- What is rendering?
- On-canvas rendering
- Render speed and quality
- Render export formats
- Review questions
- Review answers
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
On-canvas rendering
As you position 3D models in Design mode, Dimension attempts to display a realistic preview of the resulting scene on the canvas. Because an accurate rendering of the scene is so time-consuming, this on-canvas preview is only a rough approximation of what the final scene will look like. Effects that will appear especially rough in the on-canvas preview include
Shadows cast by 3D models on the ground plane
Glass and other semi-transparent materials applied to 3D model surfaces
The camera depth of field
Things that don’t display at all in the on-canvas preview include
Reflections cast on one model by another model
Reflections cast by models on the ground plane
Launch Adobe Dimension.
Click Open, or choose File > Open.
Select the file named Lesson_04_begin.dn, which is in the Lessons > Lesson04 folder that you copied onto your hard disk, and then click Open.
Note some of the limitations of the on-canvas rendering of this scene. The shadows being cast by the two 3D models are hard-edged.
You’d expect to see some part of the wood model being reflected in the shiny silver surface of the Pipe model, but the reflection isn’t visible.
Select Environment in the Scene panel.
Click the disclosure triangle
to the right of Ground Plane in the Properties panel to reveal the ground plane options.Because there is a Reflection Opacity value of 10%, you’d expect to see a slight reflection of the 3D models in the ground plane, but no reflection appears in the on-canvas preview.
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The bottom line is that the on-canvas preview is useful primarily as a way to judge the position, size, and placement of 3D models within a scene. To see materials, surfaces, and lighting accurately, you must render the scene.
Render preview
The Render Preview window provides a pretty good idea of what the final render will look like, but the quality of the preview is limited so that the preview can update quickly as you edit the scene.
Click the Render Preview icon
at the upper-right corner of the work area.Wait for the render preview to update.
Click the Toggle Fullscreen icon
at the top of the Render Preview window to view a larger preview.Note the rough, speckled “noise” in the shadows in the render preview. This is a limitation of the render preview.
You can adjust settings in the Properties panel, even while the full-screen Render Preview window is displayed on the screen.
In the Scene panel, click Environment.
In the Properties panel, turn on Sunlight.
Change the Rotation value to 130°.
You should see new cast shadows, caused by the sunlight, appearing to the left of the objects.
Click the Close icon
in the upper-right corner of the Render Preview window to close it.In the Properties panel, turn off Sunlight.
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Use the \ key to show and hide the Render Preview window.
Render mode
To really see an accurate view of the scene, the scene must be rendered in Render mode.
Before you go to Render mode, click the Camera Bookmarks icon
at the top of the screen.You’ll see that there are five bookmarks saved with this file.
Click each bookmark in turn to see what each view looks like.
When you’re finished, click the “Front view” bookmark to return to that view.
To enter Render mode, click the Render tab at the top of the screen.
In Render mode, you’ll see all five of the camera bookmarks displayed at the top of the Render Settings panel. This handy feature lets you render multiple camera views of a scene all at once. Since rendering can be very time consuming, this provides a way to queue up multiple renders of a scene and let them run overnight or while you’re at lunch.
For now, just leave “Current View” selected.
Type My_Lesson_04_end LOW in the Export Filename field. Dimension appends the name of the view to the end of the filename, so this file will be exported as My_Lesson_04_end LOW-Current View.
If you want to change the export location, click the blue export path and choose a new export location.
In the Quality setting, choose Low (Fast).
Deselect PSD under Export Format, and select PNG.
Click Render.
NOTEAlthough you can’t continue to work in Dimension while a file is being rendered, you can continue to work in other applications on your computer. If you have notifications turned on in your operating system, you’ll receive a notification when the render is complete.
Wait for the render to finish.
The render took about 1 minute and 23 seconds on my 3-year-old MacBook Pro. If you don’t want to wait for the render to finish, I’ve saved a copy of the rendered file for you in the lesson files (Lesson_04_end LOW-Current View.png).
Now change the Quality setting to High (Slow).
Change the filename to My_Lesson_04_end HIGH.
Click Render.
Wait for the render to finish. This render took almost 6 minutes on my computer. If you don’t want for it to finish, I’ve saved a copy of the file for you in the lesson files (Lesson_04_end HIGH-Current View.png).
While a file is rendering, the Render Status panel displays a progress bar that provides a rough approximation of how much of the render has completed.
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While a file is rendering, you can click the Snapshot icon 
at any time to save a PNG or PSD file of the render in progress. Since the render engine performs multiple “passes” through the scene, a partially completed render may be far enough along to give you a good idea of what the final render will look like.
