Render Display

Provides options for moving image processing settings between the render output and the Render Display window.

• Copy From Scene: If adjustments we're made to the render output options after the rendered image is complete, the Copy from Scene option grabs those settings, updating the options of the Render Display window to match.

• Paste to Scene: Any adjustments made to the rendered image within the Render Display window do not apply to subsequent renders, as the Render Display window reverts to the settings of the Render Item. The Paste to Scene option copies the settings to the render output back to the scene, applying it to all subsequent renders.

• Reset: This option returns all image adjustment options to their default values.

Disables/enables the application of all the image adjustments options in the Render Display window only, especially useful in seeing the effects of the applied adjustments.

In photography, when a very bright part of an image neighbors a very dark part, the bright part appears to glow, this phenomenon is known as Bloom. Modo's Bloom simulates this effect by removing excess energy from a pixel and distributes it around to its neighbors. This checkbox enables the effect, once checked, two additional options become available. Values can be adjusted, providing near real-time feedback in the Render Display window.

Sets the lower threshold to which pixels are effected by Bloom. When set to 100%, only the hottest specular highlights bloom, where at 0% every pixel in the scene receives the effect. For examples, see the Open topic with navigation topic of the documentation.

Sets the distance that energy is distributed, in effect controlling the size of the glow. 2% is the default value. Larger radius' impart and ethereal look to the rendered image. For examples, see the Open topic with navigation topic of the documentation.

In photography, vignetting is the natural reduction of the brightness of an image toward the outer edges of the frame. The Vignette Amount in Modo, when set at 100% is a physically accurate vignette simulation, based on the camera's focal length and film size. Values above 100% darken the resulting vignette, and values below 100% reduce its visibility.

Several types of feedback displays are offered, providing you with a means to analyze values in an impartial way when making adjustments.

• Waveform: Displays the amount of energy at each intensity level as a series of vertical strips. Especially useful for detecting crushed shadows or blown out highlights across a wide area of an image, or for checking how evenly the overall tonal range is used in a given image.

• Vectorscope: Displays the amount of energy across the hue and saturation spectrum within a unit circle of colors. Especially useful for checking overall color balance or to examine the amount of saturation for a given range of color.

• Hue & Saturation Parade: A side-by-side variation of the Waveform display, but for the amount of energy in hue or saturation instead of overall intensity.

This option allows you to choose which particular channel information contributes to the monitor displays. Entire images (Colors), or individual channels (Red, Green & Blue), or image brightness information (Luminosity).

Multiplies the displayed brightness of the monitor to make it easier to view intensity levels for under-sampled areas of the image.

Allows you to set the range of the monitor(s) to values other than the default 0 to 1 range.

Slides all color values up or down the value scale, shifting them identical amounts in the rendered image. For example, if an image has a 0% black pixel and a 50% gray pixel, offsetting the values 50% results in the black pixel changing to 50% gray and the gray pixel changing to 100% white with all other values changing with the corresponding amounts.

Specifies the radiance or luminance level that corresponds to pure black in the final rendered image (a pixel color value of 0.0).

NOTE:  To use the input level controls effectively, Clamp Colors must be disabled.

A non-linear luminance adjustment that applies a curve-like function to the pixels, modifying the mid-range the most while attenuating the adjustment amount for values moving toward the defined Black and White points. Values above 1.0 lighten the mid-range, while values below 1.0 darken the mid-range.

Specifies the radiance or luminance level that corresponds to pure white in the final rendered image (a pixel color value of 1.0).

NOTE:  To use the input level controls effectively, Clamp Colors must be disabled.

Dynamic range is measured as the difference between the darkest shadow to the brightest highlight in an image. Most image formats' dynamic range pale in comparison to that of the world around us. Much in the same way that a photographer struggles to capture all of the range our eyes can see, you may find your renders have shadow areas that are too dark, and highlight areas that are too bright. Luckily, Modo renders in full floating point accuracy, providing dynamic range well beyond what any monitor is capable of displaying. This allows you to modify the overall tonal balance of the rendered image in several ways, including Tone Mapping, a technique used to compress the rendered dynamic range into something viewable; shadows and highlights open revealing previously obscured details. To use this function, Clamp Colors must be disabled. Often, it takes a combination of settings for white level, tone mapping and gamma to achieve the best results. For further examples, see Tone Mapping.

Adjusts the color values of the rendered image independently of the luminosity or brightness values, shifting them across the entire spectrum in a sequential fashion, for example when shifting a red color, moving the values in a positive fashion adjusts reds toward an orange hue, then yellow, and so on. The hue values are like a wheel, where a rotation of 180° inverts all the color values and a rotation of 360° brings them back to their initial state.

Introduces an overall color tint into an image. This can be purely for artistic reasons, but can also be helpful in reversing color casts introduced by image-based lighting among other things. You only need to define a color with which to tint, by setting a Target Color and then adjusting the Colorization amount determining the strength of the color into the image. A value of 0% produces no colorization attenuating toward 100% where the image is replaced fully by the target color.

Specifies the color with which to tint the rendered image when the Colorization option is above 0%.

Controls the concentration or amount of color in an image independent of the luminosity of brightness. At 100%, colors are fully saturated as defined in the item's material settings, reducing the value reduces the overall color saturation down to a value of 0%, producing an image only with gray shades. Since Modo renders in full 32bit floating point accuracy, values above 100% increase saturation without introducing the color banding and artifacts generally associated with oversaturating images.

Histogram: a graphical display that shows the distribution of values across the spectrum of the image. Think of it like a graph of how many values each individual shade has, useful in subjectively determining whether an image is neutral, low key, high contrast or otherwise.

RGB Parade: Where the Histogram shows overlays of individual channels, the RGB Parade shows each individual R, G and B channel side by side, providing a clearer view of each channel's individual contribution to the final image.

Allows you to choose which particular channel information contributes to the monitor's display. Entire images (Colors), combination of all or individual channels (RGB, Red, Green & Blue), or image brightness information (Luminosity).

Allows you to set the range of the monitor to values other than the default 0 to 1 range.

Determines the output value of what is considered fully black in the image. Adjusting the value upwards changes the Black point to a shade of gray. As values are adjusted, intermediate values between black and white are adjusted as well.

Determines the output value of what is considered fully white in the image. Adjusting the value downwards changes the White point to a shade of gray. As values are adjust, intermediate values between white and black are adjusted as well.

Controls the amount of gamma applied to the rendered image, for both display and when the image is saved. It can be used as an image adjustment control to lighten or darken the image without the need to externally adjust it in an external bitmap editor. The gamma adjustment is non-linear and affects the mid-tones of the image greater than the shadow and highlight areas of the image. For best results, leave the gamma value at the default 1.0.

Determines which opposing images are compared.

• None: No image comparison

• "B" Slot: Two separate images are compared, Slot A is determined by the current image selected in the browser, Slot B is determined by holding the Ctrl key and clicking on a second image slot in the browser. A small A and B icon appears beneath each image, signifying which is which.

• "A" Slot Output- With this option, you can compare between associated 'Passes' or 'Render Outputs' of the same image.

When the "A" Slot Output option is selected, you can determine which particular Pass output to compare against with this option.

When the "A" Slot Output option is selected, you can determine which particular Render Output to compare against with this option.

Disables/enables the application of all the image adjustment options in the Render Display window.

Calculates the pixel variance between the two images and displays it as a grayscale image. Black indicates no difference between the two pixels, attenuating toward white, which indicates the maximum difference. The amount of difference displayed can be scaled (using the Difference Scale option, which is only visible when Difference is activated) This is mostly for high dynamic range images, but in some cases it provides a better indication of dramatic or subtle differences. The difference calculation is simply the same math used to determine the difference between two numbers (subtracting one value from the other). Each of the available options displays the difference between the two images for the chosen aspect, such as the difference between the Hue of both images, or the difference of the Saturation amount. Utilizing the Difference option can be especially helpful in pinpointing subtle differences between two similar images.

Several modes define how the two images are compared, each with additional options.

• Wipe: Two images are overlaid and the top image is wiped away, revealing the lower image. Additional options allow you to select Horizontal or Vertical wiping directions and set a position percent, or choose the Dissolve option and set an Opacity amount.

• Spotlight: Reveals the B images as a circle around the mouse pointer (move the mouse over the image to see its results). The size of the circle is determined by the Spotlight Radius control.

• Side by Side: Displays two half-width images that you can scrolled with an option to stack the images vertically.

When enabled, you can drag directly over the rendered image to define the limited region area interactively. Subsequently, once the initial area is defined, edges and corners of the region highlight, allowing you to further refine the defined region. Click and drag the highlighted border to adjust.

If edits are made to the same scene, the area outside the defined region is used as a background to successive renders until disabled. When switching between scenes or image resolutions, the background area outside the region simply renders as black.

Temporarily enables/disables the limited region functionality without losing any of the settings.

These settings specify the total rendered region width and height.

All resulting rendered images are generated as standard RGB bitmap format images. For diagnostic purposes, it may be useful to see the individual Red, Green or Blue color channels of an image.

When enabled, individual channels display as colored versions of themselves. When disabled, individual channels display as grayscale representations.

When enabled, any loaded images that contain an alpha/transparency channel display a gray checkerboard where the image is transparent mimicking a similar option found in many image-editing applications.

NOTE:  This option doesn't apply to internally rendered alpha channels.

When enabled, a diagonal black and white stripe pattern (called a zebra pattern) displays over overexposed or blown out areas of the image, providing useful feedback for adjusting image white point and tone mapping an image to compress as much dynamic range information as possible.

For scanline televisions (older tube televisions) there were originally two half frames that made up each whole frame, interlaced on top of each other to make a single image. Enabling the Field Rendering option in Render Item: Settings properly renders two discreet moments in time and interlace the resulting half-frames into a single image (in essence doubling the frame rate). The Fields option allows you to independently display either the Upper or Lower field, or Both, which is the standard default for non-interlaced (progressive) frames.

When viewing individual fields, enabling the Field Doubling option duplicates every other line, eliminating the black screen lines from the display.

When loading non-HDR image formats into the Render Window Image Browser panel, this is the default gamma value applied to the imported image.

This value determines the maximum number of frame buffers (renders) saved on disc in the Image Browser. Once this value is exceeded, the oldest render gets deleted, unless locked. If all frames are locked, then they are treated as if all were unlocked once the maximum number is met. This option is not affected by images loaded into the browser.