Exposure and Gamma not functioning [RESOLVED]

[Bjella]

Windows, Sketchup 2015, V2: Neither the exposure and gamma, nor the light and dark tone maps appear to be working. Nothing I do affects the rendering. Am I missing something?

[Chris]

Yes, you must be missing something. They work perfectly fine. Can you provide more information? Maybe provide a screen shot?

If you are having any kind of post-pro / tonemapping problems, make sure you have hardware accelerated post-pro turned off (in the Options window).

[Fletch]

Subject: V2 Tutorials Animated Snippets #options

[Bjella]

Attached are 3 images. The first uses an exposure of 1 during pre-rendering. The second an exposure of 20 pre-rendering. The third an exposure of 20 post-process using the drop down box at the bottom right of the screen. The post-process drop down box works, but the edit environment dialog box appears to do nothing even though its preview screen shows a change. The edit environment dialog box does work with other variables like sun strength.

Render Exposure 1 Gamma 1 - Edit Environment.JPG (368.85 KiB) Viewed 11128 times

Render Exposure 20 Gamma 1 - Edit Environment.JPG (354.26 KiB) Viewed 11128 times

Render Exposure 20 Gamma 1 - Post Process.JPG (494.9 KiB) Viewed 11128 times

[Chris]

The purpose of the gamma and edit in each of the Preview windows is only to show you a preview of what that setting will look like. It does not effect the main render. The main render is only effected by the post-pro / tonemapping settings on the main render window.

[Bjella]

This would be a nice feature to include in a future update. TwilightRender is impressive software. It would be more useful to have any settings, including gamma and exposure, transfer to the final rendering. In this way, the user could make full use of the presets, rather than having to remember to change each rendering in the post process dialog box. My firm consistently sets these values lighter and grayer to achieve better prints for our clients. The renderings looks less dark and gloomy (unlike the previously attached renderings), even though they are less realistic, which helps sell our designs. The previous version of your software included this functionality and retained the settings. The current version is a step backward and is unclear (hence the need for this post). I guess I don't understand the point of changing an unrelated preview image with exposure and gamma (that has no affect on the actual rendering) when you can see exactly the change made after rendering. It does not provide any additional information to someone like myself, but is instead confusing.

[Chris]

There is no reason you have to use the preview gamma and exposure settings if you don't like them.

You are incorrect, the render view does retain the gamma and exposure settings. Even further than that, you can create reusable presets that are saved outside of the scene and can by quickly applied to any scene. That doesn't sound like a step back to me.

I recommend you review the various video tutorials and animated snippets here on the forum to get more familiar with the new features in V2.

[Bjella]

That is correct. I don't have to use settings that do nothing. However, as a developer, I would think you would like to retain your customers and create a product that is user friendly. When customers who are already experienced in the use of your product are confused and frustrated by it, it is likely even more confusing for new users. Further, I think a less snippy attitude from the start would also help. From my first email, which you ignored, and then finally replied by telling me to post on your forum, to your response to my first post, you have not made me feel as though you care at all about my business.

Yes, I know I am missing something. Yes, I know I am probably ignorant. But maybe you could help me out by posting a useful link to the video or tutorial that explains how the gamma and exposure are saved as presets along with sun and background, etc. instead of recommending I review all of your material. That would be a good start. I have reviewed the tutorials and cannot find it. In fact, I am even more confused. There is an entire section dedicated to an "Exploration Renderer" that is supposed to be in the toolbar, but I can not locate anything by that name or that functions as described. Is this the preview you are referring to, or the one in "Edit Environment"?

[Fletch]

Hi Bjella, thank you very much for contacting us.

The Exploration Render is available only for Twilight Render Pro. Please accept our apologies if this fact is not clear in the video.
We suggest to everyone to watch the videos and follow the online tutorials because, surprisingly, many people simply ask questions without having tried to find the answer first. (not that we are accusing you, personally, of doing such a thing, it has unfortunately become a necessary standard procedure.)

Please try not to read a "snippy" tone of voice in what someone is typing online. Tone of voice is very difficult to communicate online.
We apologize if you feel like you are not being listened to, your voice is being heard!

Allow me to attempt to explain more clearly the design intent of this functionality.

It is true that there are certain words in English which are a bit over-used. Such as "development" "preview" "elevation" or even misused words such as the computing world's blasphemous and unforgivable misappropriation of the holy word "architecture" and it can be difficult to be specific when speaking quickly in online replies.

It is clear that it is confusing for you being able to change the Exposure (i.e. tone mapping i.e. gamma/exposure) in the Environment Preview scene which is available only in the Environment Editor Dialog box. You are the first to tell us such, but we do appreciate the feedback as there are likely countless others with the same confusion. (I know people who are equally confused and saving web archives of web pages onto their machines because they do not understand how bookmarking functions, but that's another topic for another forum)

Perhaps, as you say, we should make the Tone Mapping settings act globally, or we should eliminate that functionality all-together. However, if we were to do as you suggest and allow changes to the exposure in the Environment Preview Dialog to now effect the Final Rendered Image or all exposure dialogs globably, well, this could work or it could possibly confound nearly everyone else... We will then begin getting the question "why are my rendering exposures seemingly randomly changing?" So, the suggestion by my colleague to simply not touch the Tone Mapping in the Environment Preview or other previews (advice which I personally already follow). Twilight Render Pro has Batch Rendering capability where each rendering can have it's own exposure settings... just in case in your batch there may be a variety of interior and exterior renderings.

There are several "previews" in Twilight Render. In the Material Editor Dialog, there are Material Preview scenes. In the Light Editor Dialog there are Light Preview Scenes, in the Environment Editor Dialog there are Environment Preview Scenes. In each case there are several different options for scenes which one may choose in order to get a good "preview" idea of how the final result may look in the final render. It is, as you may imagine, extremely difficult to create a good preview scene which renders quickly and accurately while simultaneously trying to 'pretend' to be a situation similar to that which is in the final rendered image. So, we have enabled the ability to change the exposure of the preview so that you, as the designer, knowing more about your final image scene than the preview scene can know, can perhaps change the exposure to more closely match what you know will likely be the "real-world final image" situation for this particular light, material, or sky environment.

In conclusion, perhaps eliminating the Tone Mapping capability from these Preview Scene Dialogs altogether would be the simple answer.

Sincerest respect,