post image when it is nearly cooked.
Yes these portrait sets all work with CPU although much quicker with nvidia
...yeah I pretty much set Iray aside and moved back to 3DL until I can get a beefy GPU as I do fairly large scenes. There are methods to reduce render times but they compromise quality, particularly if you are looking for very realistic results.
Iray seems to like light, lots of it (unless you are using emissive lights, those tend to slow it down). I had reasonably good results within 25 - 30 min when I would "proof render" individual characters (using a neutral backdrop, two photometric spots, and an ambient IBL that Mec4D created a couple years ago that was available for a limited time).
Sample:
I have used them with CPU only. CPU will just render more slowly than GPU rendering.
yes, I'm finding them much slower. I like the results though. I thought about grabbing all 3 sets, but will wait until I can get a fast computer with an nvidia card. Hopefully DAZ will still be using iray by then. Probably be on version 10 of DS too
...I wonder if the captured lights use emissives (not sure how light for Iray HDRs is produced). If so that could be what is causing the slow times in CPU mode.
The light from the HDRI is built in so it is an image and the bright areas are the lights.
Image removed - please see https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/3279/acceptable-ways-of-handling-nudity#latest
well, here is a render ... it looks decent for sure. At least I like iot. took 2 hours .. not sure it finished though, as I think 2 hours is cutoff
Also, I know there are many that see all the fine details, shadows, etc in a render. My eye does not pick all that up so my judgement of good lighting isn;t that good.