Using OSL nodes result noisy incorrectly baked maps. #40369

New Issue

Bartosz Moniewski · 2014-05-26T21:54:42+02:00

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2014-05-26 21:54:42 +02:00

Many of OSL nodes need sufficient amount of samples to yield proper results in render. Blender bakes them only at one sample so they look noisy. Using sample value in render panel don't do anything in bake of color passes so results from render preview and bake may vary drastically.
I used François Gastaldo's OSL AO node but this problem will be present in significant part of OSL shaders, especially those useful in baking.

AO
First- Color output of OSL AO node used as diffuse color. Results from render preview on 200 samples. Look good.
Second- Baked diffuse_color pass. Texture preview. Noise.

Mix Factor
First- Color output of OSL AO node used as mixing factor. Render preview, 200 samples. Look Ok.
Second- Baked diffuse_color pass. Texture preview. Noise resulting incorrect color mixing.

Exact steps for others to reproduce the error
Enable render preview too see what artist may want. Then bake diffuse-color map too see what blender will bake.

Blend File
There is a link to pasteAll: http://www.pasteall.org/blend/29275
My test blend file is to big for phabricator size limit but it need some megabytes for hi-poly object. This node works best on that type of geometry. OSL script is included in blendfile.

Many of OSL nodes need sufficient amount of samples to yield proper results in render. Blender bakes them only at one sample so they look noisy. Using sample value in render panel don't do anything in bake of color passes so results from render preview and bake may vary drastically. I used François Gastaldo's OSL AO node but this problem will be present in significant part of OSL shaders, especially those useful in baking. **AO** First- Color output of OSL AO node used as diffuse color. Results from render preview on 200 samples. Look good. Second- Baked diffuse_color pass. Texture preview. Noise. ![1_AO_render.png](https://archive.blender.org/developer/F91178/1_AO_render.png) ![1_AO_bake.png](https://archive.blender.org/developer/F91231/1_AO_bake.png) **Mix Factor** First- Color output of OSL AO node used as mixing factor. Render preview, 200 samples. Look Ok. Second- Baked diffuse_color pass. Texture preview. Noise resulting incorrect color mixing. ![2_MIX_render.png](https://archive.blender.org/developer/F91235/2_MIX_render.png) ![2_MIX_bake.png](https://archive.blender.org/developer/F91237/2_MIX_bake.png) **Exact steps for others to reproduce the error** Enable render preview too see what artist may want. Then bake diffuse-color map too see what blender will bake. **Blend File** There is a link to pasteAll: http://www.pasteall.org/blend/29275 My test blend file is to big for phabricator size limit but it need some megabytes for hi-poly object. This node works best on that type of geometry. OSL script is included in blendfile.

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2014-05-26 21:54:42 +02:00

Changed status to: 'Open'

Dalai Felinto was assigned by Bartosz Moniewski

2014-05-26 21:54:42 +02:00

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2014-05-26 21:54:42 +02:00

Added subscriber: @BartekMoniewski

blender-admin commented

2014-05-26 21:54:42 +02:00

#42214 was marked as duplicate of this issue

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2014-05-26 21:56:42 +02:00

Added subscribers: @brecht, @ThomasDinges, @Lockal, @MatthewHeimlich, @marcog

Dalai Felinto commented

2014-05-26 22:24:06 +02:00

We split the passes in two groups, surface passes (uv, sss/diffuse/glossy/transmission color) and light passes (combined, ao, shadow, sss/diffuse/glossy/transmission direct or indirect).

All the surface passes are baked in one sample. All the light passes are baked with the rendering sample settings.

An OSL Shader can either contribute to the surface or the light passes. In your case you will need to bake combined (or diffuse direct + indirect + color) to get the full contribution of the OSL shader.

In other words I really don't think this is a bug. @brecht do you agree?

We split the passes in two groups, surface passes (uv, sss/diffuse/glossy/transmission color) and light passes (combined, ao, shadow, sss/diffuse/glossy/transmission direct or indirect). All the surface passes are baked in one sample. All the light passes are baked with the rendering sample settings. An OSL Shader can either contribute to the surface or the light passes. In your case you will need to bake combined (or diffuse direct + indirect + color) to get the full contribution of the OSL shader. In other words I really don't think this is a bug. @brecht do you agree?

Dalai Felinto commented

2014-05-26 22:51:24 +02:00

I just rendered it and realized that indeed the diffuse color is very smooth in the renderlayer pass indeed.
@BartekMoniewski do you build your own Blender? if so can you try this patch: P69 (hack solution)

I just rendered it and realized that indeed the diffuse color is very smooth in the renderlayer pass indeed. @BartekMoniewski do you build your own Blender? if so can you try this patch: [P69](https://archive.blender.org/developer/P69.txt) (hack solution)

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2014-05-26 22:57:05 +02:00

"In your case you will need to bake combined (or diffuse direct + indirect + color) to get the full contribution of the OSL shader."

But this not solve anything from my perspective. Combined pass has no significant meaning for people who want create assets for current games. What we need most is diffuse_color, glossy_color and some masks baked also as diffuse_color. OSL nodes can be used as mix shader / mic color factor to create variety of texture effects. But with only one sample majority of this nodes will be worthless, useless for baking purposes.

Right now baking OSL as Combined pass looks like this. 200 samples bake.

I also think this is not a bug but unfortunate design decision. But you asked for link to tracker today so I provided it.

edit:
Sadly I don't know how to build blender on my own. I get builds from buildbot.

"In your case you will need to bake combined (or diffuse direct + indirect + color) to get the full contribution of the OSL shader." But this not solve anything from my perspective. Combined pass has no significant meaning for people who want create assets for current games. What we need most is diffuse_color, glossy_color and some masks baked also as diffuse_color. OSL nodes can be used as mix shader / mic color factor to create variety of texture effects. But with only one sample majority of this nodes will be worthless, useless for baking purposes. Right now baking OSL as Combined pass looks like this. 200 samples bake. ![combined.png](https://archive.blender.org/developer/F91260/combined.png) I also think this is not a bug but unfortunate design decision. But you asked for link to tracker today so I provided it. --------------- edit: Sadly I don't know how to build blender on my own. I get builds from buildbot.

Dalai Felinto commented

2014-05-26 23:25:34 +02:00

for records, the patch P70 produces this result:

for records, the patch [P70](https://archive.blender.org/developer/P70.txt) produces this result: ![AO_OSL_bake.jpg](https://archive.blender.org/developer/F91280/AO_OSL_bake.jpg)

Brecht Van Lommel commented

2014-05-26 23:38:28 +02:00

This OSL shader here relies on the antialiasing, which baking does not do yet. It uses the shading position as input to a hash to generate a random number. To make this work, for each AA sample the subpixel position should be different and the shader evaluated at that point.

For best quality that should be done on the Blender side, because then you are AA sampling the geometry too and not just the shader.

This OSL shader here relies on the antialiasing, which baking does not do yet. It uses the shading position as input to a hash to generate a random number. To make this work, for each AA sample the subpixel position should be different and the shader evaluated at that point. For best quality that should be done on the Blender side, because then you are AA sampling the geometry too and not just the shader.

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2014-05-27 10:07:22 +02:00

Is that mean when baking will have AA user will be able do specify AA sampling number just like samples in render properties? Or that number will be taken from render properties?
In my case render start looking acceptable on about 100 samples. It looks good enough on about 500 samples. But I think 500 samples for AA on normal maps or other passes will be an overkill.

Is that mean when baking will have AA user will be able do specify AA sampling number just like samples in render properties? Or that number will be taken from render properties? In my case render start looking acceptable on about 100 samples. It looks good enough on about 500 samples. But I think 500 samples for AA on normal maps or other passes will be an overkill.

Bastien Montagne commented

2014-05-27 12:45:05 +02:00

Added subscriber: @mont29

Bastien Montagne commented

2014-05-27 12:45:05 +02:00

Maybe this should be moved to TODO then?

Brecht Van Lommel commented

2014-05-27 15:16:02 +02:00

I think so, this is just not implemented yet, it's the same for Blender Internal. The workaround would be to modify the OSL script to take more samples.

Brecht Van Lommel commented

2014-11-09 04:23:38 +01:00

Added subscribers: @MikiProxima, @Sergey, @dfelinto

Miki commented

2015-01-17 17:03:38 +01:00

I would like to ask if there is a technical reason why anti-aliasing doesn't work in Cycles Bake, when it can work in Render. Always when I create a procedural material, it looks great when rendered, but very crippled when baked. And obviously the current Samples doesn't help it in any way, because Render looks good even at 10 samples, but Bake looks horrible even at 500 samples. I noticed the only task where Samples helps is baking of AO.

I think baking with AA is essential feature for creating 3D graphics if you want to use procedural generators in your materials. So I would like to ask when AA is planed to be working also with baking. And if it is not planned, I offer my programming skills to help with that, because I think we should be able to use the same materials for both render and bake.
Best Regards

I would like to ask if there is a technical reason why anti-aliasing doesn't work in Cycles Bake, when it can work in Render. Always when I create a procedural material, it looks great when rendered, but very crippled when baked. And obviously the current Samples doesn't help it in any way, because Render looks good even at 10 samples, but Bake looks horrible even at 500 samples. I noticed the only task where Samples helps is baking of AO. I think baking with AA is essential feature for creating 3D graphics if you want to use procedural generators in your materials. So I would like to ask when AA is planed to be working also with baking. And if it is not planned, I offer my programming skills to help with that, because I think we should be able to use the same materials for both render and bake. Best Regards

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2015-01-17 17:53:39 +01:00

@MikiProxima - Well.... I assume blender devs are not interested in cycles baking anymore. Still there is lack of essential things was described on code.blender.org blog (working OSL, AA, rayblockers) and other obvious things like displacement. We need to wait for some fresh blood developer willing to rewrite cycles baking for proper resources consumption (18 gigs of RAM for baking 15 objects?!) and add missing features.

Dalai Felinto commented

2015-01-28 15:53:30 +01:00

You may want to check if 7b16fda379 fixed this issue.

You may want to check if 7b16fda379 fixed this issue.

marc dion commented

2015-01-28 20:07:49 +01:00

Added subscriber: @MarcClintDion

marc dion commented

2015-01-28 20:07:49 +01:00

@dfelinto, it does more than just fix the problem, it improves the quality substantially over normal rendering for the same amount of samples.

All three of the following renders were done with 128 samples. The left image is a viewport render, the center image is a bake using 2.73. The image on the right is a bake from the daily build with the new changes. Both images were baked at 2048x2048. I didn't record how long the bakes took but the times seemed close enough to not be noticeable.

@dfelinto, it does more than just fix the problem, it improves the quality substantially over normal rendering for the same amount of samples. All three of the following renders were done with 128 samples. The left image is a viewport render, the center image is a bake using 2.73. The image on the right is a bake from the daily build with the new changes. Both images were baked at 2048x2048. I didn't record how long the bakes took but the times seemed close enough to not be noticeable. ![new_OSL_BAKING.png](https://archive.blender.org/developer/F139730/new_OSL_BAKING.png)

Bartosz Moniewski commented

2015-01-28 20:28:00 +01:00

FINALLY! So we now can consider OSL in Cycles baking as fully working feature! :) Why so long if code was just there? "Better" is the enemy of "good enough".

Anyways, Thanks!

FINALLY! So we now can consider OSL in Cycles baking as fully working feature! :) Why so long if code was just there? "Better" is the enemy of "good enough". Anyways, Thanks!

marc dion commented

2015-01-29 07:36:04 +01:00

It seems that the reason this was removed is because it ruins the baked result for the Combined pass. I've posted a test result at https://developer.blender.org/T43388