General Features

Easy to use, works seamlessly inside Rhino, and provides a host of features that speed and simplify image rendering.

Uses both raytracing and radiosity to create sophisticated single-frame images and animations.

Automatically calculates indirect light, hard and soft shadows, color bleeding, reflections, translucency, transparency, refraction, highlight, depth of field, and depth attenuation.

Supports multiprocessors and background processing.

Includes mathematically generated 3-D plants with seasonal variation, giving realistic plants, shadows, and reflections.

Works inside Rhino. Render changes to the model immediately. You never need to export or start over.

Includes radiosity technology providing unrivaled image quality and accuracy.

Interactive raytrace and radiosity rendering.

Quick raytrace rendering option with reflections, transparency, and shadows.

Progressive-refinement rendering algorithms with on-screen preview.

Interactive radiosity solution using OpenGL.

Render a partial window.

Save and restore plant, exposure, sun and sky, and environment settings.

Save and restore radiosity solutions with the model.

Batch rendering through scripts.

Multiprocessor support.

Background processing.

Graphical library browsers for materials and plants.

Comprehensive full-color PDF documentation and on-line, context-sensitive help.

Piranesi EPix support.

RPC 3.0 support.

Post-processing for quick adjustment of fog, glare, glow, wireframe, and depth of field.

 Image Quality

Combine raytracing and radiosity for highest quality images. Calculates light, shadows, materials, transparency, diffusion, reflection, refraction, highlight, angular blend, and ClearFinish™ from surface properties. Flamingo’s accurate lighting model produces sophisticated effects and high-quality images.

True specular reflection and transparency.

Shadow casting from all light sources.

Soft shadow edges, blurry reflection and translucency.

Refraction.

Depth of field.

Depth attenuation for transparent materials.

Antialiasing with extensive user control.

24- or 32-bit color output (16.7 million colors plus alpha channel).

Any resolution up to 16,000 by 16,000.

 Environment

Background options include solid color, gradient colors, and image map

Library of background images.

Ground plane with materials.

Procedural clouds.

Ambient light.

Haze.

Reflected environment.

Light dome.

Alpha channel background.

HDR image background.

Sun and sky settings.

 Lighting

Directional, point, spot, linear, rectangular, and goniometric lights, sun, ground, and sky.

Unlimited number of lights.

Physically-based light sources and illumination algorithms.

Manufacturers photometric (IES) data supported for light fixtures.

Accurate daylight simulation (sun, sky, ground, and cloud cover components).

Sun angle specified by latitude, month, time of day.

Maps and city lists to select geographical location.

Exact solar time calculator.

Graphical adjustment of spot focus for spot lights.

Shadow casting on/off by object.

Adjustable light color in RGB or degrees Kelvin.

Intensity specified in watts.

Global illumination with light dome or HDR image.

 Materials

Extensive materials library.

Multiple library support.

Assign materials by layer or object.

Interactive material editor with “live” raytraced preview of several materials at the same time.

Physically-based material properties.

Properties include reflectivity, transparency, highlight, and index of refraction.

Depth attenuation control for transparent materials.

Customizable 2- and 3-D procedural textures, including marble, granite, wood, tile, mask, angular blend, ClearFinish and blend.

Complex materials with multiple procedural textures.

3-D procedural bump maps, including fine and coarse textures and waves.

RGB and HSB color systems.

Extensive bitmap support.

Support for TGA, BMP, PCX, PNG, TIF, and JPEG file formats.

Color, transparency, and bump mapping.

Tiled, decal, and background bitmaps.

Planar, cylindrical, spherical, and u/v projections for decals.

Multiple bitmaps per object.

Color exclusion with sensitivity setting.

Adjustable transparency.

Drag and drop material to objects and layers.

 Landscaping

Extensive library with hundreds of fractal-generated 3-D plants including wet and dry climate plants, cold and warm climate plants, groundcover, and house plants.

Bitmap mask foliage geometry.

Library browser with multiple previews.

Generated from simple wireframe objects at render time.

Specify size by height or trunk diameter.

Pruning tools for removing lower branches.

Foliage density control globally or by plant.

Polygon groundcover.

Seasonal controls.

Interactive plant editor for creating or modifying plants.