Indigo 4.0.38 Beta Release

We have been working hard on a new beta release, which brings quite a few long-awaited features to Indigo and its new OpenCL rendering core!

Download links on the forum: http://www.indigorenderer.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=14024

Here's a quick overview of some of the new features:

Contribution clamping

This feature can be used to reduce unwanted bright dots in a render, so called "fireflies", by limiting the maximum contribution of image samples. The maximum contribution is user-controlled, where a lower value means stronger firefly reduction. Please note that this feature introduces bias into the rendering - the lower the max contribution, the more bias.

We want Indigo to be unbiased by default, so clamping is disabled by default, and we recommend not using stronger clamping than necessary, as this may lead to unrealistic results. However, the tool is an effective and artist friendly way to remove fireflies from an image.

Here is an example of how clamping can be used to reduce fireflies in difficult lighting situations (click for full resolution):

Broader material support for GPU Rendering

Architectural glass (for fast rendering of flat glass panels in archviz), Double sided thin (for realistic leaves and other vegetation) and Glossy transparent have been added, along with support for step blend in blend materials.

General speed improvements

Many optimisations have been made to improve rendering speed. This includes general speed-ups in the CPU core, as well as optimisation of many of our material models, including Phong, Double Sided Thin, Coating and Glossy Transparent materials. The viewport performance is significantly faster when using GPU rendering, and more improvements in this area can be expected in later beta releases.

Full changelog and download links here: http://www.indigorenderer.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=14024