Indigo Renderer Forum

hey nick

i am interested in skipping the .xml format and using C/C++ API calls to indigo to create a scene to render in memory, what do you think?

much like PRMan and mentalray you can build the scene in memory using functions like mi_api_camera_begin(); and mi_api_material_begin();

i am unsure of the difficulty of this for you, but i thought i would ask because it would mean your renderer could plugin more tightly to our DCC apps. the export process can be slow but we maybe able to skip that step if we can dynamically create the scene in memory for indigo. this will also make the experience more interactive.

pipe dreams i know, but i am a dreamer

steven

hi Steven,

well could be damn great... no more lost time exporting...

Hope to hear something from nick...

Lets wait, Riccardo.

exactly riccardo!

the export times are never fun, even with .mi files with mentalray and .rib files with PRMan. i figure with new XSI v6 rendering framework updates, we should be able to hook into render passes and the render region. but ultimately we would need indigo to have an API. which isn't an easy thing but i wanted to talk about it now and get his view on the subject

lets wait

steven

This is definitely an interesting idea.
As you know, Indigo has a pretty basic GUI anyway, so it wouldn't be a huge stretch to convert it to a plugin.
There's still gonna be a hit for large scenes from the kdtree build time tho.

No one really knows where indigo is going to go development wise except you so...

if this is doable kinda something you keep in mind as you develop it. exposing the functions in a C/C++ API to control building the scene. then i could develop it as a plugin for XSI. Which would take advantage of render regions, pass system, and the render tree and its shaderballs.

I think functions you use internally to build a mesh and position it would be a start. I could hook into those and we could start from there maybe build some teapots. build some indigo primitives, maybe even push your scene building ideas some so indigo can scale better to larger scenes.

just some thoughts,lemme know
steven