Anyone using Reality 4.3?
wintoons
Posts: 391
in The Commons
Hi guys,
I just wanted to know is anyone using Reality 4.3 as their renderer instead of iRay?
I would love to know people who are using it and is it good to use, especially if you have a Mac.
Thanks
Winton

Comments
I used it for years before IRAY. Luxrender creates great results, but you have to tweak materials na settings quite a bit to get the best results and since it goes from DS to the reality plugin to Luxrender, your workflow is a loittle longer than setting everyting up inside DS.
Can't speak for the Mac part since I don't use Macs.
It was better in the 2.x days when you could use more default settings to get some amazing renders. Later versions started rendering hidden objects, broke compatibility with the toolkit used to load HDRIs, so soem products (Skies of Reality) that were never updated have to be manually added in, etc. It just really messed up my work flow. It's too bad, because most of my best work was done in those earlier days of Reality. It wasn't a "make art" button by any stretch, but it was possible to spend most your time tweaking the lightining than later versions, than in IRAY, etc. I don't think there's any question that Reality 2.x was its peak.
Edit: My DA gallery: https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/gallery/
Here are some of my most well known ones:
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/Undcover-Cool-Valkyrie-Light-Sword-349271701
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/Elfen-Citadel-Skyship-Night-2-210925611
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/First-Contact-203836050
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/G-I-S-Skyway-at-Sunset-254500917
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/Descendant-of-the-Seraphim-307681897
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/Shae-Ryder-Mon-Chevalier-284676051
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/SteamBee-at-Sunset-216918214
https://www.deviantart.com/argel1200/art/Forward-Thinking-207054926
Cool work :)
Hi! Not many Reality users around here, it seems. Now, if you would be asking for alternatives to IRay for CPU rendering, instead of a specific product, you would possibly get a few tips from people without their posts being deleted.
I don't mind. I always love reading tips as well. Plus, I was just curious as to how many people use it.
I've used Reality 4.3 on the Mac for a long time. Works great! But I agree with FSMC (above) that a fair amount of tweaking surface settings is needed to get good results. I think it's gotten worse over time because more and more IRay tricks are now used widely, and Reality does not do a good job converting them. But if you tweak, you will get first-class results.
I use Reality/Luxrender all the time (I find it easier to use than iRay), Yes you will need to tweak some of the materials but with a little practice it can produce some amazing reaults. If you want to see what can be done then take a look at my DeviantArt Gallery Page https://www.deviantart.com/platnumk/gallery
Converting iRay materials can sometimes be tricky but most will convert with a little effort.
Machine Specs: Mid 2011 27' iMac - MacOS X High Sierra - 20GB Memory
I prefered Luxus over Reality for sure.
Until a couple of years ago I was limited to my iMac (same model as you have) and I had been using Reality for years by then. I also had Luxrender running on a Linux computer so I took advantage of the networking capabilities of Luxrender. Ultimately I became jealous of the things people were doing with iRay so I invested in a PC and NVidia GPU and moved my DAZ Studio installation over to the PC (I still have the iMac which I use for everything other than DAZ Studio).
Now I find myself jealous of all the things people are achieving using Blender with Eevee and Cycles so I feel another big change coming on.
Wow Blender 2.8 has really moved on. Looks really cool!
I started of using Luxus but made the switch to Reality do to Luxus was no longer being updated at the time of Paolo releasing Reality 2.5, Which is a shame because Luxus still had/has features that Reality 4 is sadly lacking.
Reality 4.3 broke my daz :(
I used to luxrender also too many workarounds iray is much simpler and waste less time IMO. The only thing I liked better is metal & glass alot less wet looking.. A render I did there was many..
Nope, Reality support was terrible. I uninstalled it and haven't looked back.
What seems to be the problem
Wait... there are different versions of reality...? I was barely getting by on the original version... maybe that's why the world seems so screwed up...I didn't upgrade.
In the latest version is there still chocolate and were they able to bring back the dinosaurs... is gravity still a thing?
I think Reality 4.3 was trying to squeeze 4 dimensions into the 3 ones - that was a big task and that is why many people are complaining about...
... support.
Still do occasionally.
I'm exclusively on Mac. I used Reality for a very long time and it taught me an enormous amount about lighting and scene composition. It has even helped my real photography! The lighting tools were great: seeing through mesh lights, seeing the HDR dome preview to allow good positioning, and (especially) adjusting the different light intensities during rendering. On the down side, IRAY surfaces have continued to evolve and it was a struggle converting them to Reality. For this reason alone I finally gave up. Paolo gave unbelievably good support for many years, although he has stopped developing it and I think the support is only community-based at this point. If you are new to this I can't recommend Reality at this point unless you really want the frustration with surface conversion.
When I ray came to DS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iwuy4hHO3YQ
Daz 3d really needs to look into other rendering technologies, especially for users who use AMD graphic cards (eg like mac users). We all know now that Apple is not going to ever have Nvidia support so we going to have to accept it. I know Octane is working on a AMD version and one for macs called Octane X. If daz 3d could at least support that it would be a great option. I contacted Otoy about a version for Daz Studio, they said yes they are looking into it. Plus they are making one for Poser too.