I got good results rendered quickly without messing too much with the zillion options available. I tried V-Ray to have a taste of what seems to be the favorite application for many here, even thought the cost was way higher than the rest. The cost is not high, but still higher than some of the competition. Some presets were very fast to render, but unfortunately the rendering engine again didn't seem to be at the level of some other applications (even with the best quality presets which took much longer to render). Podium was also very easy to use although the interface didn't seem as refined and it had fewer features.
Unfortunately the rendering engine itself didn't seem to be up to par with some of the other applications, while the cost was higher than most of the other options. Shaderlight had the easiest to use interface, had several tutorials and webinars and it was relatively fast. Availability of Tutorials and video Tutorials online to help me learn the application quickly. How user friendly and easy to use was the interfaceĤ. How close the rendered image was to my actual home office (both during day with light from the window and night with artificial lights)Ģ. I made a model of my home office in Sketchup and then I tested each of the above applications based on the following factors (in no particular order):ġ. Obviously it would be be impossible to fully learn all applications within such a limited time but a decision had to be made eventually even with the limited info I could have during such short period. And of course the Suite is supported on Windows, Mac, and Linux.Īlso as an aside (to no one in particular), the overreacting on hearsay or conjecture is pretty amusing the first dozen times it happens but after a while it gets pretty tiresome - before jerking the knee in overreaction perhaps some slight investigation about the facts is best.Īfter about a week of trying different applications (Twilight, Maxwell for SU, Shaderlight, V-Ray for SU and Podium) I finally decided to settle on one of them.
as I said before, it's meant for people who make a living rendering (not necessarily modeling).įor instance the Maxwell Render Suite comes with all of this for free:Īs well as a dedicated stand-alone Studio environment to work with models from packages that are not supported by plugins.
This makes it a really nice solution for people who work with multiple modeling packages on a regular basis.
#MAXWELL RENDER PLUGIN FOR SOLIDWORKS FOR FREE#
One thing to understand about the price difference is that the full Render Suite includes all the plugins for any app they support for free and all of that is cross platform as well for free. Thea is very stable, never fails, a lot of materials at the licensed useres date base. But surely I can recomend, Thea Render, or Octane Render with a good Nvidia Geforce gtx card. I found them both very usefull, but I hope Maxwell make some changes that fixes bugs, and add some features.
#MAXWELL RENDER PLUGIN FOR SOLIDWORKS PLUS#
Reflections and bumps, are easy to make in both, but in Maxwell in think there is a plus in bumps.Ībout resolution, Ibelieve that i enough, but some times not very often, the clients ask for resolutions above 3000. Twilight has other engines that are not unbiased and they are faster. Maxwell seems to be faster, but with the draft engine, with production engine, seems to take the same time as twilight. Twilight have the feature to put lamps, Maxwell not, just emitters, I had difficults most of the time wih the reversed faces, I applyed in both sides the emmiter materials and then they don't emmit any light. Hi, I have both, Twilight and Maxwell render for su, I have bought both, so I will not talk about the free version.