I kind of prefer this educational style more over the over-charismatic jumpy forced fast forward style that many creators do with their blender videos. Keep up the concise and precise explanation. 👌🏻
Sadly everyone is on that jumpy time quick saving 1 minute video train. Like I like detailed videos explaining to me like an adult or some Ted talk lol.
Your videos are killer. It’s hard to find great Blender content this in depth aimed at an audience that already has a good understanding of the underlying fundamentals of 3D/Blender.
I have noticed this problem since 2014 and I was trying to learn computer science and programming to create a color system since that period, but because of the war in Gaza since 2014/2016/2018 unfortunately, I was not able to do that, but now when I leave Gaza and my circumstances improved, I discovered that someone had preceded me in this 😂😂😂 Sorry for my bad English
Thank you for explaining this. No one (I know) can explain this kind of technical data better than you. I'm not sure if anyone else is even bothered or knows how to explain it. This is a great service to the Blender community.
I have never seen such a clear and well demonstrated explanation of what gamut amd view transforms are.and seeing the shift between them really makes it so apparent. Having ALL of that color data there, even if desaturated, is mind blowing to see. It is so clearly all there.
Рік тому+5
At 17:22, if you use the ACES from Blender, the OCIO config send with Blender, it's not the real ACES, not match (too desaturated). The one with Blender is mapped trought the view transform inside a REC.709 profile. I use the real ACES 1.2 using OCIO variable and it's closer to the standard sRGB but with a better control if not clamped in indirect (ok, the six color problem still here but can be solved in comp). I'm not so quite happy that Blender devs choosed AgX because the principal problem that we are not using Blender in studio is because the lack of industries standard and here, I think, it's the worst error they made. AgX is nice to eyes directly and ok, less work to do in compositing, no more six color problem but if you light your scene correctly and you keep the rules of "no color in real life have a saturation other a value of 0.95" all is good. The same problem is present with USD, this last one is imported, not referenced using the USD layer system that is the base of the USD goal, so here again the devs close the door to use Blender in studios... And I say that because I like a lot Blender and want to use it in studio but choices like this put Blender again at the side of the road. Maybe I'm wrong and AgX will become an industry standard but I think not because it's not only a color system, it's also a LUT and in VFX / 3D movies and series we need to match color directly with a MacBeth table and not spend time to estimate it because a LUT (look profile) is inside your render and need to no wich one. Great video on the subject, thx.
I'm not sure what you mean by not real ACES? Presuming you are referring to the "ACES Linear" colour space, that is the ACES 2065-1 (AP0 primaries) not AcesCG (AP1 primaries). If you are loading ACES Linear output from Blender as AcesCG then it will look desaturated as they use different primaries and AP0 has a larger gamut. I do agree adding AcesCG as an input space within the Blender default OCIO would be a good idea though but the beauty of OCIO is you can modify to match your needs as an individual and as a studio. Studios often don't use the default OCIO set ups anyway, they set OCIO via environment variables. As for VFX and Macbeth charts it doesn't clash with ACES at all. AgX is not a colour space it is simply a view transform. The view transform doesn't need to be applied to your output from Blender, export linear. The scene data will be the same and you can still use Aces interchange colour spaces if you wished then use AgX for your view transform in Nuke or whatever software you composite in. It won't affect matching Macbeth charts at all as you are matching the colour **before** the view transform is applied to your image data whilst it is still linear. It's best not to think of AgX as an ACES alternative or competitor. ACES is an encoding system that happens to have a view transform within it. That view transform isn't ACES (as much as people think it is). You can still use ACES in your pipeline and then opt to not use ACES pre-packaged view transform. AgX is a better alternative to ACES ODT not the whole encoding system. Hope this helps.
Рік тому
@@llennoco It's exactly that (AP0 vs AP1 and of course the rec.709 profile forced in the Blender 3D viewport). I use AcesCG in Blender for all (color wheels and co), so I have an AP1 trought all my pipeline. Not solve the rec.709 hardcoded profile in the viewport (background image in camera) but in blender compositor it's ok and in Nuke and Davinci too. I'm working only with exr file in AP1 linear in all my softwares, less gamut but constant in all softwares. And yes, AgX is better to the eyes directly, but not well incorporated in differents softwares, so a bit tricky right now to have a pipeline with it.
Every video of yours is incredible, they are the right amount of beginner friendly info to in-depth info without being overboard. The many examples you provide in various scenarios and demonstrating what's happening and why this/that is better... just amazing. Thank you so much for making this content and I look forward to every video you make!
This level of understanding of how technology works is just truly fascinating to listen to even for someone who is only a fan of 3D and tech. What a great content
Chris, let me take the time to give you some feedback here in the comments. I'm putting it under your latest video, but it applies to all your content so far. It has been an absolute joy to go through your material up to this point. Even though I'm experienced enough in Blender not to "learn new stuff" per se, I absolutely love to watch this kind of thought-through, well-paced, clear, and quality-driven content. Many years ago I spent my time in Cinema 4D and used Maxwell Render as a plugin. With a photographer background, I really appreciated the artist-friendly approach that Maxwell allows: model to scale, describe the material properties (Maxwell gives you great control over Fresnel and falloff), set up your camera as you would a real one and just press render. No tricks-just beautiful light (if you wait long enough 😇). Since I moved to Blender years ago, while I like Cycles, I've always missed that 'chef's kiss' details in the plausible natural lighting that I feel I got from Maxwell. While I haven't jumped into Blender 4 yet, what I'm seeing in AgX, I feel that might bridge a big part of what I've been missing. The larger dynamic range and the natural desaturation in the highlights will do wonders for photorealistic rendering. It is an absolute crime that you have only got around 6900 subs. But PLEASE stick around and keep doing what you do. I would really love to see more from you using Blender 4 with its new technologies going forward. I love the look of your renders and would really like to see more videos focusing the balance between model quality, texture complexity, and lighting setup. It breaks my heart that "commercial success" on UA-cam doesn't follow the quality of the content, but it's hard to change. I hope the artist in you can find some amount of consolation in the fact that there is at least a small community here that really appreciates this type of content. I will try to get my act together and contribute too.
without this demonstration i don't think i would have figured out what the difference was alone, thank you for the showcase of filmic vs AgX difference
This is gonna be a game changer. Blender renders always had that "Blender look" (not in a very good way) because of filmic VS other industry softwares like Maya or 3dsMax which use ACES. Now content created with Blender (even by beginners) will have by default a much more pro look, apparently even better than the competition. This will literally change the colors of how Blender art is looked upon for the better!
Glad they are adding a better view transform. One thing I noticed when trying to manipulate my renders in a photo editing software was that lack of dynamic range and presence of saturation. Worked to my advantage as I was not making anything that was meant to be subtle, but I can only imagine how annoying that could be for professionals making high quality renders for commercial applications.
Yes!!! The channel is coming alive!!! This guy also was the Strata 3D master that first got me into 3D back in the day… so glad he joined the Blender team!
Nice! I thought this was going to be a difficult video, but you explained it so well! And thanks for talking about ACES too. I thought it was the gold standard already.
I personally hope they decide to support the ACES pipeline fully in the future. But for now not. You can installed ACES since Blender uses OpenColor IO however.
This was my question through the whole thing! It's doubly confusing as Unreal's "filmic" is an ACES transform (with a *lot* of knobs to tweak), so I was really surprised to see that Blender was using an SDR transform.
I just had a render client provide me with a file needing AgX and it's the first time I used it. Definitely retained some of the blown-out sky in his render and slightly muted things but an effect helped with that. You did a phenomenal job in explaining the sRGB problem as for many of us that's all we know, and how things like AgX move beyond that limitation. Great video, subbed.
Beyond an indication of what Blender would be able to do, this video really helped get a more intuitive understanding of how view transforms work in general.
Fantastic explaination and examples. I've been using AgX in Blender, Substance Painter, and Fusion for a few weeks. It really is extremely good in practice. Great to learn Blender are including it in 4.0, but it's very easy to install right now - so I'd advise people to chuck it in and have a play around.
Extremely high quality renders and video, thank you. So many people don't understand the amount of time, work, planning, execution it takes to create this high quality of content. I applaud you, Christopher. (I've been doing 3D since around 1995, and creating tutorials on UA-cam since 2009 on anther channel not connected to my personal account)
Wow, this was so informative. I've always struggled to understand the view transform but now see how much my renders could benefit from it. I'm excited to try AgX now. Thanks so much!
Compiling my top 20 go-to UA-cam TUTs - you're def way up in there C3D! - Many thanks for your education:) There's a buzz I get when someone like yourself explains something in way that even I can understand, I love learning and understanding how things work. Short cuts/add-ons are great if you know your stuff, ie when in a production environment - can save time. But if you're learning I say, don't get too distracted with all the unnecessary add-ons - instead do the spade work in blender vanilla and understand how to get there/problem solving etc. In the long run you will save more energy and time than any add-on can provide.
I only have a passing knowledge of color spaces, so I couldn't really grasp when you pointed out "This is clearly better", but when you rendered the white spheres with 3 lightsabers using the different transform functions, that really helped.
This is a fantastic video, thank you for going through and explaining everything from the top too! I learned a ton from this video, it was a great watch ^^
Thank you for this explanation! I'm happy that I now better understand how this works, and I'm more ready to make an informed decision on this instead of just eyeballing it. I have to say though, filmic looked much more like a nice and saturated middle ground in the rainbow + color balls + bright light example here 14:20 , so it's not all cut and dried (which I'm happy about too!)
Dude, You've done an amazing job at explaining everything😀! I'm always scared by all these color transforms and stuff because they always go over my head and seem very very complicated, but you explained it very nicely. Though, I didn't understand everything, I learned alot 😀! Thank you so much for the amazing video & sharing the knowledge! Blender 4.0 is very exciting and amazing :D
Just a few words on aces… aces takes the display primaries into account. You need to use the correct odt. So a mpb with Display p3 as the Color gamut should then use the display p3 odt. Also the Color saturation shifts around white are intentional, to mimic film stocks response to light. That is the rrt in aces…. All Color management only works if the screen is set to the same primaries than the view transform or odt in aces. Otherwise it all falls short…
As a character rigger, I literally don't care about any of this, but I know a high quality video when I see one, good job, I couldn't stop watching the whole thing even though I have better things to do.
Top notch explanation and step by step comparisons for semi-laymen like myself >> it seems AgX gives you a 'log profile' effect so that you have all the colour information to allow for freedom of post processing decisions >> which will make for some fantastic 'next level' image renders from all the super talented folk out there... excellent work👌💯👀🎯😎🌟
I made some tests in the past to compare Filmic, AgX, and ACES in coordination with Troy Sobotka. As you figured out, too, ACES has issues within the range of blue with color shifts towards purple and collapsing HUE colors under extreme lighting situations. In my tests, I animated the color of an area of light through the entire HUE spectrum with high exposure (intensity). ACES is not able to color transform this properly while AgX is handling this perfectly, smoothly and consistently.
@@christopher3d475 Interesting. I wasn't aware of this. I also hope they implement Photon Tracing for caustics. Do you know the three-part series "Unlock Better Color in Blender" by Riley Brown?
Yeah, I tested out a build of the spectral version of Cycles earlier this year, but I haven't followed it closely so don't know where it's at. But it's able to handle tough color situations better than direct RGB rendering. Weta Digital has their own in-house renderer called Manuka that's a spectral renderer, they do this because it allows them to match real world camera color response quite closely. I hope Cycles makes it to the light of day. I've seen a bit of one of his videos, I should probably watch all 3 parts.@@3dvfxprofessor
Just wanted to mention that as of ACES 1.3 this is resolved using the ACES Gamut Compression fix. You can grab that fix in several floating configs out there, including my custom RS config. ACES 2 will ship with this directly resolved. @3dvfxprofessor
0:04 For reference, this isn't Cycles exclusive, but a general update to view transform functionality that is used with any other render engines including Eevee too lol
I use ACES but i don't know how it would compare to agx. I think ACES is still better and agx now has a proper implementation in blender that would make it a viable option for people who do not understand ACES. However it would be good to do a comparison between them as ACES loses the looks feature after implementing it so a pros and cons list can be made too.
Yeah, I'm not sure of the decision to not also add ACES as an option. Cycles is moving towards becoming a spectral renderer and it may be that they're holding off until that's done. Just a guess.
AgX is the much better color transform close to how an ARRI film camera captures color and exposure on film material. I made a couple of tests that show serious issues with the ACES protocol. This confirms the color problem with ACES similar to Filmic in the video. ACES has issues with color shifts in the blue range and collapsing HUE colors in my test while AgX is transforming the results perfectly and constistent. In a client project, I was able to solve color issues just by switching from Filmic to AgX. This solved color temperature issues like a charm. The AgX Beauty, the Filmic Beast and the ACES Monster (HUE + Exposure) ua-cam.com/video/7-zFWruNJ7U/v-deo.html
Great video but as there are many comments that are confused/ misinformed regarding AgX vs ACES, here is some important information: ACES is an encoding system, AgX is a view transform. Within ACES there is set of view transforms referred to as ODT's (output device transforms). The ODT's packaged within ACES don't perform as well as AgX (yes even v1.3). So the direct comparison being made is between ACES' ODT and AgX **not** ACES vs AgX. Choosing to use AgX as your view transform does not mean that you can no longer use the rest of ACES transforms, colour spaces ect. It just means the final step transforming from open to closed domain to reach your display (see 2:41) is done with AgX rather than ACES, they are LUTs. Where ACES is useful is working in film and VFX where you are getting footage from various sources with different colour spaces and you want them all to all be converted to a single, linear intermediate colour space to work in. You can still make use of this and use AgX. Whilst ACES is generally considered an industry "standard" that doesn't obligate you to use their pre-packaged ODT in your own work. Final reminder: Whilst a nice addition, the inclusion of AgX is more of a change of defaults rather than a feature. The feature is OCIO which Blender has had for a long time and you have the freedom to load whatever config suits your needs be that AgX, Filmic, RED, ARRI, ACES. You can make your own config with whatever colour spaces, funky looks, luts and view transforms you want. This isn't Blender quirky or being defiant against an industry standard it is simply the default config they chose to ship, if you want to *still* use ACES ODT anyway just download it.
AAAAAAAAA. I freaking love AgX and Spectral rendering, and I had to run it in its own blender install because it would break a lot of my bridge plug-ins (understandable, when a plug-in is looking for a node that no longer exists) I stumbled upon your videos with the 4.0 coat one. It never occurred to me that IOR for (clear)coat was locked at 1.5. Thank you for making these! P.s. did not know that problem about ACES. Thought it would handle that colour grouping problem just fine. Welp! Now I know. ❤
Yeah, I'm seriously hoping Cycles becomes a full spectral renderer. They actually a functional test version of it earlier this year that I tested a bit, but I don't think that was meant for anything beyond research at that point. But I think there's still movement towards that goal. AgX was a necessary step to allow for spectral so let's hope. And I actually wish the Blender folks would do a proper ACES implementation (as an option) because it is a standard.
P.S.S. Like I saw the others say, your presentation and relaxed pace is perfect. Feels like a teacher who cares about the subject and has the ability to explain it to anyone without making them feel like a dumdum. The referenced UA-camrs are like hypemen. Great for short video going over the changes for the next version. Spend maybe 15 seconds rougly explaining the reason it change, then move on. You I would absolutely sit down and watch to /_*understand*_/ the change. I don't even hesitate to send your videos to my non-3d art/science friends, I just know they'd be able to follow along. Please keep up the great work.
Thank you for this awesome video! Quick question. In your Blender viewport there's a sort of "display linking" button enabled on the upper right. I never saw it before. What is it for?
Yes, it's a fantastic add-on I can't live with now. It makes it so when you switch from one viewport to another, the are matched up. It's frustrating when you go from one viewport to another and have completely different camera and shading. Someone wrote an addon to sync them up. I did a quick video on it with a link to the addon. ua-cam.com/video/jSnLLPQhDsc/v-deo.html
great video man! i find it very nice how you kept it informative, yet simple and easy to follow. i also like how you talked about ACES, which i was going to ask about, but you stopped me right in my tracks so good on you for anticipating that 😂 thanks for sharing the knowledge, and keep up the awesome work!
I actually just produced an entire 3d video involving a lot of colored lights in blender and this would have helped me so much! I ended up exporting in exr and working on the color In DaVinci resolve
Very useful resource. Ultimately using the compositor and things like looks, exposure and such will give you more control over a gradient than crushed color blotches. Maybe in ten years we will be defining textures by the nM of light each pixel reflects and finally be rid of raster artifacts.
There's been research development done in that direction. There was actually a working build earlier this year that I briefly tested, but it's not ready for the release as a lot of internal 'hive mind' work is going on with a series of developers to figure out the best way to handle various issues. So I don't think there's any definitive timeframe for it to happen. However, AgX was a necessary step to allow for spectral to be introduced downstream.
Thank you for your videos. Why can’t they just have ACES and AgX built in? ACES is the standard for a VFX workflow. It’s frustrating to manually install ACES for every Blender version I have.
I agree, I don't know why they didn't do that, but I suspect there might be some technicalities under the hood for proper support. Just a guess. I'm hoping that by the time the spectral Cycles is up and running they'll do that.
Incredible samples to understand standard, filmic, AgX... thanks! Just one question, when Blender 4.0 gets released, would AgX would be set by default?
Yes, AgX is the new default, but Filmic is still there for older files or if you want to use it. Blender uses OpenColor IO which means view transforms and color spaces can be plugged into it.
I kind of prefer this educational style more over the over-charismatic jumpy forced fast forward style that many creators do with their blender videos. Keep up the concise and precise explanation. 👌🏻
Sadly everyone is on that jumpy time quick saving 1 minute video train. Like I like detailed videos explaining to me like an adult or some Ted talk lol.
@@vilmfilm It depends on the subject. I really appreciate 1 minute videos when I just need a concise answer to my question.
Your videos are killer. It’s hard to find great Blender content this in depth aimed at an audience that already has a good understanding of the underlying fundamentals of 3D/Blender.
I’m watching despite having the most basic understanding
This was by far the clearest, and easiest to understand, explaination of colorspaces I've ever seen on the subject - thank you!
I have noticed this problem since 2014 and I was trying to learn computer science and programming to create a color system since that period, but because of the war in Gaza since 2014/2016/2018 unfortunately, I was not able to do that, but now when I leave Gaza and my circumstances improved, I discovered that someone had preceded me in this 😂😂😂 Sorry for my bad English
Thank you for explaining this. No one (I know) can explain this kind of technical data better than you. I'm not sure if anyone else is even bothered or knows how to explain it. This is a great service to the Blender community.
Yes 🙌 totally agree ! Brilliant and cristal clear !!! Bravo !!! Et merci beaucoup !
I have never seen such a clear and well demonstrated explanation of what gamut amd view transforms are.and seeing the shift between them really makes it so apparent. Having ALL of that color data there, even if desaturated, is mind blowing to see. It is so clearly all there.
At 17:22, if you use the ACES from Blender, the OCIO config send with Blender, it's not the real ACES, not match (too desaturated). The one with Blender is mapped trought the view transform inside a REC.709 profile. I use the real ACES 1.2 using OCIO variable and it's closer to the standard sRGB but with a better control if not clamped in indirect (ok, the six color problem still here but can be solved in comp). I'm not so quite happy that Blender devs choosed AgX because the principal problem that we are not using Blender in studio is because the lack of industries standard and here, I think, it's the worst error they made. AgX is nice to eyes directly and ok, less work to do in compositing, no more six color problem but if you light your scene correctly and you keep the rules of "no color in real life have a saturation other a value of 0.95" all is good. The same problem is present with USD, this last one is imported, not referenced using the USD layer system that is the base of the USD goal, so here again the devs close the door to use Blender in studios... And I say that because I like a lot Blender and want to use it in studio but choices like this put Blender again at the side of the road. Maybe I'm wrong and AgX will become an industry standard but I think not because it's not only a color system, it's also a LUT and in VFX / 3D movies and series we need to match color directly with a MacBeth table and not spend time to estimate it because a LUT (look profile) is inside your render and need to no wich one. Great video on the subject, thx.
I'm not sure what you mean by not real ACES? Presuming you are referring to the "ACES Linear" colour space, that is the ACES 2065-1 (AP0 primaries) not AcesCG (AP1 primaries). If you are loading ACES Linear output from Blender as AcesCG then it will look desaturated as they use different primaries and AP0 has a larger gamut. I do agree adding AcesCG as an input space within the Blender default OCIO would be a good idea though but the beauty of OCIO is you can modify to match your needs as an individual and as a studio. Studios often don't use the default OCIO set ups anyway, they set OCIO via environment variables.
As for VFX and Macbeth charts it doesn't clash with ACES at all. AgX is not a colour space it is simply a view transform. The view transform doesn't need to be applied to your output from Blender, export linear. The scene data will be the same and you can still use Aces interchange colour spaces if you wished then use AgX for your view transform in Nuke or whatever software you composite in. It won't affect matching Macbeth charts at all as you are matching the colour **before** the view transform is applied to your image data whilst it is still linear.
It's best not to think of AgX as an ACES alternative or competitor. ACES is an encoding system that happens to have a view transform within it. That view transform isn't ACES (as much as people think it is). You can still use ACES in your pipeline and then opt to not use ACES pre-packaged view transform. AgX is a better alternative to ACES ODT not the whole encoding system.
Hope this helps.
@@llennoco It's exactly that (AP0 vs AP1 and of course the rec.709 profile forced in the Blender 3D viewport). I use AcesCG in Blender for all (color wheels and co), so I have an AP1 trought all my pipeline. Not solve the rec.709 hardcoded profile in the viewport (background image in camera) but in blender compositor it's ok and in Nuke and Davinci too. I'm working only with exr file in AP1 linear in all my softwares, less gamut but constant in all softwares. And yes, AgX is better to the eyes directly, but not well incorporated in differents softwares, so a bit tricky right now to have a pipeline with it.
I've been using AgX for quite a while now, and I'm really excited for this update.
Yeah, this is an important update that could be overlooked easily. It's nice that it's an official thing now.
Very nice explanation of a hard to explain topic. It would be fair to add that both Filmic and Agx are developed by Troy James Sobotka.
Thank you for that. I've added that info to the video description for proper credit.
Every video of yours is incredible, they are the right amount of beginner friendly info to in-depth info without being overboard. The many examples you provide in various scenarios and demonstrating what's happening and why this/that is better... just amazing. Thank you so much for making this content and I look forward to every video you make!
This level of understanding of how technology works is just truly fascinating to listen to even for someone who is only a fan of 3D and tech. What a great content
Damn, this fixed all color problems I've had on my renders. Thank you for sharing this! You're the first I've seen talking about this.
Chris, let me take the time to give you some feedback here in the comments. I'm putting it under your latest video, but it applies to all your content so far.
It has been an absolute joy to go through your material up to this point. Even though I'm experienced enough in Blender not to "learn new stuff" per se, I absolutely love to watch this kind of thought-through, well-paced, clear, and quality-driven content. Many years ago I spent my time in Cinema 4D and used Maxwell Render as a plugin. With a photographer background, I really appreciated the artist-friendly approach that Maxwell allows: model to scale, describe the material properties (Maxwell gives you great control over Fresnel and falloff), set up your camera as you would a real one and just press render. No tricks-just beautiful light (if you wait long enough 😇). Since I moved to Blender years ago, while I like Cycles, I've always missed that 'chef's kiss' details in the plausible natural lighting that I feel I got from Maxwell. While I haven't jumped into Blender 4 yet, what I'm seeing in AgX, I feel that might bridge a big part of what I've been missing. The larger dynamic range and the natural desaturation in the highlights will do wonders for photorealistic rendering.
It is an absolute crime that you have only got around 6900 subs. But PLEASE stick around and keep doing what you do. I would really love to see more from you using Blender 4 with its new technologies going forward. I love the look of your renders and would really like to see more videos focusing the balance between model quality, texture complexity, and lighting setup.
It breaks my heart that "commercial success" on UA-cam doesn't follow the quality of the content, but it's hard to change. I hope the artist in you can find some amount of consolation in the fact that there is at least a small community here that really appreciates this type of content. I will try to get my act together and contribute too.
I’m going to share this video with colleagues who use Blender. Will do my part to support your channel 👍
without this demonstration i don't think i would have figured out what the difference was alone, thank you for the showcase of filmic vs AgX difference
Your channel is a gold mine
I can't wait for blender 4.0 to come out
This is gonna be a game changer. Blender renders always had that "Blender look" (not in a very good way) because of filmic VS other industry softwares like Maya or 3dsMax which use ACES. Now content created with Blender (even by beginners) will have by default a much more pro look, apparently even better than the competition.
This will literally change the colors of how Blender art is looked upon for the better!
Glad they are adding a better view transform. One thing I noticed when trying to manipulate my renders in a photo editing software was that lack of dynamic range and presence of saturation. Worked to my advantage as I was not making anything that was meant to be subtle, but I can only imagine how annoying that could be for professionals making high quality renders for commercial applications.
Excellent overview!!!
13:45 the explanation and examples are apt, precise and concise... AgX is mind blowing
Yes!!! The channel is coming alive!!! This guy also was the Strata 3D master that first got me into 3D back in the day… so glad he joined the Blender team!
I’m treating this video as a college lecture, so much knowledge poured into making this!!!!
Wow! The explanation of the 6 color problem and what AgX does is really well done! And the other examples as well!
Finally blender goes toward realism without spending money on other program
Alright, I'm sold! The difference in that scene with those three "neon" RGB pipes and spheres is staggering.
wow, what a exellent explanation!!! great video
Nice! I thought this was going to be a difficult video, but you explained it so well! And thanks for talking about ACES too. I thought it was the gold standard already.
I personally hope they decide to support the ACES pipeline fully in the future. But for now not. You can installed ACES since Blender uses OpenColor IO however.
This was my question through the whole thing! It's doubly confusing as Unreal's "filmic" is an ACES transform (with a *lot* of knobs to tweak), so I was really surprised to see that Blender was using an SDR transform.
Color management is complex for sure.@@SimonBuchanNz
I just had a render client provide me with a file needing AgX and it's the first time I used it. Definitely retained some of the blown-out sky in his render and slightly muted things but an effect helped with that. You did a phenomenal job in explaining the sRGB problem as for many of us that's all we know, and how things like AgX move beyond that limitation. Great video, subbed.
Beyond an indication of what Blender would be able to do, this video really helped get a more intuitive understanding of how view transforms work in general.
Best explanation of AgX that I've seen online. Thank you so much for your work.
This is some information that I didn't know I needed to know. Thanks for the very descriptive explanation.
That’s the best explanation I have seen on this topic. Nice to be watching your content again after I left strata behind so many years ago.
Fantastic explaination and examples. I've been using AgX in Blender, Substance Painter, and Fusion for a few weeks. It really is extremely good in practice. Great to learn Blender are including it in 4.0, but it's very easy to install right now - so I'd advise people to chuck it in and have a play around.
Extremely high quality renders and video, thank you. So many people don't understand the amount of time, work, planning, execution it takes to create this high quality of content. I applaud you, Christopher. (I've been doing 3D since around 1995, and creating tutorials on UA-cam since 2009 on anther channel not connected to my personal account)
Wow, this was so informative. I've always struggled to understand the view transform but now see how much my renders could benefit from it. I'm excited to try AgX now. Thanks so much!
Wow. The example with the solid colors is mind blowing. Stunning!
I feel like Im back in college watching your videos. Your teaching me about thing that I was completely unaware! You broaden my world bro!
What a great explanation, thank you so much for these videos!
Compiling my top 20 go-to UA-cam TUTs - you're def way up in there C3D! - Many thanks for your education:) There's a buzz I get when someone like yourself explains something in way that even I can understand, I love learning and understanding how things work. Short cuts/add-ons are great if you know your stuff, ie when in a production environment - can save time. But if you're learning I say, don't get too distracted with all the unnecessary add-ons - instead do the spade work in blender vanilla and understand how to get there/problem solving etc. In the long run you will save more energy and time than any add-on can provide.
I only have a passing knowledge of color spaces, so I couldn't really grasp when you pointed out "This is clearly better", but when you rendered the white spheres with 3 lightsabers using the different transform functions, that really helped.
Thank you better dude!
Super amazing clarity assisting bringing colour + rendering info into light. Off to explore AgX.
Oh damn nice, I was using agx n aces already but I had to put it in every time I installed a different version, it's nice to have it built in
Finally I understand what AgX is good for. Thank you so much.
This is going to be a game changer, awesome video!
Crazy concise presentation. Really perfect, and an absolute rarity. 👍
Fantastic explanation. Thank you for taking the time to produce these very informative and interesting videos.
This is a fantastic video, thank you for going through and explaining everything from the top too! I learned a ton from this video, it was a great watch ^^
Very well presented. knowledgable video series on the new features in 4 colour management. Thank-you!
Thank you for this explanation! I'm happy that I now better understand how this works, and I'm more ready to make an informed decision on this instead of just eyeballing it. I have to say though, filmic looked much more like a nice and saturated middle ground in the rainbow + color balls + bright light example here 14:20 , so it's not all cut and dried (which I'm happy about too!)
That was really well thought out and informative. I don't see this quality too much, and I rarely mention it even when i do see it. Great job! Subbed.
Wow! this was so in-depth! I love it!
Dude, You've done an amazing job at explaining everything😀! I'm always scared by all these color transforms and stuff because they always go over my head and seem very very complicated, but you explained it very nicely. Though, I didn't understand everything, I learned alot 😀! Thank you so much for the amazing video & sharing the knowledge! Blender 4.0 is very exciting and amazing :D
Just a few words on aces… aces takes the display primaries into account. You need to use the correct odt. So a mpb with Display p3 as the Color gamut should then use the display p3 odt. Also the Color saturation shifts around white are intentional, to mimic film stocks response to light. That is the rrt in aces…. All Color management only works if the screen is set to the same primaries than the view transform or odt in aces. Otherwise it all falls short…
As a character rigger, I literally don't care about any of this, but I know a high quality video when I see one, good job, I couldn't stop watching the whole thing even though I have better things to do.
I've been looking for a relationship between the three of them, thank you very much for your explanation
Thank you for the explanation, it was quite clear and I'm excited to try it in Blender 4.0
Thanks for the detailed explanations and great examples. Awesome!
You are technical grand master of Blender ♥♥♥
Top notch explanation and step by step comparisons for semi-laymen like myself >> it seems AgX gives you a 'log profile' effect so that you have all the colour information to allow for freedom of post processing decisions >> which will make for some fantastic 'next level' image renders from all the super talented folk out there... excellent work👌💯👀🎯😎🌟
Very amazing and in depth video, the technical explanations were very understandable.
More than ready, already using AgX and it's the best.
GREAT EXPLANATION! Thank you very much for your time!
Excellent video! Your videos are the most informative out there
I made some tests in the past to compare Filmic, AgX, and ACES in coordination with Troy Sobotka. As you figured out, too, ACES has issues within the range of blue with color shifts towards purple and collapsing HUE colors under extreme lighting situations. In my tests, I animated the color of an area of light through the entire HUE spectrum with high exposure (intensity). ACES is not able to color transform this properly while AgX is handling this perfectly, smoothly and consistently.
I'm hoping the spectral development of Cycles comes to full fruition because my understanding is that that'll also help with color in this area.
@@christopher3d475 Interesting. I wasn't aware of this. I also hope they implement Photon Tracing for caustics. Do you know the three-part series "Unlock Better Color in Blender" by Riley Brown?
Yeah, I tested out a build of the spectral version of Cycles earlier this year, but I haven't followed it closely so don't know where it's at. But it's able to handle tough color situations better than direct RGB rendering. Weta Digital has their own in-house renderer called Manuka that's a spectral renderer, they do this because it allows them to match real world camera color response quite closely. I hope Cycles makes it to the light of day.
I've seen a bit of one of his videos, I should probably watch all 3 parts.@@3dvfxprofessor
@@christopher3d475 I thought Weta sold all their in-house 3D software to Unity years ago.
Yes, _that_ Unity.
Just wanted to mention that as of ACES 1.3 this is resolved using the ACES Gamut Compression fix. You can grab that fix in several floating configs out there, including my custom RS config. ACES 2 will ship with this directly resolved. @3dvfxprofessor
Love the style of this video! Very concise & informative. Subbed 👍🏾
Nothing but a banger! 🔥
0:04 For reference, this isn't Cycles exclusive, but a general update to view transform functionality that is used with any other render engines including Eevee too lol
Thanks for the clarification.
I use ACES but i don't know how it would compare to agx. I think ACES is still better and agx now has a proper implementation in blender that would make it a viable option for people who do not understand ACES. However it would be good to do a comparison between them as ACES loses the looks feature after implementing it so a pros and cons list can be made too.
Yeah, I'm not sure of the decision to not also add ACES as an option. Cycles is moving towards becoming a spectral renderer and it may be that they're holding off until that's done. Just a guess.
AgX is the much better color transform close to how an ARRI film camera captures color and exposure on film material. I made a couple of tests that show serious issues with the ACES protocol. This confirms the color problem with ACES similar to Filmic in the video. ACES has issues with color shifts in the blue range and collapsing HUE colors in my test while AgX is transforming the results perfectly and constistent. In a client project, I was able to solve color issues just by switching from Filmic to AgX. This solved color temperature issues like a charm.
The AgX Beauty, the Filmic Beast and the ACES Monster (HUE + Exposure)
ua-cam.com/video/7-zFWruNJ7U/v-deo.html
OMG dude what a great video. Thank you sooooo much.
It's the first video from your channel and after watching this i have to subscribe because the video was very informative and awesome.
What a masterclass, thank you!
Thanks for sharing! Your videos are incredible, really showing in practice how it works, excellent explanation, I'm your fan!
AHH this was such a useful video, thank you 😁
Great video but as there are many comments that are confused/ misinformed regarding AgX vs ACES, here is some important information:
ACES is an encoding system, AgX is a view transform. Within ACES there is set of view transforms referred to as ODT's (output device transforms). The ODT's packaged within ACES don't perform as well as AgX (yes even v1.3). So the direct comparison being made is between ACES' ODT and AgX **not** ACES vs AgX. Choosing to use AgX as your view transform does not mean that you can no longer use the rest of ACES transforms, colour spaces ect. It just means the final step transforming from open to closed domain to reach your display (see 2:41) is done with AgX rather than ACES, they are LUTs.
Where ACES is useful is working in film and VFX where you are getting footage from various sources with different colour spaces and you want them all to all be converted to a single, linear intermediate colour space to work in. You can still make use of this and use AgX. Whilst ACES is generally considered an industry "standard" that doesn't obligate you to use their pre-packaged ODT in your own work.
Final reminder: Whilst a nice addition, the inclusion of AgX is more of a change of defaults rather than a feature. The feature is OCIO which Blender has had for a long time and you have the freedom to load whatever config suits your needs be that AgX, Filmic, RED, ARRI, ACES. You can make your own config with whatever colour spaces, funky looks, luts and view transforms you want. This isn't Blender quirky or being defiant against an industry standard it is simply the default config they chose to ship, if you want to *still* use ACES ODT anyway just download it.
Thanks for the comment. It is a confusing area for sure.
Thanks for this overview, very helpful.
Love your content, very authentic in nature. Btw I just noticed your channel banner has a typo for the word practical!
Thanks for the catch, I've fixed that.
this is a high tier video of blender information. i hope you get 100k subs soon! thanks a lot!
Really great video! A tone of great and well explained information.
AAAAAAAAA. I freaking love AgX and Spectral rendering, and I had to run it in its own blender install because it would break a lot of my bridge plug-ins (understandable, when a plug-in is looking for a node that no longer exists)
I stumbled upon your videos with the 4.0 coat one. It never occurred to me that IOR for (clear)coat was locked at 1.5. Thank you for making these!
P.s. did not know that problem about ACES. Thought it would handle that colour grouping problem just fine. Welp! Now I know. ❤
Yeah, I'm seriously hoping Cycles becomes a full spectral renderer. They actually a functional test version of it earlier this year that I tested a bit, but I don't think that was meant for anything beyond research at that point. But I think there's still movement towards that goal. AgX was a necessary step to allow for spectral so let's hope. And I actually wish the Blender folks would do a proper ACES implementation (as an option) because it is a standard.
P.S.S. Like I saw the others say, your presentation and relaxed pace is perfect. Feels like a teacher who cares about the subject and has the ability to explain it to anyone without making them feel like a dumdum.
The referenced UA-camrs are like hypemen. Great for short video going over the changes for the next version. Spend maybe 15 seconds rougly explaining the reason it change, then move on.
You I would absolutely sit down and watch to /_*understand*_/ the change. I don't even hesitate to send your videos to my non-3d art/science friends, I just know they'd be able to follow along. Please keep up the great work.
Thank you for this awesome video!
Quick question. In your Blender viewport there's a sort of "display linking" button enabled on the upper right. I never saw it before. What is it for?
Yes, it's a fantastic add-on I can't live with now. It makes it so when you switch from one viewport to another, the are matched up. It's frustrating when you go from one viewport to another and have completely different camera and shading. Someone wrote an addon to sync them up. I did a quick video on it with a link to the addon. ua-cam.com/video/jSnLLPQhDsc/v-deo.html
Superb breakdown, thank you. During the video, when I flip back to the Filmic examples, they almost look cartoony!
great video man! i find it very nice how you kept it informative, yet simple and easy to follow. i also like how you talked about ACES, which i was going to ask about, but you stopped me right in my tracks so good on you for anticipating that 😂
thanks for sharing the knowledge, and keep up the awesome work!
I actually just produced an entire 3d video involving a lot of colored lights in blender and this would have helped me so much! I ended up exporting in exr and working on the color In DaVinci resolve
so well explained dude!
Very useful resource. Ultimately using the compositor and things like looks, exposure and such will give you more control over a gradient than crushed color blotches. Maybe in ten years we will be defining textures by the nM of light each pixel reflects and finally be rid of raster artifacts.
The next major step is turning Cycles in a spectral renderer. That's cooking in the background right now.
Your content is a gem 💎 thank you so much.
Thanks A Lot Bro ;)
At 0:50, you mention spectral rendering. Is the plan for blender to evolve into a spectral renderer?
There's been research development done in that direction. There was actually a working build earlier this year that I briefly tested, but it's not ready for the release as a lot of internal 'hive mind' work is going on with a series of developers to figure out the best way to handle various issues. So I don't think there's any definitive timeframe for it to happen. However, AgX was a necessary step to allow for spectral to be introduced downstream.
Amazing videos... your level of understanding rendering is on another level :)
Thank you for your videos.
Why can’t they just have ACES and AgX built in? ACES is the standard for a VFX workflow. It’s frustrating to manually install ACES for every Blender version I have.
I agree, I don't know why they didn't do that, but I suspect there might be some technicalities under the hood for proper support. Just a guess. I'm hoping that by the time the spectral Cycles is up and running they'll do that.
@@christopher3d475yeah must be. which is interesting because you can export to ACEScg in the sequencer.
Love your videos!
Could you maybe add some side by side comparison shots in the future? I often find myself skipping back and forth to compare.
I could definitely do that.
Thank you for this wonderful explanation.
Maaan I need this. I do scenic design and have always felt t there was premature blow out on my led bars
Appreciate the wonderful content. Extremely insightful.
I was thinking about aces, glad you bring it up. So..., are they going to fix aces or will AgX take over?
Very nice and easy to understand intro. Thanks.
🙌🙌🙌 so amazing! thank you for all the knowledge you share with us 🙏
Great explanation, thank you!!
Incredible samples to understand standard, filmic, AgX... thanks! Just one question, when Blender 4.0 gets released, would AgX would be set by default?
Yes, AgX is the new default, but Filmic is still there for older files or if you want to use it. Blender uses OpenColor IO which means view transforms and color spaces can be plugged into it.
I‘ve been using AgX for almost a year now. Very informative video though, I didn’t now most of these details
Yeah, it's been a bit of a secret for 'in the know' people, it's good that it's now becoming a defacto standard.