Denoiser (3ds Max) doesn't do anything... why?

[RandellTrulson]

So, I can go into "Arnold RenderView" Add the Arnold Denoiser, and it works great. I can even render frames out, and it will apply that denoiser, but it does it on a frame by frame basis and I get shimmer in the animation. So I wanted to use the "Arnold Denoiser" in the Render Panel so I could apply it for the whole animation. So here is what I do.

1. I go into the "Arnold Denoiser" tab in the renderer and check the box "Output Denoising AOVs"

2. I go to the "Common" tab and tell it to save as EXR (I have tried it with checking the "automatically add/remove AOVs from the Render Dialog" and without...both ways)

3. I Render out the sequence which makes the files MyImage_Noice_Input_0000.exr

4. I use MyImage_Noice_Input_0000.exr as the input image on the input, and specify the output

5. I make the settings the same as the Denoiser in "Arnold RenderView" one

6. I click the Denoise button and it makes all new EXR images...only in the RAM Player when you compare them with the original, Nothing happened it still looks super noisy.

What am I missing?

[Stephen.Blair]

Do you have other imagers in the scene? That will cause problems wiht noice.

What versions? of 3ds max, of maxtoa?

[RandellTrulson]

No other imagers. I even took the noice one out and just run it with the "output Denoising AOVs" checked.

Max 2021 ( I can run Max 2022 if that is an issue)

nVidia 3090 RTX with Driver 471.41 (the latest)

Arnolad to Max 4.3.3.21

I'm going to try getting it to work with "output denoising AOVs" on a single frame.

If I add it as an imager, and render them and dump the images as PNG it will do it, but of course it doesn't take the sequence in mind, applies it one frame at a time and I get shimmer and flicker. Was hoping to use the sequence denoiser on the entire sequence.

[Stephen.Blair]

What's the Denoise log look like?

It works here with a test scene.

[RandellTrulson]

Will just copy AOV "RGBA", variance not found

Could not find variance for AOV "RGBA

Could not find variance for AOV "RGBA", skipping denoise.

So does the "Output Denoising AOVs" not work?

[RandellTrulson]

Okay, so from what I am reading I can't do GPU rendering and get the variance filters?

[RandellTrulson]

Okay the log looks has this "Will just copy AOV "RGBA", variance not found"

Denoising D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0000.exr to D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0000.exr


"c:\programdata\autodesk\applicationplugins\maxtoa_2021\noice.exe" -i "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0000.exr" "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0001.exr" -o "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0000.exr" -v 0.5 -sr 9 -pr 3

noice 6.2.1.1 [fbf3b21a] - the Arnold denoiser
Using 20 threads.
Loading images...
Loading file "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0000.exr".
Using feature AOV 'denoise_albedo' with filter 'gaussian_filter'
Using feature AOV 'N' with filter 'gaussian_filter'
Using feature AOV 'Z' with filter 'gaussian_filter'
Working with 1 frame at 1280x720
Will just copy AOV "RGBA", variance not found
   Output file will be "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0000.exr"
Start denoising (patch radius 3, search radius 9, variance 0.5)
Denoising RGBA
   Could not find AOV with source RGBA and filter variance_filter
   Could not find variance for AOV "RGBA", skipping denoise.
Finished denoising
Saving image D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0000.exr (1280 x 720 x 4)
-----------------------
Denoising D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0001.exr to D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0001.exr


"c:\programdata\autodesk\applicationplugins\maxtoa_2021\noice.exe" -i "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0001.exr" "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0000.exr" "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0002.exr" -o "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0001.exr" -v 0.5 -sr 9 -pr 3

noice 6.2.1.1 [fbf3b21a] - the Arnold denoiser
Using 20 threads.
Loading images...
Loading file "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__Noice_Input0001.exr".
Using feature AOV 'denoise_albedo' with filter 'gaussian_filter'
Using feature AOV 'N' with filter 'gaussian_filter'
Using feature AOV 'Z' with filter 'gaussian_filter'
Working with 1 frame at 1280x720
Will just copy AOV "RGBA", variance not found
   Output file will be "D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0001.exr"
Start denoising (patch radius 3, search radius 9, variance 0.5)
Denoising RGBA
   Could not find AOV with source RGBA and filter variance_filter
   Could not find variance for AOV "RGBA", skipping denoise.
Finished denoising
Saving image D:/Render_Output/Sammy_n_Brutar/6-1_1/Denoised\Sammy_Dialog_6-1_1__denoised0001.exr (1280 x 720 x 4)
-----------------------

Here is a frame before the Denoiser

So here is a shot of what I am rendering in the Arnold RenderView

This is a frame after the denoiser... the frame is lighter, but that is all it seemed to do...it is still super noisy unlike the RenderView

[Stephen.Blair]

@ Right. Arnold GPU doesn't suport the variance filter yet, so Arnold GPU doesn't support noice. You have to use CPU

[CiroCardoso3v]

When working with GPU, I like to use this denoiser. Does the trick for now

https://github.com/DeclanRussell/IntelOIDenoiser

[RandellTrulson]

@Ciro Cardoso Thanks! Yeah, I want the power of the GPU for the speed on this project, but also don't want to crank up the sampling in favor of using a denoiser. Going to check this out tomorrow for sure. Super thanks again.