We’re 3dsMax users here, but we often will do an AO pass at 1/2 or 1/4 resolution to cut render times, then blur it a bit with multiply. Can you bake the AO
to bit maps, then render it – that is generally the fastest method for us – but only on geometry that doesn’t change.
There is also a 3rd party map, Dirt Map, that is blazingly fast – I think CD4 might use something similar.
From: After Effects Mail List [mailto:AE-List@media-motion.tv]
On Behalf Of Greg Balint
Sent: Tuesday, November 12, 2013 8:52 AM
To: After Effects Mail List
Subject: [AE] Faking ambient occlusion or SSAO in After Effects?
Hey all,
I'm on a crunch time project right now and one of my renders from Cinema 4d was going to take over 25 hours with Ambient occlusion on.. the project is super high resolution 9660x1080 and it's just simple cube-space mograph stuff, but the
AO was taking forever.. I opted to turn off the AO pass and render out a general pass instead..
Now I need to figure out how to get that look back, as the standard pass is too flat and dull.
There USED to be a plugin / script called super SSAO or something like that, and it used pixelbender to make fake AO on a prerendered animation or still. it was actually quite useful for quick renders from 3d and although it wasn't PERFECT,
it was great for quick jobs that couldn't afford the render times but still needed the extra depth.
Anyway.. does anyone know of a way to do this without that plugin? (as far as I know pixelbender went away after CS5 so the plugin i used to use is not going to work)
Maybe a few regular plugins that could create the same effect?
Thanks!
--
///Greg Balint
//Art Director / Motion Graphics Designer
/321.514.4839
delRAZOR.com/