RenderMan's Strengths
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Performance – Render
the largest scenes with efficiency
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Quality – Create the
highest quality images possible with features like advanced filtering and
true 3D motion blur
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Control – The RenderMan
Shading Language and RIB (the format for Pixar's 3D data) offer many
opportunities to develop solutions for any type of creative challenge
Production Features
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Memory efficient (see REYES
algorithm)
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Camera Controls
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Fast 3D motion blur
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Shutter Timing
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True 3d depth-of-field
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Bokeh controls
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Particles
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Points (riPoints)
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Spheres (riSphere)
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Implicit surfaces (riBlobbies)
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Hierarchical subdivision surfaces
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Curve rendering (riCurve primitive)
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Hair and fur (riCurve
primitive)
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High quality displacements (8,
16, and 32 bit)
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Deep shadows (Transparent and filtered)
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Subsurface Scattering (Point based)
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Global Illumination
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Ambient Occlusion (ray-traced & point
based)
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Color Bleeding (ray-traced & point based)
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Image Based Lighting (HDRI)
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Caustics (photon based)
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Ray-traced area lights
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Pixar's Organized Point Clouds (with API)
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Pixar's Brick Maps (with API)
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Ray Tracing
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Hybrid system (sub-system of RSL)
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Programmable ray tracing
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Ray tracing groups
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CSG (Booleans in the renderer)
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Secondary Outputs (AOVs)
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OpenEXR (reading and writing)
Fast and Dependable
Pixar develops RenderMan for production, so every version is faster and more
reliable than the previous one. In fact, because Pixar uses RenderMan
exclusively, the software has already been pushed to the extreme, so it's ready
to render anything you can throw at it.
Tools of the Trade
RenderMan is not only fast and powerful, it also possesses a wealth of
sophisticated features for the creation of a vast range of styles and effects.
These features of RenderMan give you all the controls you need to complete your
vision, wherever it may take you.
Versatile Rendering System
Use RenderMan to create any look you need. From simulating traditional 2D
animation to creating complex yet subtle environmental effects, RenderMan will
deliver.
Ray Tracing and Global Illumination
The ray tracing and global illumination features have been integrated with
Pixar's highly evolved implementation of the REYES "scanline" rendering
algorithm so that you only incur the overhead associated with these effects when
and where you need them. RenderMan shader developers can selectively invoke
RenderMan's ray tracing subsystem to invent new solutions to difficult
production problems or to achieve physically correct illumination effects.
Render Passes For Compositing
RenderMan lets you smoothly integrate special effects into film by accurately
simulating the behavior of physical cameras. RenderMan's motion blur and
depth-of-field use a patented anti-aliasing technique that blurs synthetic
images so they realistically simulate their conventionally filmed counterparts.
Pixar's new multi-segment motion blur even lets you approximate the nonlinear
motion of objects — spinning, for example — within a single frame.
