Slow render with Sunlight..

[Downup]

Hi.
Love the lightning effect Sunlight gives. And i "suck" at lightning. So i find Sunlight as a cheap way to go :D

The problem is that the renders are extremely slow.

I want to render with 1280x720 and sunlight with Ray per sample 15-20.

Frame without sunlight = 2 seconds
Frame with sunlight = 3 min 22 seconds

And my system is
winXP 64-bit
8gb RAM 1066MHz
And AMD's latest CPU AMD Phenom II X4 940 Black Edition

Should it not go a little faster? Or is there a way to make Sunlight go faster? :D

3Ds Max 08 - Default install
Maybe some setting in the program that let me use more of the computer?

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The thing i am planing to do has over 10.000 Frames and that is 533 hours rendering..

[Oniram]

i know there is a way to set a program to use a majority of your computer's power.. i believe it is done within the task manager, but i am not sure. naturally however, with any lighting, a render will go slower than it will with no lights at all. the computer needs to take time to calculate shadows and whatnot. 3 minutes is actually not all that long anyway. if anything just take down the rays per sample. you wont get as crisp of shadows but it will probably speed up the time.

also, if the scene is very complex, that will take into effect of the time. also if you have any other things active such as particles, hair and fur, etc, that will add time as well. but like i said, 3 minutes is actually a breeze time for a decent render. ive had to render a rotating wireframe of a building i did, and just for looks i tossed in a sunlight system, the entire 600 frames took about 8 hours. it takes time for good results.

if however you are having some issues in the scene and want to check on only one part of the render, you can make a render region (after u hit render it should be in the top right hand side of the window, a drop down menu saying "view" ). a render region will allow you to sample only a certain area of the camera so that way you dont have to wait for the entire picture to render.

[Downup]

Thanks for your reply.
Yes, i think i have to tweak the Rays little.

Just afraid that i wont be able to render it in 1280x720. I can but render something for 20 days will kill my system :D.

Planing to do a 5min movie in 1280x720
5 min = 7200 frames
7200*4 min per frame = 480 hours if my calculation are correct :D

[Drewvian]

The thing is using the sunlight like you are doing is a expensive thing to do and by expensive I mean it will take some time. Since it is your short cut and helps avoid long times of figuring out light. You get screwed in rendering. Also with your samples up you are saying for every pixel it will take 15-20 samples. Which if you are doing a 720p movie like you are it will take time. So I could suggest learn how to light a bit better to help with render times and find cheaper ways of lighting your scene but still looking good. Good luck though man hope this has helped also are you using 3ds max?

[Downup]

Oh, changed this from 200 to 30 and it goes super fast now.. And it keeps the same lightning i want for my project :)

http://i28.tinypic.com/242snk1.jpg

[Drewvian]

That is great just be careful of noise in the scene in some of the shadow/ light area because sometimes it will happen and you may have to find a happen medium for it. Also great that you were able to find what works great for you with keeping the render times down man.....have a good one