How to Render in ACES! | Maya / Arnold

[@marioCazares]

I just recently started diving into ACES and specifically wanting to know the cg lighting workflow for it so this is perfect thank you!

[@inuyasha561]

This is such an awesome video. this has helped me out so much Arvid!

[@hashemalshaer]

Thank you for the video, I saw it recently and I simply wanted to roll down all the cases which we may have to deal with in Maya with Arnold, maybe correcting one or two of the ones you mentioned in your video: For linear images such as EXR and HDRI, we use as IDT in Arnold: Utility-Linear-sRGB For 8-16 color based images such as color and Albedo and Most textures you download from the internet are going to be in the sRGB color space, which you’ll see in OCIO as: “Utility - sRGB - Texture”. For gray images or Utilities such as Metallic, Bumb, Displacement, Normal we use: Utility-Raw or in another reference, we consider them linear images and use: Utility-linear-sRGB For light maps and Mattes, we use: Utility-Rec 709- Camera For images which are already converted to AcesCG, we use AcesCG I hope that makes sense

[@ziadramman]

what about gloss and refl maps? are those also utility-raw?

[@hashemalshaer]

​@@ziadramman I guess yes, like Metallic and Bumb

[@Yamagatabr]

It does make sense and seems right, but still the “Utility - sRGB - Texture” color shift the internet textures a Lot. And it seems that in Maya 2023 they simplified all of the options to just: "sRGB" for the color and 8bit textures "Scene linear rec709" for HDRIs "RAW" for the utility textures The sRGB still color shifts the textures. And it now have a "Invert View" option to make them look corect, but give you a warning, and seems to be out of purpose. EDIT: the purpose of making them darker is to allow you to give the light stronger values, as the Aces color system gives "more headroom" in the highlighs. It is a bit strange, the colors do end up looking more saturated but maytbe it is it's current intent, and maybe if this colorspace is more adopted we may have less problem in the use of textures.

[@steppingstone9699]

in my maya 2022 utility SRGB is missing do you kno why?

[@katermurr]

Finally a simple and straight forward explanation.thanks!

[@biogenicdesign]

Arvid, just double checked with OCIO guidelines. To convert data passes / displacement / roughness, need to use "Utility > RAW" and not "Utility > Linear > sRGB"; it probably won't have too big of a difference

[@arvidurs]

Yeah that is correct - Utiliy Linear sRGB will apply a minor transformation. RAW will just not touch your passes. Thanks for double checking

[@svivan20]

Thank you for that double check! Also Include hdr files to that list.

[@CassetteMelody]

Hi, @10:45 your Mixing Color Space is set to "Utility - sRGB - Texture" I can't seem to change this setting. My Mixing Color Space is set to "Output - Rec.709". When I select mid grey (0.5) I get a value of .275 when unchecking "color management" In my Color Management Preferences I have the aces_1.1 config loaded My Rendering Space is set to ACES - ACEScg View Transform is set to sRGB (ACES) Rule Priority is "Default" and my Input Color Space is "Utility - Linear - sRGB" Where am I going wrong?

[@CassetteMelody]

for anyone running into this issue just edit your OCIO config just replace "Output - Rec.709" with "Utility - sRGB - Texture" where mixing color space is displayed

[@dominikraskin]

@@CassetteMelody How do you edit OCIO config exactely? thx

[@vikrantsingh7636]

I can't seem to find all these options in my Maya - utility linear sRGB and stuff. Idk what to do

[@boneivory2020]

I'm loving the new intro Arvid ! Also amazing content as usual

[@arvidurs]

Glad you like it :) more content to come

[@gregmassie7666]

Great stuff as usual Arvid!

[@ahmednna201177]

Well done, the blog is also amazing suggestion ty

[@MeshmenStudio]

Great tut Arvid, love the intro. Keep it up

[@Come0ndeath]

@Arvid Schneider I've done everything you said except when I use Arnold Render View to take a look at working renders it doesn't seem to be correcting it and the colors are super flat. Do I need to do some kind of setting to make sure the Arnold render view is applying a transform/lut so I can actually view my renders in progress?

[@monocore]

Arvid, unrelated question. When I re import an sRGB 16 bit png sequence from an ACES script (rendered as Output sRGB) in nuke, it looks darker than the same output before writing it out. What am I doing wrong? The png sequence is read as Utility sRGB Texture color space.

[@sajans3998]

so if i import the rendered exr file to photoshop to composite,should i convert it into srgb?

[@arvidurs]

Yeah - PS does not have a good color management system. I would recommend compositing in nuke or similar

[@bhagyeshthanekar4516]

Just one request. Can you please zoom the video if possible when you change the attributes? : )

[@arvidurs]

Yes! I usually change my DPI settings. But it’s recorded in 4K you should be able to see every detail

[@TheFunDimension]

@@arvidurs No in mobile. Do everything always assuming people are watching you on a phone.

[@aliengalaxy6096]

Hi Arvid! Just to make it clear, which color settings should I use for these files? - EXR 32bit Displacement bake from ZBrush - Photoshop color texture - Normal map - Black and white roughness or metalness texture - famous HDR maps like Tomoco Studio.exr

[@arvidurs]

In the same order: Utility Raw sRgb Texture Utility Raw Utility Raw Utility linear srgb

[@arvidurs]

Just to clarify this can also be different depending on how you export them

[@aliengalaxy6096]

@@arvidurs thanks for your answer! so you means "sRGB Texture" = "Utility sRGB Texture"?

[@RahulSaraiya]

Can someone please answer these 2 questions? 1 -How do you use IDT? 2 -I'm using a default Arnold config (ACES 1.0 SDR-video (sRGB)). When I do test renders in Maya's render viewer. The colors look correct but when I render it exr(dwaa compression), my renders look all washed out and desaturated? Is there a step I'm missing? Does something need to change for my batch renders to match my viewport renders?

[@bojanduric_art]

Hi Arvid, thank you so much for making these videos got me into ACES but i bumped into this when i follow your ACES workflow this is the message i get every time when open maya with ACES workflow setup " Color Managment There is one missing color space used in the scene that is not defined in the selected transform collection.

[@arvidurs]

It just means that you have file nodes in your scene - which have a transform set which is not available. What you can do is open Maya CM prefs, and apply scene rules. This should resolve the error

[@bojanduric_art]

thank you Arvid will try your suggestion

[@bojanduric_art]

@@arvidurs Hi Arvid following your suggestion it did solve the issue to a point but still experiencing massive slowdowns and constant freezes from using ACES workflow in maya and constantly getting this message // Warning: file: C:/Program Files/Autodesk/Maya2019/scripts/startup/colorManagementUtilities.mel line 262: Color space "sRGB" in node . Did you experience this issue by any time ?

[@indexMemories]

This video is a godsend. Thank you. The book is massive help in understanding post.

[@lugerginyu]

How do I set the mixing color space for solid colors? I can only choose rec. 709...

[@arvidurs]

Great question! You would need to edit the config file which comes with aces 1.1 and change the picking role to the one you’d like. You can find more info on that in the link in the description

[@amitgedia]

Hi Arvid can you quickly mention the ACES setup for Vray 5 and 3dsmax if possible. Thanks in advance

[@arvidurs]

i'm not doing any vray videos

[@detono]

Hello, I am wondering if I want to use an image background ( currently is a .jpg). I would have to convert it to acesCg first in order to see it properly ? or there is a way to do it in maya ? anyone knows ?

[@lugerginyu]

Hey Arvid. Great video. How do i get the config file for Aces 1.1? I can't find on the ocio website

[@lugerginyu]

Nevermind. Found it. Here's the link for anybody's who's interested: github.com/colour-science/OpenColorIO-Configs/tree/07ed7c962f1018cdd9d3ad7ebe019c966d9fa0e3

[@hemantdoke9831]

@@lugerginyu Hi Arlandah this link is not working properly, is it possible for you to mail or share a link with me only the ACES 1.1 and 1.2 folder? I will be thankful to you.

[@biogenicdesign]

Arvid thank you! Could you please elaborate - how come in one example you have "Color Management" on when you change grey color to 0.5; then in another example you say "disable "Color Management" checkbox and you say "we need to work in the rendering space". Could you please clarify, got confused there

[@arvidurs]

Serjan Burlak sometimes I want to set the color in srgb space. Which is essentially what your eye sees. But sometimes I want to set values in rendering space. For instance measured albedo values etc. that’s why I changed it

[@steppingstone9699]

in my maya 2022 utility SRGB is missing do you kno why?

[@bikramjitroy6155]

Update to 2023

[@toluabisola]

Hi, This is great content, thanks for posting. I'm using Maya 2022 and I'm curious if this step is still necessary? By step, I mean setting up aces from the downloaded file. Any help would be greatly appreciated :)

[@arvidurs]

maya 2022 ships with aces, so no need for the environment variable or custom OCIO path steps. IDT and ODT still a thing though

[@toluabisola]

@@arvidurs Most appreciated, thanks Arvid :)

[@Nukepie]

@@arvidurs what color space should i set in maya 2022 with deafult aces, it only has Display>sRGB and Utillity>Raw. There is no Utillity>linear>Raw or Utillity>linear>sRGB etc

[@kimjongoof5000]

Is there one for blender?

[@arvidurs]

aces support yes? If I made a video for blender, no

[@LeoLeenus]

Great video! could you do a tutorial on setting up the new aces for maya for beginners?

[@arvidurs]

My previous videos has the setup for this - go check that out, and you should be more familiar

[@dauletbekishev]

Dope intro! Personally I love it! (but IMHO a bit loud... it would've been great if you considered lowering the volume juuust a little bit) In general - thank you very much for this video! You helped me to understand a few things even more! I discovered Chris Brejon's book quite a while ago and I'm re-reading it for 8th time already, progressively understanding more and more from every sentence written there. It's definitely one of the biggest findings in 2019 for me.

[@arvidurs]

I’ll pay more attention to the intro db levels. Thanks

[@okhowdy]

Hello! Is there a faster way to automate setting the colorspace IDT for textures? I thought to use the Color Management preferences, but the option to add additional rules is grayed out. It's a long list to scroll through for each individual texture setting.

[@arvidurs]

You could edit the config file and only make the ones available which you want. Or as you said create some file rules

[@DarioOrtisi]

Hi Arvid. Good explanation. I will ask to you if you can create a tutorial on using maya 2022 aces or srgb and manage the exr output in Photoshop. I know that Photoshop is not good to manage the exr, but i'm doing everytime still images. With maya 2022 i get horrible results i never understand how to solve it. Thanks

[@arvidurs]

I don't work too much in photoshop tbh - I'll probably be not a good help for you :)

[@madshader]

Would "out_srgb" be the correct ODT for "sequencer" on a standard monitor, or just use "ACES-CG"? I'm using Blender 2.93 btw.

[@MarceloSouza-wo7ue]

At 24:57 you had that jpg set as sRGB-Linear ? Is that right ? I guess 8bit(24bit) jpg are never linear, right ? I know it's a normal bump. Normals maps should never be stored as jpgs, right ? I know that in that case, the normal/bump is very less critical, but just to clarify.

[@arvidurs]

You can have linear 8 bit maps, it just means there is no gamma curve baked in

[@MarceloSouza-wo7ue]

@@arvidurs hmm. Thanks. I always have that idea that sRGB 8Bit has a gamma curve applied to it. Most of documents i search online seems to say that. I randomly googled one here -> forum.reallusion.com/PrintTopic308094.aspx

[@MarceloSouza-wo7ue]

@@arvidursSo, maybe lets say it's not typical but possible ? That article by Toadstorm touch the JPG issue saying "Your typical JPEG is also using sRGB primaries, but it has an input gamma curve of 2.2, so it’s not linear. When in doubt, if the image isn’t floating-point, use Utility - sRGB - Texture. If it is floating-point, use Utility - Linear - sRGB." That's what i always read about , that if its not floating point, is not linear, so it has a curve embed... Now i am in doubt again. lol. I know that PNGs can go over 8Bit, but there's no Float Jpgs. www.toadstorm.com/blog/?p=694&fbclid=IwAR2WQylNU_wOcIH9OHGtv0Oq3t-Sq4iVUvha2H97V9wVwtzRPfmVCxCZuHo

[@verstaerker]

thanks for the informative video Arvid! One note about the sound .. you should put a highpassfilter at 80 Hz on your mic , there's often some deep rumbling going on

[@arvidurs]

Great advice! Will do. Only in my most recent I added some audio filter. Thanks!

[@gorkyable]

Hey Arvid, in your last tutorial you converted the texture to ACES-CG but here you directly using default IDT like utility-linier-srgb or utility-srgb-texture... that means we need not required to convert any texture in nuke ? we can directly use appropriate IDT in maya itself ?

[@claytomcs]

related to the .TX files , lets say i havea srgb tex them convert it to .tx , when using aces shoud i use utility srgb ? ou utility linear because tx files are linearized versions of the original im wrong ?

[@arvidurs]

No the tx files are not applying a transform. What ever you specify in the IDT will be baked in to the tx. TX is just a container with several resolutions of you map

[@claytomcs]

@@arvidurs i get it now , is there a diference in rendering in aces vs rendering in linear worflow them comping in aces in nuke ?

[@arvidurs]

Claytom Ferreira yes there is a difference. Have a look at Chris Brejon website. Linked in the description. It shows the difference

[@HDGamingVelocity]

What about black & white masks coming from the internet? Should they be in utility - srgb - texture or utility - linear - srgb?

[@arvidurs]

If you want to use them as a mask, should be treated as raw. No color transforms will be applied.

[@mazi2043]

Hi Arvid can you explain what's different with Output-sRGB and Utility-sRGB-Texture?

[@arvidurs]

Afaik the output srgb will apply a slightly noticeable transform. I can find out in more detail though.

[@mazi2043]

@@arvidurs Looking forward to your new video（￣︶￣）↗

[@ViviOverclock]

Output - sRGB is used when you want to preserve brand colors and images as you see them online, he should have used this on his movie posters, because using Utility - sRGB -Texture he damanged the brand colors. There are however dangers with Output - sRGB, because 1.0/1.0/1.0 on a movie poster will be 16.3/16.3/16.3 in acesCG if you used Output - sRGB. So you have the right "look" but the colors are wack and will shoot an unnatural amount of rays back into the scene. So what you actually need to do is split the rays, have camera see Output - sRGB, but indirect rays use Utility, sRGB - Texture. Well thats my opinion anyway

[@dbharath6876]

A nice and clear tutorial on aces workflow working with srgb textures thank you sir ,but I work in a production where I get raw footages and stuff sir, so I wanna know that how to work with raw footage ,like which color space or 3d lut to apply a raw footage in RESOLVE , how to import it Maya , what if the ocio doesn't have the colorspace in aces ,so how would I work with 3rd party colorspace which are not in ocio like "black magic cine poket camera 6k" has a 3d lut called poket 6k rec 2020 gamma something , so how could I import it Maya ,does it have the support of aces .I really got stuck in between these stuff need help to get over this ,thank you

[@kirandev]

Any update? Did you find out?

[@krishnaavrilcg1136]

My monitor supports only 100%SRGB, I'm using a linear workflow from years, Can I switch to ACES workflow? Please give a complete tutorial on a shot about colorspace, I always have a blur knowledge here

[@arvidurs]

LBS FX yes! Totally

[@TristanLGChannel]

Hi Arvid, thanks for this new video and all your shared work and knowledges, you're a gold mine ! I'm happy to see you talking about Chris's book, it's also an impressive amount of knowledge, and I helped him a bit about details of his book, so I'm a bit proud :p For your intro, it's a bit fast for me, I don't really have the time to read and understand everything, as you're talking about mentorship, I think you can slow it down just a bit for a better reading :)

[@arvidurs]

Thanks for reaching out! Yes Chris's book is amazing and just gives a great understanding about the whole topic! And thanks for the feedback on the intro :) I wanted it short and snappy, as people tend to skip or get annoyed about intros

[@joekestrada9476]

GREAT VIDEO! Thanks Arvid!

[@dbharath6876]

your intro was amazing , i loved it

[@davidtriune8028]

My rendering program does not have ACES built in. However, it can output linear EXR files. Is it still possible to work in ACES colorspace with these files, through a compositing program?

[@arvidurs]

No as your image is not rendered with the wider ACES gamut.

[@RonnieMirands]

I tried the ACES workflow but didnt work for me. Saw a lot of tutors but i got a very tinted render and the metalness and roughness maps seens like are not working. I will keep trying :(

[@arvidurs]

why don't you join our discord server and I can try to help you there?

[@kishorevfxbro]

intro was awesome

[@skottyboy666]

Hey Arvid - once again amazing content - Much appreciated! I saw you dived into houdini a little while ago - Have you played around with solaris, USD, karma and the new render delegates inside houdini? And are you planning on doing more houdini tutorials in the future ?

[@arvidurs]

Yes I have - I still need to get more familiar with all that. But yes, I'm planning to do more Houdini related videos as well

[@L3nny666]

i mean you don't really need aces for clamped colors, because you can handle that with tonemapping your linear srgb output...that's basically what the ocio does in the aces workflow...

[@lyovkn8445]

I think that normal maps , roughnes textures must not be Utility Linier SRGB, it must be Utilty Raw. Everithing else is right. I must be wrong but in many forums i find that it must be Utility Raw. Correct me if i was wrong

[@johnmcmurrough]

Hello Arvid, awesome stuff! One question - why did you pick the utility-sRGB-texture for your color picking change in your config - when you used this picker and changed the color/value of your walls? Reading Christophers posts on ACES he wonders if a utility-Linear-Rec.2020 would be ideal? I'm just beginning to understand ACES and its workflow in Maya/Arnold so - ufff, I have a lot of questions. Is there noticable difference here or will this get you into the ball park for correct values and colors? Using the utility-sRGB-texture vs utility-Linear-Rec.2020. THX

[@b0bby2005]

Hi Arvid, I am a lighter at Sony Imageworks, I love your videos! I have one question, I am painting textures in Mari, and exporting them as exr 16 bits for the diffuse color. What Idc should I use on those textures? Thanks for your great work!

[@arvidurs]

You don’t really need 16bit unless your painting emissive. It depends if they are in linear srgb or srgb. Based on that you’d need to change your idt

[@aliengalaxy6096]

Hi Arvid! I use the ACES, I have set the textures as well. But I am confused, in the renderview/window/display settings/ view transform and I change here the color space, what it this? docs.arnoldrenderer.com/download/attachments/55709149/image2016-7-26%208%3A52%3A9.png?version=1&modificationDate=1496732618000&api=v2 there are many variation as well, so what is the correct settings here? Or this is only a boost? docs.arnoldrenderer.com/display/A5AFMUG/Arnold+RenderView+Window

[@monocore]

There are some HDRIs that need to be in RAW instead of Linear sRGB. Also greyscale float images such as displacement maps shouldn't they be raw as well?

[@Capeau]

Yes

[@AndyMcGinnis]

Hey Arvid, great tutorial, thank you! So I consulted Maya Forums for this issue, which seems to be a very simple one, but I hope you can advise.. I'm sure you've come across the issue with ACES rendering, where white will simply not appear as full white in both the viewport and render, but a light gray. How have you resolved this issue? I've had two suggestions on the forum, which have not worked: - Add more light so that the object gets pushed to pure white. This is frankly a terrible idea, since this increase in light will obviously effect everything in the scene, unless you want to try light linking, which will give unrealistic results. - Change the mixing color space to Display Space, and set rgb to 1,1,1. If you click on a color swatch, and change its Mixing Color Space to 1, that should in theory give you pure white. However, it only blows out the color, resulting in having to use a very high threshold if utilizing the LensEffects Imager, and giving the color a washed-out look, as if Subsurface was set way to high. If you have any insight on how to address this, other than of course setting up a Photoshop action or something in post, I'd really appreciate it. Thanks!

[@mixtapechi]

Perfect timing! Thank you

[@adnaninside]

Really really helpful & thanks for the massive info. I'm late into the ACES but it's still worth it. I get some errors while extracting the config file, I've downloaded Aces 1.2 from your provided link below. I'm using Maya 2020 with redshift. I'm gonna try with that as I'm not sure if Redshift 3.03 is is fully compatible with ACES. the first error is "path to the file\OpenColorIO-Configs-feature-aces-1.2-config.zip Unexpected end of data". Second error is "Data error : OpenColorIO-Configs-feature-aces-1.2-config\aces_1.2\baked\flame\P3-D65 ST2084 ( 1000 nits ) for ACESss Flame.3dl" I'm using 7zip 64bit for extracting the file. please guide me if I'm doing something wrong!

[@danielbrylka2228]

Hi ARvid, the D in IDT & ODT stands for device, not display. Thanks for making ACES tutorials for 3D artists.

[@arvidurs]

Thanks! I just have been nervous 😬

[@dukebrain6060]

I think the bump map should use "Utility - Raw" color space.

[@arvidurs]

Yes 👍

[@kemarwalker9091]

Loving it man, thanks again! :-)

[@FrozenSkiller]

Do you think Houdini will be able to beat Katana in Lighting Lookdev some day?

[@arvidurs]

Yes I think so

[@FrozenSkiller]

@@arvidurs What makes you think that way? Where are the advantages of Houdini?

[@arvidurs]

@@FrozenSkiller for one, Katana is read only. Which is very limiting in flexibility.

[@bensasi]

Roughness, normal, displacements gotta be set to Utility - Raw and not Utility Linear sRGB

[@zachlewis1744]

Correct; otherwise, you're inadvertently applying an affine transform to non-color data!

[@AnimeZProduction]

Hi Avrid!! Once again an amazing video as always!! I have a question involving katana. Does Katana support OCIO, and if it does do you know how to setup ACES in katana?

[@biogenicdesign]

FYI y'all ACES 1.2 ocio config files found here: github.com/colour-science/OpenColorIO-Configs/tree/feature/aces-1.2-config/aces_1.2

[@Capeau]

ODT is only for displaying/viewing purposes with corrections applied so that you can view the data on the selected display type... it's not the 'real' output, the 'real' output you are saving to should always be linear/raw

[@arvidurs]

agreed - it should, but it doesn't have to.

[@SuperMaimed]

work linear. but instead of using SRGB to interpret your render view and texture import , you choose ACES. problem comes when adding textures. no sweat. convert them from SRGB to ACES and all will look nice and dandy. save Renders linear with no color profile. floating point exr is best. import to AE/Nuke /whateverprogram. add from LINEAR to ACES conversion and comp it. output SRGB. I think it works like this.

[@xbaroka]

pls! when you make a tutorial on 4k monitor ,don't forget zoom in because on full HD 27" monitor very difficult to see the Maya ui . and 90% off the users dont have 4k monitor so better do just full HD video it think :) anyway is a great video THANKS !

[@itsthatYEStoogoodguy]

Dude Arnold Renderer is the best.

[@aliengalaxy6096]

Hi Arvid! So the ACES 1.2 is the latest? github.com/colour-science/OpenColorIO-Configs/tree/feature/aces-1.2-config

[@arvidurs]

currently yes

[@kyankudos5968]

uuuu yeah.. baybe, bayyybe! going to check that out tonight but leave a like in advance :)

[@micemincer]

Why put so much effort into the settings if the final result is totally subjective and is based on personal opinion or feeling?

[@arvidurs]

I'd say it's about having the correct (as close to reality as possible) light transport. If that is given, you are free to do whatever you want.

[@hemantdoke9831]

in my maya 2022 utility SRGB is missing do you kno why?

[@arvidurs]

yeah, since then Maya changed a bit and applied their own Aces workflows. So this video is not fully accurate in terms of aces options