--- ray/doc/notes/ReleaseNotes 2004/10/04 22:32:58 1.52 +++ ray/doc/notes/ReleaseNotes 2008/04/18 18:06:29 1.147 @@ -1338,3 +1338,332 @@ reported radiance rather than XYZ values with Y in cd/ Made it so ra_bmp only produces run-length encoded 8-bit output for grayscale images that are tone-mapped. This minimizes circumstances under which output scanline order is reversed. + +Fixed bug in rcalc where it sometimes wasn't parsing the input format +correctly. + +===================== +Version 3.7 + +Fixed bug in source occluder cache which caused consistency error +for distant sources and mist materials. (Thanks to Mark Stock for +finding the problem.) + +Fixed serious bug in source drawing routines for rpict, where the edges +of light sources were appearing through obstructions. (Thanks to Veronica +Sundstedt for pointing this out.) + +(The above were included in the 3.6.1 patch release.) + +Changed default temporary directory from /usr/tmp, which doesn't exist +on a lot of systems these days, to /tmp. + +Eliminated many unused files and programs from the distribution, including +the following programs that were being built but no longer used: + oki20 - printer driver for OkiMate 20 printer (B&W) + oki20c - printer driver for OkiMate 20 color printer + pcwarp - intended as more general substitute for macbetcal, + but never quite worked + ra_avs - convert to & from AVS image format + ra_bn - convert to & from Barneyscann format + ra_pr - convert to & from 8-bit Sun rasterfile format + ra_pr24 - convert to & from 24-bit Sun rasterfile format + thf2rad - convert GDS "things file" to Radiance scene format +If anyone is still wanting any of the above programs, let us know and we'll +reinstate it. + +Fixed bug in pcond's acuity simulation for small view angles (less than +4 degrees horizontally or vertically). Thanks to James Lee for figuring +this out. + +Added script to convert to/from ICT's Poskanzer Float Map, which I don't +care to support officially due to its machine-dependent byte order. + +Fixed bug that caused incorrect reporting of non-surface in set when +mixing meshes and instances. (Thanks to Jack de Valpine for discovery.) + +Fixed inaccuracy in calculation of diffuse transmission in the presence +of pure specular (Fresnel reflection) using "trans" material. Thanks +to Christoph Reinhart for pointing out the error. + +Made internal change to tone-mapping library to use structure pointer +rather than stack, making code re-entrant and more up to modern standards. + +Added -pd option to handle depth-of-field blur in rpict. This requires +that the view directon (-vd option) include focal distance information, +which is now preserved by the various view file routines, and reported +by the vwright command. + +Added DBLUR variable to ranimate and pmdblur script to handle simultaneous +motion and depth-of-field blurring. Thanks to Visarc for funding this work. + +Added setting of focus distance in rvu ("focus" command) and rholo +('f'/"frame" command). + +Changed default remote shell in ranimate to "ssh" rather than "rsh", +which has been abandoned on most Unix systems due to security issues. + +Fixed behavior of source primitive using illum with no alternate +material. These now become transparent so one can see the sky or +light-probe background for use in image-based lighting. Previously, +the user needed to specify the background glow as the alternate +material for a distant illum source to behave properly. (This still +works.) + +Fixed some minor problems and inconsistencies with 16-bit/channel +TIFF i/o in ra_tiff. + +Created mksource program to generate distant sources for improved +image-based lighting with light probes. + +Changed ambient calculation so that -ad will not limit recursion +depth, and a minimum of 27 samples will be sent out for each stored +ambient value, or 3 samples if -aa is 0 (caching off). + +Added -oM option to rtrace to report material (rather than modifier) +for cases where actual material is aliased or further up modifier chain. + +Rearranged the way ray contributions are computed so that it might be +possible to use rtrace to derive daylight coefficients and optical +transfer functions. The new -oTW option of rtrace produces color +contribution weights for each ray, which combined with the -ti (or -tI) +option permits the contribution of selected surfaces or sources to +be determined. Using the -oTW option, one should also specify +options "-dt 0 -aa 0 -as 0" for optimal results. In particular, +one cannot expect reasonable tallies with -ab >= 1 and irradiance +caching on (-aa > 0). + +The same code modifications included a change to the indirect computation +with caching switched off (-aa 0). Whereas before, the number of secondary +rays after the first bounce were half of the previous generation, they are +now determined by the surface reflectance, making for a better and faster +calculation. It should now be possible to compute many bounces with -aa 0, +which used to be prohibitively expensive. + +Added -T option to xshowtrace to trace rays to light sources. + +Added meta2bmp program to produce BMP files from metafile graphics. + +Added cct_x(t) and cct_y(t) to src/cal/cal/blackbody.cal to interpolate +CIE chromaticities for particular black-body temperatures. + +Increased maximum number of input pictures in pcomb and pcompos to 512. + +Created rtcontrib program for computing ray contribution coefficients. +This tool may be used to do standard optical ray tracing or daylight +coefficient calculations for annual simulations, among other uses. + +Added tilde ('~') output option as part of the -o* specification of +rtrace. This permits ray trees to be parsed more easily in binary +output mode, as needed by rtcontrib. + +Implemented Russian roulette ray termination with -lr <= 0. +Made -lr -10 the default in rtcontrib. + +Made rtcontrib -f option search RAYPATH directories. + +Made it so -o option of rtcontrib can pipe -o output to a command. + +Added -if and -of options to total for binary i/o (following rcalc mold). + +Switched default options in rtrace to use Russian roulette. (Rpict and rvu +still use biased ray termination.) + +Added rtcontrib -r option to recover partial output. + +Added -u rendering option for pure Monte Carlo sampling. +(Got rid of -DMC compile option, which this makes superfluous.) + +Changed -t option of rlam to accept strings as well as single characters. + +Fixed bug in rcalc with -l option where it would sometimes go into an +infinite loop. + +Fixed truly ancient bug in bounding box computation for cones, which +could (and did) cause missing segments. + +Added -z option to normtiff to output LZW-compressed files. + +Last change to total causes it to produce results when it sees an empty +line on the input. This was not intentional, but I decided I like this +behavior so I documented it rather than changing it. + +===================== +Version 3.8 + +Fixed Russian roulette ray termination, which was doing the opposite of +what it should have been doing, resulting in overestimated values below +minimum ray sampling weight (serious). + +Changed mksource to use 98th percentile (rather than 99th) for threshold. + +(Above changes included in 3.7.1 patch release.) + +Eliminated writing of EXPOSURE= line in ra_tiff -r when source TIFF +does not have STONITS set. + +Fixed bug in ambient calculation that caused black values for multiple +bounces in some scenes. Thanks to Mark Stock for creating and sharing +the sophisticated test scene that demonstrated this problem. + +Fixed bug in antimatter using Russian Roulette sampling. + +(Above changes included in 3.7.2 patch release 22 Aug 2005.) + +Created fieldcomb script to combine alternate fields in a rendering +sequence. (Development generously sponsored by Iebele Abel.) + +Added missing preload of mesh objects for more efficient memory use +during parallel rendering -- this was a serious oversight. + +Created ran2tiff program to automate exposure setting of animation +sequences using a moving histogram in combination with pcond, and +converting frames to TIFF. + +Eliminated SPEED macro from makeall and source tree. + +Added -pj option to vwrays to allow jittering of sample locations. + +Fixed bug in rtcontrib where it occasionally missed writing the +final bin file. (Pretty serious, actually.) + +Added -Dfseeko=fseek to MACH= line for linux, as fseeko(3) seems to be +broken in current versions of Linux. (Need to remove this later.) + +Rearranged struct's for better efficiency on 64-bit architectures. + +Added -i option to rlam so it works with binary input formats. + +Added rtcontrib -bn option to specify number of bins and fixed bug +in recovery of files containing multiple values per record. + +Added rtcontrib -fo option to write over existing files, which it now +refuses to do without this option. + +Made rtcontrib flush output when handed a zero-length ray vector, +to match behavior of rtrace. + +Improved color scale for falsecolor output. + +Added threshold test for Fresnel approximation to prevent its use +on smooth surfaces with unrealistically low specularities (less than 1.8%). +Water has a specular reflectance of 2.1% at room temperture. + +Removed NICE macro settings in rpict and rtrace, which was slowing down +the processes under Mac OS X (10.4) by about 60% due to processor napping. + +Made xform, replmarks and rad2mgf handle quoted modifiers and names properly. + +Fixed problem in genblinds, where it was generating slats that were too +wide with the +/-r option. (Thanks to Helena Buelow-Huebe for discovering +this bug.) + +Fixed bug in ra_ppm for 16-bit/sample i/o, where it was getting the byte +order wrong (apparently). + +Added -V option to rtcontrib to report actual contributions, rather than +just ray coefficients. + +Fixed bug in ranimate that caused it to fail in continuation of renderings. + +Renamed librt.a to librtrad.a, to avoid conflict on Solaris. Almost +everything now gets linked to -lrtrad instead of -lrt. + +Fixed problem with large sample sets, so -u+ option now is truly random. +Thanks to Rick Mistrick and Younju Yoon for identifying this problem, +which was related to a poorly designed hash function. + +Changed -u+ to be the default setting in rtrace (only). + +Fixed binary i/o for rlam and vwrays under Windows. + +Added tmCvLums() to tone-mapping routines using a 16-bit lookup table +on IEEE floats, which is also used to improve speed of COLOR conversions, +especially on machines with slow log() calls. The first call to +tmCvLums(), tmCvGrays(), or tmCvColors() initializes the table. + +Created optics2rad.csh script to convert from Optics 5 material output +to something correct for Radiance. Built on old glazing.cal function, +which is actually incorrect so removed from the distribution. + +Fixed nuisance bug in ximage under some SGI machines that caused it to +choose an inappropriate visual and display incorrect colors. (Thanks +to Oskar Itzinger for debugging the problem.) + +Fixed long-standing inaccuracy of pcompos -t and +t thresholding options. + +Fixed bug in handling of views with tabs rather than spaces. + +Fixed bug related to alias of alias. + +****** COMPATIBILITY CHANGE ******** +Changed default sky turbidity in gensky from the original default of +2.75 to the CIE 110-1994 standard value of 2.45. Thanks to Marilyne +Anderson of MIT for pointing out this discrepancy. + +Added -o option to ra_xyze to produce original pixel values. + +Fixed bug in tracing of virtual sources, where intervening glazing was +not being accounted for properly. + +Added -h option to pcompos and pcomb to eliminate verbose headers. + +===================== +Version 3.9 + +Added -spec option to falsecolor to restore original spectral color scale. +Also added "-s auto" option to automatically set the maximum value. + +Added byte-swapping input and output to rcalc. + +Additional error-checking for source surfaces. + +Re-fixed bug in octree code that caused it to allocate 8 times as +much memory as it actually used(!) -- this was pointed out way back +in 1999 by Erik Reinhard and Erik Jansen, but the fix they gave me +got lost in the slightly broken release process at the time. This +should make a big difference in memory usage, especially for the +new mesh primitive. (I measured 30% less memory usage.) + +Corrected ray weights for material mixtures. + +Reduced the default -n setting for obj2mesh to take better advantage +of the smaller octree structure size. + +Fixed bug in shadow cache where it was adding surfaces with antimatter +holes cut in them to the obstructor list. Thanks to John Mardaljevic +for discovering and reporting the problem. + +Adding ability in mkillum to incorporate BSDF data in calculation. +Internal interface (raypcalls) now used in place of rtrace process(es). + +Fixed pixel alignment in pcomb for size reduction and enlargement. + +Allow rtcontrib user to set -P and -PP options for persistent rendering. +The only caveat is that -n setting > 1 requires -PP rather than -P. + +Added -c option to rtcontrib to facilitate cumulative calculations. + +Added ability to incorporate LBNL Window 6 bidirectional scattering +distribution function (BSDF) data in mkillum. + +****** COMPATIBILITY CHANGE ******** +Fixed long-standing bug in source.cal, which caused it to produce +reversed anisotropic photometric distributions due to the +misorientation of the y-axis. Thanks to Zack Rogers for discovering +and helping debug this problem. + +Fixed long-standing bug in replmarks, where triangles with X-side +aligned with Z-axis would cause incorrect rotations. Thanks to +Zack Rogers for finding this error. + +Added rsensor program to compute sensor signal for daylighting controls. +Funding for this component was provided by the Architectural Energy +Corporation in Boulder, CO, and directed by Zack Rogers. + +Added "planisphere" (stereographic) fisheye view type for traditional +daylighting analysis. Feature requested & explained by Axel Jacobs. + +Modified -c option to rtcontrib so it can take a number of input +rays to average over, rather than only produce a single accumulated +record (which can now be done with -c 0).