Nekonomicon - VRED: blatant commercial

Brombear
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Wrote the following at Oct. 8, 2004, 12:29 a.m...

Hi,

though this has not much to do with SGI machines in particular I thought this topic would belong here best.

Those of you following some of my recent postings here may have noticed that I am working in the field of realtime rendering. Unfortunately I didn't had the opportunity to show what we are doing (pictures are really essential in this kind of business). But now this has changed, one of our clients gave us the permission to present some of the things we are doing currently. You'll find some images/movies under VRED -> Gallery. Attention, bandwith is needed to view the movies.

http://www.dmu-vr-solutions.de

Comments are welcome

Regards

Matthias

PS: The metallic shader runs at approx 10fps on a fx3000, the unicolor shader with 12fps

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barefoot
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Wrote the following at Oct. 8, 2004, 5 a.m...

Fantastic!, wish the model was available for looking at on my own octane. Also, I notice there is no support for wavefront obj, is that in the pipeline?
cheers
barefoot

Brombear
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Wrote the following at Oct. 8, 2004, 5:17 a.m...

Well,

we are not allowed to distribute the model itself and the octane is lacking several needed features to show it.

the feature wish list is very very long right now and is constant getting longer. obj is currently not on the list, but i believe there are converters available to convert it to inventor (ObjToIv ?)

Regards

Matthias

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barefoot
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Wrote the following at Oct. 9, 2004, 6:35 a.m...

Brombear wrote:

Well,

we are not allowed to distribute the model itself and the octane is lacking several needed features to show it.

the feature wish list is very very long right now and is constant getting longer. obj is currently not on the list, but i believe there are converters available to convert it to inventor (ObjToIv ?)

Regards

Matthias

So does that mean vred won't run on octane or just that the particular vw model won't run on octane?
Cheers

Brombear
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Wrote the following at Oct. 9, 2004, 8:52 a.m...

vred will run without a problem on your octane but there are several features simply not working due to missing opengl features, e.g.:

- cube environment mapping (the chrom and windows on the car are done that way)
- cg & opengl shader (the coat on the car is done that way)
- realtime shadows

There are some other things missing (video generation) simply because our target audience wouldn't want to use vred on sgi machines anymore, so we only port things that are easy to do.

Matthias

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Brombear
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Wrote the following at Nov. 9, 2004, 4:38 a.m...

Hi,

we have now released version 0.95 with a lot of new features and one of them is the obj loader someone was asking for. It can be downloaded at http://www.dmu-vr-solutions.de

Someone might ask what the difference between the freeware version and the commercial one is:

- FHS Writer (a special format needed mainly by german automotive companies)
- CSB Import
- Snapshots bigger than 640x480 px (vred support resolutions over 8192^2 with high antialiasing
- support of the AR-Tracking optical tracking device
- cluster rendering support for powerwalls, powerbenches and cave environments (we are regularly testing our software on a 48pc cluster wall which outputs 6144x3076 pixels in passive stereo at impressive 32dpi, see here http://www.heyewall.de/index.DE.php?page=index&lang=EN ). Would be working under IRIX as well, but we do not know of any big sgi rendering cluster

Note for IRIX users: Some features require the use of a newer generation pc type graphics card. The may be working on onyxes with the ati graphics but we did not test it.

Regards

Matthias

PS: Here is the changelist

Code:

  0.95 (07.11.04)
  
  New Features
  
  - rendering: support for local light sources (enable in RenderPreferences)
  
  - rendering: added new SpecTexChunk for correct specular highlights on texture (some call it Spextra)
  
  - rendering: added TwoSidedLightingChunk to enable double sided lighting on material basis.
  
  - rendering: added CG support to OpenGL Shading Language Chunk.
  
  - rendering: new software rendering option (RenderPreferences)
  
  - obj-import: reactivated obj loader.
  
  - csb-import: support for local lights
  
  - optimization: added new share optimize options ( which saves a lot of memory on disk as well as on graphic card)
  
  - renderpreferences: added new cache scene option
  
  - materialeditor: textures can be written to disk
  
  - materiallibrary: added user definable material library.
  
  - material sort key.
  
  - scripting: new vrSpeech event (see speech.py example, needs http://www.microsoft.com/speech/download/SDK51)
  
  - scripting: new vrWidget action (see widget.py)
  
  - scripting: added setUpdateDuration und setFrame to vrVideoGrab action.
  
  - scripting: huge speed improvement for findNode() via new initFindCache() method see find2.py.
  
  - examples: new GLSL example added (bounce.py)
  
  - added experimental raytracer
  
  - Lights: added auto beacon creation and much improved transform handling.
  
  - improved script and shader editor.
  
  - navigation: right-mouse-button-shift-control changes the at point of the virtual trackball.
  
  - cluster: added new cluster service/daemon for auto starting the cluster servers.
  
  - cluster: added server autostart via rsh and many bugfixes.
  
  - cluster: added render statistic to cluster server.
  
  - cluster: added stereo mode to powerwall configuration.
  
  Bug fixes:
  
  - csb-import: Correct Blendfunctions are used for grayscale shadow textures
  
  - povray-export: exports textures now.
  
  - scripting: added some missing python dll's.
  
  - optimization: fixed some crashs with shared geometry porperties.
  
  Other:
  
  - materialeditor: select nodes speed improvement.
  
  - materialeditor: improved gui resize behavior.
  
  - materialeditor: SHLChunk GUI-parameters can be configured via special GLSL comments
  
  examples:
  
  uniform vec3 SurfaceColor; // color
  
  uniform float ambient;     // slider<-1.0 1.0 0.05>
  
  uniform float specular;    // wheel<-10.0 10.0 0.05>
  
  "color" creates a color manipulator
  
  "slider" or "slider<min, max, step>" creates a slider
  
  "wheel" or "wheel<step>" or "wheel<min, max, step>" creates a wheel
  
  - improved hdr support.
  
  - improved GLSL Shader support.
  
  - ActiveX: many bugfixes and improvements.
  
  - scripting: improved videograb action, added user definable video resolution.
  
  - scripting: added online help just type help(<CLASSNAME>) in the terminal,
  
  e.g. help(vrKey)
  
  - scripting: updated the online documentation.
  
  - optimize: improved speed with many nodes.

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Brombear
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Wrote the following at Nov. 28, 2004, 12:36 a.m...

Brombear wrote:

PS: The metallic shader runs at approx 10fps on a fx3000, the unicolor shader with 12fps

Just a small update. Yesterday I removed the old ultra 5700 gfx card from my main development machine and put an 6800 gt instead. Now both shader run at nice 32 fps which gives a real smooth viewing experience. I am always thrilled by the progress the gfx card manufacturers are doing these days.

Matthias

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Brombear
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Wrote the following at April 10, 2005, 10:32 a.m...

Hi,

after a long time we have finally released version 0.96. Most dramatic changes are the evolvement of our csb loader, the standard format of sgi's cosmo3d/optimizer library. The file format is used by most vr software here in germany as some kind of standard. Furthermore we have added a special vrml importer for static scenes, which is able to deal with huge files created by CATIA V5. On a special request we have implemented a maya loader which is capable to support multitexturing. Of course there are tons of other things like improved support for local lights, improved cluster support (speed wise) which can be tested also with the evaluation version as well as the possibility to use up to 3GB on 32bit Windows and up to 4GB on WinXP64 (we do not have a native 64bit port, simply because we do not have a need for it yet, we have success reports of customers loading automotive models up to 27 million polygons). The complete list of features/bugfixes can be found below.

Also there are some organizational changes. We have founded a new company called VREC GmbH (for VR eazy) and moved to our new bureau location. Because the new website is not ready yet, please visit the old website http://www.dmu-vr-solutions.de . Currently we are working on the documentation and hope to finish it until end of april, when we are going to release version 1.0

Our software has sparked interest even at graphic card manufacturers, at the moment we are evaluating a wildcat realizm 800 to ensure that it is working flawless with our software. The first found bug has already lead to a driver update.

The IRIX version will be released within the next days, maybe someone with an IR3/IR4 can give us some info if it works

Best regards

Matthias

Code:

  0.96 (10.04.05)
  
  New Features:
  
  - added support for 3 GB address space on windows XP (add /3GB option to C:\boot.ini file)
  
  - added support for 4 GB address space on windows XP64
  
  - rendering: added new global specular texture highlight render mode.
  
  - rendering: correct two sided lighting mode with mirror (negative scale) transformations.
  
  - rendering: added new point headlight option.
  
  - rendering: added DepthTestChunk
  
  - rendering: much improved antialiasing quality.
  
  - rendering: antialiasing now supports all stereo modes and clustering.
  
  - rendering: interruptible antialiasing.
  
  - rendering: support for up to 64 local light sources.
  
  - rendering: added new state sorting group node.
  
  - cluster:   added support for wireframe, double sided lighting and
  
  specular texture highlights.
  
  - cluster: improved render speed with activated client rendering.
  
  - cluster: added cluster disable option to the render preferences to safe some memory.
  
  - cluster: added interactive changing of eye separation and zero parallax.
  
  - cluster: added direct connection via port.
  
  - csb-import: added support for depthtest function
  
  - ViLMA-import: added support for ViLMA-Structures
  
  - fhs-export: inline textures will be exported to disk
  
  - material editor: added separated transparency sliders for front and back material.
  
  - material editor: added color material option.
  
  - material editor: added material sort key.
  
  - material editor: added lodbias adjustment for normal textures and cubetextures.
  
  - material editor: added texture export into Cubetexture GUI
  
  - material editor: added sharing of Textures, Materials, BlendChunks.
  
  - material editor: new layout.
  
  - fileio: added large file importer (use file menu import LargeFile)
  
  - fileio: saving osb will now always write in compressed gzip format.
  
  - fileio: osb now supports also unreferenced materials.
  
  - fileio: added progress bar.
  
  - fileio: new show fileio progress option.
  
  - fileio: osb exports now relative paths.
  
  - fileio: new geometry verifier tries to fix corrupted geometry.
  
  - fileio: new show fileio progress option.
  
  - render preferences: added z-up option.
  
  - art tracking: added space and sensor calibration.
  
  - art tracking: added support for z-up and y-up coordinate systems.
  
  - node editor: added auto update option.
  
  - viewpoint module: added support for near & far clipping plane as well as field of view.
  
  - installer: added osb file format association on windows.
  
  - actions: added new fade action (see fade.py)
  
  - scenegraph: added drag and drop between nodes.
  
  - optimize: added BlendChunk sharing.
  
  - movie export: added new python createSnapshot command.
  
  - vdse project: Viewpoints can be imported
  
  - picking / selection: improved speed.
  
  - script: new setCameraZUp() method.
  
  - vredviewer: changed resize behavior and added new script command (setViewerActiveXWidth)
  
  to change the width of activex widget.
  
  - snapshot: improved image clipping with different aspect ratio in the main render
  
  widget and the resulting snapshot.
  
  - transform: added center rotation.
  
  Bug fixes:
  
  - fixed possible crash in node info update.
  
  - csb-import: Fixed wrong orientation of the 6 cubemap images
  
  - csb-import: Fixed too optimistic caching strategy of cubemapping
  
  - csb-import: fixed wrong back material diffuse color and added support
  
  for front and back material transparency.
  
  - csb-import: better support for local light sources which are not below an environment node.
  
  - csb-import: improved speed
  
  - csb-import: lower memory consumption
  
  - csb-import: some blend modi fixes.
  
  - rendering: fixed conflict in ViewTextureTransform and TextureTransform chunk.
  
  - rendering: more stable fullscreen mode on ATI cards.
  
  - rendering: fixed redraw bug on WindowsXP.
  
  - rendering: fixed some chunk state bugs.
  
  - rendering: added antialiasing abortion via escape key.
  
  - rendering: fixed possible crash in the SHLChunk.
  
  - cluster: fixed a crash in the cluster server.
  
  - cluster: fixed active stereo bug.
  
  - cluster: fixed crash on connection.
  
  - cluster: server start via rsh didn't work in direct connection mode.
  
  - fileio: fixed wrong transforms in the wrl export.
  
  - fileio: improved error message while trying to save in a unsupported fileformat.
  
  - optimize: added workaround for a crash in material optimize.
  
  - optimize: much improved material optimize speed.
  
  - optimize: fixed rare crash in material optimize.
  
  - optimize: fixed flush genfunc bug.
  
  - qt lib: fixed a crash in QListView
  
  - art tracking: fixed hmd mode.
  
  - art tracking: fixed threading on linux.
  
  - viewpoint module: fixed a crash on linux.
  
  - activex: source path with environment variable didn't work in IE.
  
  - transform: fixed bouncing rotation.
  
  - clusterService: fixed path name with spaces problem in the install bat file.
  
  - materialeditor: fixed missing materials after convertToFresnel and converToPhong.
  
  - materialeditor: fixed share materials crash.
  
  - materialeditor: colors do no longer turn to grayscale when using the slider
  
  - script: fixed some crashes with invalid pointers.
  
  - movieplayer: texturetransformchunk will only be created when necessary.
  
  - navigation/picking: works now also with big scenes.
  
  - fhs export: when using clamp_to_edge, write clamp because fhs does not support it.
  
  - nodeeditor: fixed update bugs in cluster mode.
  
  - scene: improved z-up.
  
  - scenegraph: much improved update speed (up to 50 times faster)
  
  - navigator: fixed wrong at point for snapshots and viewpoints.
  
  Other:
  
  - updated to qt version 3.34.
  
  - updated to python 2.4
  
  - rearranged tab-order in some modules
  
  - rewrote the material ref counting.
  
  - improved opengl 2.0 support.
  
  - updated to ffmpeg 0.49

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GIJoe
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 2 a.m...

i think i'll give it a try on my lowly vpro

since you seem to be in close contact with fraunhofer institute and want to test your software on sgi's bigger iron, you might want to contact fraunhofer sankt augustin (i believe it's IMK). at least they used to be stuffed with sgi gear from desktops to supercomputers up to the building roofs and might still keep some big machines around.

hamei
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Who joined Feb. 24, 2004, 5:10 p.m.
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 3 a.m...

Brombear wrote:

Hi,

http://www.dmu-vr-solutions.de

Comments are welcome

Umm, Brombear - is this exactly what you meant ?

http://www.dmu-vr-solutions.de/vred/interaction.html

"Your favourite device
In case your favourite interaction device isn't listed here do not bother to contact us ... " :lol:

Brombear
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 3:10 a.m...

hamei wrote:

"Your favourite device
In case your favourite interaction device isn't listed here do not bother to contact us ... "

Ok, for sure it wasn't meant to be a joke. There are so many interaction devices at the market for use in vr (magnetic tracking: polhemus, ascension, intersension and optical tracking: art, vicon and joysticks, wheels and probably thousand others we don't know yet). We just did not want to waste our resources in developing bindings to devices noone really uses anymore. E.g. the art optical tracking system is so popular here in germany, there are few vr labs that still rely on magnetic systems (there are exceptions where optical tracking does not make sense though).

Matthias

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Brombear
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 3:13 a.m...

GIJoe wrote:

i think i'll give it a try on my lowly vpro

since you seem to be in close contact with fraunhofer institute and want to test your software on sgi's bigger iron, you might want to contact fraunhofer sankt augustin (i believe it's IMK). at least they used to be stuffed with sgi gear from desktops to supercomputers up to the building roofs and might still keep some big machines around.

Hi GIJoe,

thanx for the offer. We are more closely related to the IGD here in Darmstadt, but I think all their onyx machines have been sold in the meantime (I grew up with an 3-pipe onyx I and a dual-pipe onyx2

) . Besides that the IRIX port is not of great value anymore today, so I won't actively search for people testing it. In fact IRIX is an unsupported platform for us, it's just pure fun to see that it still compiles and runs on it.

Matthias

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hamei
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 3:33 a.m...

Brombear wrote:

Besides that the IRIX port is not of great value anymore today, so I won't actively search for people testing it. In fact IRIX is an unsupported platform for us, it's just pure fun to see that it still compiles and runs on it.

You don't find that making sure your application compiles and runs on Irix to be a worthwhile sanity check ? Or is cross-platform portability of minimal value these days ? Just curious ....

Brombear
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 4:19 a.m...

hamei wrote:

You don't find that making sure your application compiles and runs on Irix to be a worthwhile sanity check ? Or is cross-platform portability of minimal value these days ? Just curious ....

Of course we test it but to perform a full check for a virtual reality system which is a very dynamic by its nature is not possible. The more used a platform is the more we perform tests. A lot of functionality of our system is used for a different project which is used under IRIX too, so I do not anticipate significantly more errors. Our dailybuild runs on IRIX all few days too ... (not all days I prefer more comfortable noise levels

)

Our system is really cross-platform and we will consider supporting the mac platform too. Of course there are some modules that cannot be ported but we try to avoid that as much as possible.

Matthias

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hamei
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 4:29 a.m...

Brombear wrote:

Our dailybuild runs on IRIX all few days too ... (not all days I prefer more comfortable noise levels

)

Pick up a Fuel ! That's one thing you have to give it credit for - it's quiet. And red , too

Brombear
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Wrote the following at April 11, 2005, 4:34 a.m...

hamei wrote:

Brombear wrote:

Our dailybuild runs on IRIX all few days too ... (not all days I prefer more comfortable noise levels

)

Pick up a Fuel ! That's one thing you have to give it credit for - it's quiet. And red , too

At the moment I prefer to not spent money but to receive it instead :wink:

And our chairs are already red too

Matthias

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Brombear
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Wrote the following at April 13, 2005, 9:47 a.m...

If you prefer a fresh built version for IRIX, this is your chance to grab it while it's still hot :wink:

Matthias

PS: For those interested it took a bit longer due to a new bug ähm feature within Qt :roll:

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lhaza
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Who joined April 20, 2005, 6:35 p.m.
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Wrote the following at May 11, 2005, 1:58 p.m...

Brombear wrote:

If you prefer a fresh built version for IRIX, this is your chance to grab it while it's still hot :wink:

Matthias

PS: For those interested it took a bit longer due to a new bug ähm feature within Qt :roll:

there is another feature at your website:

Warning: filesize() [function.filesize]: Stat failed for /home/www/web41/html/download/vred/IRIX/vred-0.96b-IRIX-Build20050413-lite.tar.bz2 (errno=2 - No such file or directory) in /home/www/web1/html/templates/functions.php on line 61
0 B

:wink:

Brombear
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Wrote the following at May 11, 2005, 2:05 p.m...

lhaza wrote:

there is another feature at your website:

Warning: filesize() [function.filesize]: Stat failed for /home/www/web41/html/download/vred/IRIX/vred-0.96b-IRIX-Build20050413-lite.tar.bz2 (errno=2 - No such file or directory) in /home/www/web1/html/templates/functions.php on line 61
0 B

Fixed, we had to rebuild the release version because of a bug (originally we stripped the executables on irix, but this trashed the executable)

Matthias

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Brombear
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Wrote the following at Nov. 17, 2006, 2:46 p.m...

Since quite a lot things happened between the last post and now I thought it could be a good idea to give an update what we are doing now. This week I have been at fujitsu-siemens' inhouse-exhibition visit showing what we can do in realtime now. The workstation is the new v840 (opteron II based) equipped with two fx4500, the powerwall is driven in passive stereo with 2 fx5500 (for photos we switched to mono of course).

The model you see has approx 5.5 million polygons and is completely covered with shading materials. Lighting is completely done with IBL in addition with dirt mapping. The dirt mapping is precalculated and takes about 15-30 minutes on a multiprocessor workstation (depending on your experience) It renders on a single g70 gfx card with approx 10fps (depending on resolution) and on the new g80 cards with more than 20fps (way to go nvidia).

Regards

Matthias

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