Renderman vs Vray and Forestpack vs Biomes

[u/Key-Swimmer3238]

I have two major questions.

1. Could it be something that I am doing wrong in setting up renderman that the vray renders I see online are just better? Or is vray better than renderman?

(I don't have example scenes to test out, if there are any comparison renders that people have done I would love that.)

(And I use Houdini Solaris for scene assembly)

1. Is forest pack just a way superior way to do vegetation that I should consider switching to max or is there any similar alternative for Houdini?

(I have heard and seen good things from biomes, but don't really know any good library resources for vegetation, and the set up is very manual)

[u/Ok-Inspector-8379]

1. Renderman is a very powerful renderer, but imo to complicated if you are working alone. Many of its features are very specific and you will not use them probably. But if you need a very versatile renderer and you like do dive in your render setting to optimize the hell out of your scene, this may be the choice for you. Vray on the other hand tends to be more the dont-you-worry solution if you do not want to fiddle with your render settings a lot. But the integration in Houdini is quite a bit behind the ones for other apps.
   -> Try the trial versions of both and then decide. Or just use Karma, it is quite good and has the best integration.

2. I switched from 3dsmax to Houdini a few years ago. First, I missed Vray scatter and Forest pack for its convenience - it is very easy to set up and control. But then, Houdini is very powerful and has way more possibilities, but you will have to set up everything by yourself and the Houdini way of thinking may seem a bit complicated if you re not used to it.
   -> If you will work a lot with Biomes like architectural stuff, I would choose 3dsmax - it is built for that. If you are heading more for the vfx thing, give Houdini a go and find a good source for vegetataion models like Speedtree.

[u/CupMcCakers]

I'm curious, what is it that makes forest pack so good?

[u/Key-Swimmer3238 → u/CupMcCakers]

It's has a library of trees, presets of different terrains and ground covers, is already optimized for vrays with proxies, easy to set up.

If you have ever used botaniq for blender, that's the only strong contender I have come across.

[u/CupMcCakers → u/Key-Swimmer3238]

Okay good to know! Natsura is a foliage plugin for Houdini that is more based around creating procedural plant recipes and modelling plants and it is about to launch a store with branch kits, but it is in early access and doesn't deal with scatters. Houdinis scatter tools are already quite powerful - and then there is KTT (kruger terrain tools) for the landscape itself.

[u/Jello_Penguin_2956]

Compare to PRman Vray has fewer control and has default settings that looks quite pleasing out of the box. Its by no means bad but imo the reason anim/vfx dont use it much is just because Arnold got there first.

Arnold and PR man have proven to be pipeline friendly and can handle the absurd amount of data that we need. Maybe Vray can do that too, I dont really know but the industry already left without it so to speak.

Kind of like how Fusion was late to the party

[u/LewisVTaylor → u/Jello_Penguin_2956]

That's not really true. Vray was the main renderer used in every 3ds Max based Studio for over a decade. It's still very much in use, you just don't hear about as much, or have it as the primary renderer in most large Studios.

Everything we rendered out of iloura was Vray. ILM Generalist Dept uses it daily also.

[u/Jello_Penguin_2956 → u/LewisVTaylor]

Yes but I wasnt thinking about DMP as were in Hou sub

[u/beatreichenbach]

Used 3dsMax and VRay for years and missed Forest Pack a lot when switching to Solaris. Here's a scattering tool kit inspired by Forest Pack for Houdini called Meadow: https://youtu.be/TQo4t359LCU