Cycles shadow catcher improvements #71253

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Dalai Felinto · 2019-10-31T21:22:14+01:00

Dalai Felinto commented

2019-10-31 21:22:14 +01:00

Indirect light support
Option to include/exclude lights
Dedicated shadow catcher pass
Dedicated compositor node for easier setup
Separate shadow and reflection passes
Shadow catcher behind sharp reflection and refraction?
Optimization to share more shader evaluation and sampling until path diverges?

- [x] Indirect light support - [x] Option to include/exclude lights - [x] Dedicated shadow catcher pass - [ ] Dedicated compositor node for easier setup - [ ] Separate shadow and reflection passes - [ ] Shadow catcher behind sharp reflection and refraction? - [ ] Optimization to share more shader evaluation and sampling until path diverges? [devtalk thread ](https://devtalk.blender.org/t/lets-finally-fix-the-shadowcatcher/691) with user feedback

Dalai Felinto commented

2019-10-31 21:22:14 +01:00

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Daniel Calderón commented

2019-11-01 16:58:47 +01:00

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Jose Damian Orozco commented

2019-11-02 11:23:45 +01:00

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Steffen Dünner commented

2019-11-03 13:30:48 +01:00

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Sam Van Hulle commented

2019-11-06 13:02:16 +01:00

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Sam Van Hulle commented

2019-11-06 13:02:16 +01:00

I've attempted summarising the DevTalk post. Of course the original article and its reactions contain much more information - and a bit of sidetracking - but I've tried to condense the gist of it as best I could. With just a hint of personal opinion here and there.

Primary and secondary rays on the shadow catcher

The shadow catcher obviously appears to capture occlusion and shadows, but ignores any colour contributed to by scene lights and the World.
Emission shaders and secondary bounces from other objects are ignored as well. This includes diffuse colour bleeding and glossy reflections.

Shadow catcher as seen in secondary rays on other objects

In secondary rays on other objects, the shadow catcher is seen with its original material, instead of a camera mapped backplate or environment map.
This camera mapping is necessary on a per frame basis and therefore can't be expected to be done by the user.

Suggestion: Shadow Catcher BSDF

Basically a Principled BSDF whose primary rays are invisible to the camera.
Automatic camera mapping of the backplate or environment texture, and usage of this when seen in secondary rays on other objects.

Storage
The render result of a shadow catcher layer is quite complex as it needs to contain all of the above in a single image. This means that a pixel's colour and its opacity are not at all guaranteed to be aligned. A popular workaround is to split shadows/occlusion and emission/GI, and respectively multiply and add those layers onto the backplate, but I believe it's easily possible to store the complete result with premultiplied alpha, and composite without a hassle.

I've attempted summarising the DevTalk post. Of course the original article and its reactions contain much more information - and a bit of sidetracking - but I've tried to condense the gist of it as best I could. With just a hint of personal opinion here and there. **Primary and secondary rays on the shadow catcher** - The shadow catcher obviously appears to capture occlusion and shadows, but ignores any colour contributed to by scene lights and the World. - Emission shaders and secondary bounces from other objects are ignored as well. This includes diffuse colour bleeding and glossy reflections. **Shadow catcher as seen in secondary rays on other objects** - In secondary rays on other objects, the shadow catcher is seen with its original material, instead of a camera mapped backplate or environment map. - This camera mapping is necessary on a per frame basis and therefore can't be expected to be done by the user. **Suggestion: Shadow Catcher BSDF** - Basically a Principled BSDF whose primary rays are invisible to the camera. - Automatic camera mapping of the backplate or environment texture, and usage of this when seen in secondary rays on other objects. **Storage** The render result of a shadow catcher layer is quite complex as it needs to contain all of the above in a single image. This means that a pixel's colour and its opacity are not at all guaranteed to be aligned. A popular workaround is to split shadows/occlusion and emission/GI, and respectively multiply and add those layers onto the backplate, but I believe it's easily possible to store the complete result with premultiplied alpha, and composite without a hassle.

Chrischan commented

2019-11-15 22:57:46 +01:00

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Sam Van Hulle commented

2019-11-21 18:04:24 +01:00

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Sam Van Hulle commented

2019-11-21 18:04:24 +01:00

This comment was removed by @frameshift

*This comment was removed by @frameshift*

Nicola Wurbs commented

2019-11-22 19:32:04 +01:00

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Serhiy Striletksy commented

2019-12-16 13:11:11 +01:00

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Mark Sutton commented

2019-12-21 15:15:24 +01:00

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Juan Gea commented

2019-12-27 12:46:49 +01:00

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Juan Gea commented

2019-12-27 12:46:49 +01:00

In #71253#806621, @frameshift wrote:
Suggestion: Shadow Catcher BSDF

Basically a Principled BSDF whose primary rays are invisible to the camera.

Automatic camera mapping of the backplate or environment texture, and usage of this when seen in secondary rays on other objects.

The Shadow Catcher BSDF could be interesting, but it's not the best Shadow Catcher implementation, because with shadow catcher you still need the light bounces affecting the objects.

Don't think about the shadow catcher just for plate compositing, shadow catcher is useful in many situations, think of a scene with an animated background and a character moving, you can render the animated background in render pass, and the characters in another pass, with all the set being enabled as shadow catcher, you get the character (together with it's shadow and how it affects the environment) in a separate pass, if you have to modify the character it's easy, just re-render the character pass and recompose it. Right now that's not possible at all, because the shadow catcher don't catch reflections, or light contribution from the character to the scenario.

As you said in the original devtalk thread is very well explained, but the BSDF, while could be good as an option, is not the desirable behaviour in general. The "Shadow Catcher" tag for the object is much more useful :)

> In #71253#806621, @frameshift wrote: > **Suggestion: Shadow Catcher BSDF** > - Basically a Principled BSDF whose primary rays are invisible to the camera. > - Automatic camera mapping of the backplate or environment texture, and usage of this when seen in secondary rays on other objects. The Shadow Catcher BSDF could be interesting, but it's not the best Shadow Catcher implementation, because with shadow catcher you still need the light bounces affecting the objects. Don't think about the shadow catcher just for plate compositing, shadow catcher is useful in many situations, think of a scene with an animated background and a character moving, you can render the animated background in render pass, and the characters in another pass, with all the set being enabled as shadow catcher, you get the character (together with it's shadow and how it affects the environment) in a separate pass, if you have to modify the character it's easy, just re-render the character pass and recompose it. Right now that's not possible at all, because the shadow catcher don't catch reflections, or light contribution from the character to the scenario. As you said in the original devtalk thread is very well explained, but the BSDF, while could be good as an option, is not the desirable behaviour in general. The "Shadow Catcher" tag for the object is much more useful :)

Sam Green commented

2020-03-04 23:14:51 +01:00

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Martin Malmqvist commented

2020-05-26 16:50:28 +02:00

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2020-05-31 21:13:27 +02:00

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2020-07-17 06:41:46 +02:00

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blown chunks commented

2021-02-01 12:20:39 +01:00

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Sergey Sharybin commented

2021-05-12 17:53:47 +02:00

Just for the record, the shadow catcher has been refactored in the cycles-x branch and the support of indirect light should be there. There are still some remaining topics about the shadow catcher mentioned in #87837. We are working on them.

Brecht Van Lommel changed title from ~~Shadow catcher refactor to support indirect light~~ to Cycles shadow catcher improvements

2021-08-20 16:55:11 +02:00

Filip commented

2021-11-01 12:10:19 +01:00

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Anton Raves commented

2021-12-07 19:38:32 +01:00

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James Barrie commented

2022-05-12 01:13:44 +02:00

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Brecht Van Lommel added this to the Render & Cycles project 2023-02-07 19:08:06 +01:00

Thomas Dinges added this to the 2.90 milestone 2023-02-08 16:25:01 +01:00

Philipp Oeser removed the

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Cycles shadow catcher improvements #71253