speeding renders with multiple characters

synechodus_b7d65b3411

In a set of renders, I want to have a number of people (6 or so) in the middle distance; they will be pretty clear so I don't want to use billboards or lorez figures, and do not want the renders to slow down too much (I am using a low power computer). I want to keep other settings on lighting etc the same as the other renders in the series. Could anyone tell me what, if any, difference doing the following would have on render times:

Using the same character skin on multiple characters but using different tints and body shapes (ie less different textures)

Editing the skin textures and saving then at half the pixel dimensions

Using lower poly hair and clothing, and hair with minimal transparency

Using shaders on clothing where small textures are repeated rather than large texture files

Using the same base shader on hair and tinting it differently on different characters (ie less different textures)

Changing skin settings (such as removing or changing SSS and other detail)

Anything else obvious?

 

Thanks

margrave

Editing the skin textures and saving then at half the pixel dimensions

Bingo.

You can also turn down SubD. Just like halving a texture map reduces the texture memory usage by four, turning SubD down also decreases the geometry usage by four.

cajhin

There's a massive difference between "your gfx card can handle all the data" and "fallback to CPU". If all the textures fit (or if they won't fit anyway), then these optimizations won't do much.

To save VRam, my first attempts are 1. reuse textures 2. remove detail textures if they're too far anyway (bump maps and the like) 3. downsize large textures. Note that geometry usually is small compared to 4k textures.

Besides the VRam, the biggest speed difference comes from light sources and transparency, IMO. Low light, dozens of lights, closed room, lots of transparency and subsurface scattering -> slow.

blaz

I read somewhere than normal maps also slow down render speed.

synechodus_b7d65b3411

Thanks for the comments

Paintbox

This can help : https://www.daz3d.com/mmx-resource-saver-shaders-collection-2-for-iray