Chaos Group releases V-Ray for Unreal
Originally posted on 27 March 2018. Scroll down for news of the commercial release.
Chaos Group has launched V-Ray for Unreal, the new version of its V-Ray renderer for Unreal Engine, in beta.
The product makes it possible both to import V-Ray scenes into Unreal Engine to use as the basis of immersive real-time experience and to generate ray traced renders within UE4.
Import V-Ray scenes created in 3ds Max, Maya and SketchUp into Unreal Engine
V-Ray for Unreal makes it possible to import scenes created in other editions of V-Ray – at the minute, 3ds Max, Maya and SketchUp: there’s still “some development to do for other platforms” – into Unreal Engine.
Updated: The final release also supports V-Ray for Rhino.
The process automatically converts V-Ray lights and materials into their real-time equivalents.
(Epic Games’ own Unreal Studio – itself just released in beta – does something similar, but only for 3ds Max scenes with V-Ray materials.)
Adjust materials and lighting in UE4 in real time, then generate a ray traced render
As well as using a V-Ray scene as the basis for a conventional Unreal Engine project, users can also use UE4 as an environment in which to make changes to materials and lighting in real time.
The changes are then propagated back to V-Ray; or you can generate a ray traced render within UE4 itself.
The system is intended to make it possible to create both offline and real-time content with a single unified workflow, particularly for visualisation projects.
Updated 31 August 2018: Chaos Group has released Beta 2 of V-Ray for Unreal.
New features include light baking, making it possible to bake V-Ray lights directly into Unreal, and support for rendering UE4’s native foliage – currently limited to static geometry.
It is also now possible to render animated cinematics created using UE4’s Sequencer editor.
Updated 9 November 2018: V-Ray for Unreal is shipping. It’s the second of Chaos Group’s products to be available on a rental-only basis, following the firm’s acquisition of V-RayforC4D last week.
According to Chaos Group, V-Ray for Unreal will be “rapidly updated to keep pace with Unreal Engine, so it will be sold through a subscription that always keeps the user up-to-date”.
Pricing and availability
V-Ray for Unreal is compatible with V-Ray for 3ds Max, Maya, Rhino and SketchUp and Unreal Engine 4.19 and 4.20: support for 4.21 is “coming soon”. Subscriptions cost $80/month or $470/year.