Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!epicb!billr
From: billr@truevision.com (Bill Romanowski)
Newsgroups: comp.graphics
Subject: RenderMen unite!
Message-ID: <1991Jan7.234121.25040@truevision.com>
Date: 7 Jan 91 23:41:21 GMT
Organization: Truevision Inc., Indianapolis, IN
Lines: 47



In an attempt to correct some of the mis-info 
posted about my pal (and yours) RenderMan....

 - WireMan??  -- cute name but no such animal
 you mean VectorMan ... a Pixar preview renderer
that displays a rib (render(man?) interface bytestream)
file in wireframe for previews. There was some mention
of real-time vs. not... I've not yet seen an Interactive
real-time RenderMan (or even close to it). I have seen
many implementions of the renderer that are quite far from
real-time ...MacRenderMan comes to mind...
The new product from Pixar for the Mac is ShowPlace. 
Neat Program,beautiful..everything you want in a modeler
except modeling...

Autodesk's 3DStudio does not (in this 1.0 release i have) use
RenderMan in any way. 3DS uses it's own renderer (a pretty ok
one..not much faster that RMan on an equal machine). Maybe
we'll see rib file out from 3DS in the future. Cool but somewhat
VGA-ISH product.

If you want RenderMan from Autodesk you want the AutoShade(2?) product.
AutoShade takes one "scene" from Autocad and produces a .rib
file which you can then render the frame on your 386/486 with Pixar's 
"PhotoRealistic RenderMan" (included with Autoshade).

You can also get 386/486 "PhotoRealistic RenderMan" bundled with
FastCad3D from Evolution Technologies (Tempe AZ.) a nice NURB-ish
modeler at a good price. 

Pixar will sell you developers RenderMan for 386/486 for ~$2500.00
or for sparc or sgi or others for a bit more (or not) and you may 
then be entitled to talk to Dr. Bill which is in itself a $2500 value).
Developers RenderMan means renderer,shader compiler,file utilities,the
mysterious linkable renderer, tutorials and documentation.
You get about the same thing in Autoshade and FastCad3D 'cept 
tutorials,libraries and in-depth doc's.

but I know what you REALLY want to run PhotoRealistic RenderMan ....
I've got one right here but that would be not-nice-net-manners to talk
about it in public so I won't.


Bill Romanowski
code mule