New user looking for help

[rgephart]

Hello all.  I am a potential new user and have been very impressed with what all KeyShot can do and the amazing renderings that everyone is generating.  Now to the important reason I am posting.

I work for a boat company and we do a lot of custom work on a "production level"  customers like to see exactly what they are getting before writing the check.  I am looking for a way that we can possibly draw up in CAD our interior cockpit upholstery as well as our interior cabin decor and switch out the materials as the customer requests.  We currently use NX for our CAD work and I am wondering if anyone could give me some direction as to if KeyShot is the right software for what we are looking for.  Basically I am looking to render out different shots of the interior and exterior of multiple different boats and send them off to potential as well as current customers for approval.  right now we are photoshopping everything and this, in some cases, can take hours and hours of work.  I am hoping that if the basic model is there we can just change a material and render out the images.

Thank you for any input and assistance.

Ron

[mattjgerard]

In short, yes. Keyshot will allow you to accomplish this quite well. There is some initial setup and there will be some work put into creating all the materials and fabrics that you'd want as options, but that would be the same with anything.

1) Material Libraries- You can save and organize vast amounts of material presets within Keyshot so to create variations on your models, its mostly drag and drop to swap out materials.

2) Model sets and Studios- Will allow you to organize projects per client or per model, or depending on the complexity have all the models in one document and be able to work with them all in one project.  Very flexible workflow so you can organize projects the way you want to.

3) Keyshot Configurator- While I have not dived into this personally, you can create a Keyshot project with all the various materials and colors you want, package it and send it to your client who can then download the keyshot viewer app for free and then be able to switch through all the options that you set as available.  Pretty cool "eye candy" for those high dollar clients:)

That and the availability of network rendering, 3rd party render farms, the forum here, this is a great option to do what you want to do. The biggest plus for me was that while there are a bunch of other render engine options out there, Keyshot is very focused on the hard surface texturing and lighting that the keyshot world isn't flooded with all the other 3d disciplines out there like character rigging, motion graphics, etc. You will get help on this forum from a huge range of people with awesome talents and skill.

[rgephart]

Thank you for the quick reply Matt.

This is excatly what I am looking for ...

eye candy" for those high dollar clients

and a quick turnaround.  I don't have hours to wait on renderings sometimes I am sitting with clients and they want to see their new boat asap.

I have some knowledge of the other softwares out there, 3DSMax, Maya, etc ....  and am looking for something a little less "advanced" if that makes sense.

[rgephart]

this is a photo of a interior of a boat cockpit that I am looking to duplicate in rendering with the ability to switch out the material in the upholstery.

[Eric Summers]

Studios and Multi-Materials will definitely be your friend. You can have a whole list of materials assigned to a certain piece of geometry and then create a different Studio for each material option. The addition of Studios in KS7 was a game changer for me. As Matt said, it's a flexible workflow and personally it allows me to condense every possible rendering of a particular unit into one KeyShot file in a logical way. I could go on about Studios for quite a while, but I'll just stop here 

[Furniture_Guy]

Dude, KeyShot was made for you...

When dealing with upholstery, be sure to check out Esben Oxholm video to minimize seams:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mubi6zVbMCg

And remember, KeyShot is all about the number of processor cores!

Perry (Furniture_Guy)

[mattjgerard]

This would be the point to propose that you obtain the most beastly computer you can get the bosses to put out for. Keyshot is all CPU based rendering, so if you have people there looking over your shoulder, then you will want something pretty powerful.

You won't be walking with photreal shots in minutes, and depending on materials and lighting, for more complicated shots I can let my 2500x2500 images cook for an hour or so and come away with pretty good results. And that is with cloudy plastics, practical lights and transparency that has to be calculated.

Keyshot is by far the easiest  3d imaging system to get into and get some pretty good results right off the bat, then as you learn more about lighting and matierials it only gets better  from there. Sure, maybe the other render engines might be able to get you a better image, but there will be a HUGE penalty in terms of learning curve and render time. Coming from one of those not mentioned, just figuring out how it all worked, and why something so simple took forever to render made the jump to Keyshot such a pleasure./

Go play with the demo of VRAY Arnold or Octane, then play with keyshot. Its night and day in user experience and so similar in end results for the types of scenes we use it was a no-brainer.

[mattjgerard]

this is a photo of a interior of a boat cockpit that I am looking to duplicate in rendering with the ability to switch out the material in the upholstery.

If you post the CAD I"ll bet you get someone  to render something pretty up right quick _

[rgephart]

Okay I'll ask then,  what is the best way to go about learning KeyShot?  Not really sure I have time to teach myself. 

[rgephart]

This would be the point to propose that you obtain the most beastly computer you can get the bosses to put out for. Keyshot is all CPU based rendering, so if you have people there looking over your shoulder, then you will want something pretty powerful.

Currently machine -
MacBook Pro (15-inch, 2016)
2.9 GHz Intel Core i7
16 GB 2133 MHz LPDDR3
Radeon Pro 460 4096 MB
Intel HD Graphics 530 1536 MB

Does this seem sufficient for starting out or do I need to look at something more powerful.  I would love to be able to talk them into a new iMac Pro 

[mattjgerard]

This would be the point to propose that you obtain the most beastly computer you can get the bosses to put out for. Keyshot is all CPU based rendering, so if you have people there looking over your shoulder, then you will want something pretty powerful.

Currently machine -
MacBook Pro (15-inch, 2016)
2.9 GHz Intel Core i7
16 GB 2133 MHz LPDDR3
Radeon Pro 460 4096 MB
Intel HD Graphics 530 1536 MB

Does this seem sufficient for starting out or do I need to look at something more powerful.  I would love to be able to talk them into a new iMac Pro 

Well, one way is  to show up at RenderWorld in  Huntington Beach CA May 21-22. Tons of information there, at least that's what I'm hoping , I'll be there for the first time.

There are  options for online training, Luxion  can do one on one i think, tons of Youtube stuff, lots of webinars. There might be local user groups, but I'm not sure if Ive ever seen any classes or stuff like that.

There are some here that have gotten the new iMac Pro and are fairly happy with it. I think if you paired it with a good render machine you could make a good setup.  You could certainly render on that machine as well. Learning on the  laptop would be good, that's the same laptop I have , but mines a 2015.

[Speedster]

Welcome to KeyShot and to the Forum!

There are important things to understand about using KeyShot.

I'm a 10 year power user, and here's a few tips...

KeyShot is VERY simple to use on the surface, but has incredible depth when or if you need it.  90% of your needs can be done right out of the box, with a minimal learning curve.  I have an associate who created an ad print ready rendering in 15 minutes after installing KS.

Absolutely do not be afraid or embarrassed to post any question here on the Forum, and always understand there is no such thing as a dumb question- only dumb answers!  We are an amazing global community, speaking many languages, but the one we all speak is KeyShot.  We're ALL here to help, as we have all been helped along the way. You won't find any back-stabbing crap here!  I usually check in three or more times a day, and even with my experience, never a day goes by that I don't learn an amazing trick.

Okay I'll ask then,  what is the best way to go about learning KeyShot?  Not really sure I have time to teach myself.

Push the computer "on" button.  Log in if necessary.  Open KeyShot.  Drag in an assembly.  Select an environment from the library, and do a rough setup.  Open the Materials library and select appropriate materials for a specific part or parts. Adjust camera and environment.  Click Render.  Get a cup of coffee.  Done!  You've just learned KeyShot!  Reading the manual helps!

Sounds like I'm joking, but not really. And there are many excellent videos on the KS website and YouTube.  Some of our Forum members offer training, and Esben Oxholm is among the best.  http://esbenoxholm.dk/

Now, here's the biggie for me at least, and it sounds like you're in the same "boat".  Many of my clients are ad or marketing agencies, or internal versions of same.  We often create an entire program on-line using one of the meeting programs like join.me or Go to Meeting.  I usually create a preliminary rig based on discussion, using their or my model depending, including materials, environment and the like.  Then, in an on-line conference, we slam away.  I first select "Save Camera with Screenshot" in Preferences.  When they like what they see I snap a screenshot (bottom right of the window), and we move on.  Then off-line I go back in and render them out.  This sometimes takes several tries, but it's amazingly fast and efficient!  And the client has a strong buy-in to boot!

Whatever you do, go for as many CPU's as you can jam in!  I run an expensive 32 core (64 hyperthreaded) BOXX workstation, which is blazingly fast at rendering.  And it's five years old!

Bottom line- we're here to help, so ask away!  Your success is our success!

Bill G
www.GouldStudios.com

[theAVator]

I definitely think you need a new computer...     

Most likely wouldn't need to get started, but hey, why not?

[rgephart]

Thanks to all for the input and suggestions.  I will for sure be digging into KeyShot more and giving it a try. I'll be around asking lots of questions I'm sure.