mattmerk wrote:I too have this problem. If I load the Autopano Giga Pro output into software that can read floating point values, the whites are clipped at 1.0. True HDRI used for image based lighting in 3D software such as Maya or 3DS Max, or any other, relies on true floating point irradiance maps with white values above 1. I've been struggling with this for days under the assumption that I am doing something wrong, but after hours of RTFM and pressing every available button in the software, I am coming to the conclusion that this is a software limitation in Autopano Giga. I think I'll be recommending PTGui to my friends from now on unless someone can point out how I have screwed up, which is still a great possibility.
I like how the software works. It is just sad that getting true HDRI output working is so difficult, or even impossible.
mattmerk wrote:Thanks for the reply Klaus. Very helpful. Much appreciated.
Now I know that Autopano Giga can at least do what I was told it could do. Now I just need to figure out how. Like I said, I have spent a lot of time with the manual and I am still not getting true HDR output. When I select HDR output and file type to either .exr or to .hdr with a 32bit color depth, my output is clamped at 1.0.
I have tried merging my stacks in advance in photoshop as 32bit HDR images that I can load in a program like Nuke or After Effects and color correct them down to see all the detail in the highlights. In other words, they are true HDRI, suitable for IBL in any 3D app. (I really don't care at all about tone mapping. All I care about is true HDRI, and I find it a shame that people call tone mapped LDR images HDRI. But that is a rant for another time.)
Once I load my bracketed images into Autopano Giga and make a pano, in the rendered output, my highlights are all clipped at 1.0. There should be way more info in a spherical panorama in those highlights well above 1. I get the same results in Autopano Giga if I load the images as stacks of bracketed exposures or if I pre-merge them into 32bit HDR .exr files and load those.
So, what am I missing here? Is there a button somewhere I missed? My panos look fine in terms of stitching. They just don't contain color values above 1.0 and no detail in the "overexposed" ares (which in an HDRI, there are really no overexposed pixels, except for maybe the sun).
Just a point in the right direction would be most appreciated.
I'm attaching four images.
1. A UI screen capture of my render settings.
2. The distorted one is a premerged HDRI out of Photoshop showing a split screen color correction bringing the white values down to reveal the data in the highlights above 1.
3. The flattened image is a blow up and color corrected cropped screen grab of the .hdr panorama file showing the exact same color correction where there is no information above 1 and is brutally clipped.
4. And the pano, to show that the distortion is fine.
MM
>APG can very well output "true" HDR as .hdr and .exr. I use it in Maya, Maxwell and Cinema4D for IBL. I use 3 or 7 or 9 steps bracketing. No problem.
>What APG cannot do is tonemaping. Here it uses fusioning instead.
>best, Klaus
gkaefer wrote:so if you need real .exr output for IBL than I would suggest like Klaus to use Photomatix or oloneo to create .exr files from your Image stacks first. Here you have much more influence on the result and you can do a test tonemapping from your exr files too.
klausesser wrote:gkaefer wrote:so if you need real .exr output for IBL than I would suggest like Klaus to use Photomatix or oloneo to create .exr files from your Image stacks first. Here you have much more influence on the result and you can do a test tonemapping from your exr files too.
Hey Georg!
Sorry - you took me wrong: it´s NOT about using Photomatix or so FIRST - it´s about using it AFTERWARDS!
You don´t need to HDR single images FIRST when you need HDR-output. You put the stacks into APG and let it output a HDR/exr file. THIS you put into
a HDR application for judging the result and/or apply tonemapping to it . . IF you want. The TO doesn´t want to apply tonemapping - he wants to use native HDR
for IBL/GL as i understood him.
best, Klaus
mattmerk wrote:Now I am going to try and track down the programmers and ask them. Anyone want to maybe point me to where I can send THAT email?
Thanks again.
mattmerk wrote:........... I've never used PTGUI before and it required no reading of any documentation whatsoever to get these results. I spent a week with the Autopano Giga documentation.
......
Matthew Merkovich
mattmerk wrote:Aaron, in Hotoshop (CS6 for me) are you using the File/Automate/Merge to HDR PRO functionality? If you do that with bracketed images representing the brightest and darkest exposures, you should be getting 32 bit float results.
aaronpriest wrote:You can output stitched bracketed layers from both PTGui and AutoPano. The trouble is, most HDR programs will not handle very large panoramas to bring the separate 8 or 16-bit exposures into a 32-bit HDR file. For the time being I gave up on 32-bit panoramas, and I've often been tonemapping or fusing into 16-bit LDR files BEFORE stitching because neither APG nor PTGui have good enough control over the fusion process to do it all in one pass. There are obvious issues however with tonemapping or fusing before stitching, the biggest being inconsistency between images with such a large scene.
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