Comments on: Sunflow 0.06.1 Photo-Realistic Renderer Released

By: LetterRip

LetterRip — Sun, 07 May 2006 00:10:24 +0000

C/C++ are about twice as fast as java for most things that are going to be CPU bound

http://shootout.alioth.debian.org/sandbox/benchmark.php?test=all&lang=gcc&lang2=java

LetterRip

By: Jeppe

Jeppe — Sat, 06 May 2006 11:13:26 +0000

Actually, current Java versions are not that slow when doing pure number crunching. Java used to be slow as hell, at least with graphics/GUI. Running Java application consumes more memory than optimized C/C++ application for sure, but Java doesn't equal slow anymore.

http://www.idiom.com/~zilla/Computer/javaCbenchmark.html

By: Henrymop

Henrymop — Sat, 06 May 2006 06:19:54 +0000

I see what you mean now. My dad says that he doesn't like Java a whole lot, and I used to think that whenever he started saying that (he's a C person). But, now the reason I'm starting to not like it is because 1) It's an emulator, and a interpreter, at that 2) Corperations are pushing it up everyone's butt, which means they're going to try to use it for something in their best interest, which usualy means something that isn't in ours.

But, yeah, it's pretty obvious that this guy is a good programmer. He could probibly be great at other languages. If he ported this over to other languages, that would be cool, too.

By: etr9j

etr9j — Sat, 06 May 2006 02:58:32 +0000

But I do see what you mean though… how much better would it be like if it (with all that it has now) was written in C++.

I'm just throwing out there thoughts on the quality of the rendering is more based on the the way it's done rather than the language. I just don't want the Java to deter anyone from trying it. Okay, talking too much now :)

By: etr9j

etr9j — Sat, 06 May 2006 01:19:48 +0000

You're right… should have clarified better :)

What I was trying to say was that if we believe that one language is "better" than the other (e.g. C++ versus Java) that might be true under very particular circumstances if two programs were written to do the exact same thing in the exact same way. But in the case of Sunflow, Chris's use of numerous techniques (KDTree construction using radix sort, optimized raytracing routines, a new global illumination algorithm, etc.) might allow for a better overall render speeds versus similar renderers written in other languages becuase he is using optimized techniques for the task.

I'm interested in any thoughts you might have on this!

By: Henrymop

Henrymop — Sat, 06 May 2006 00:57:46 +0000

Quote from etr9j:

Never underestimate great programming skills and utilizing the latest ray-trace/GI/3D research (which Chris employs) to overcome programming language differences.

What do you mean?

By: etr9j

etr9j — Fri, 05 May 2006 22:45:28 +0000

@Henrymop
Never underestimate great programming skills and utilizing the latest ray-trace/GI/3D research (which Chris employs) to overcome programming language differences.

@Carlos
What issues did you have?

By: Carlos

Carlos — Fri, 05 May 2006 22:28:36 +0000

It looks really good, but I've never been able to run it.

By: Henrymop

Henrymop — Fri, 05 May 2006 20:41:42 +0000

I wonder how fast this renderer would be if it was written in C or C++? Man, that would be fast, considering it's already fast.

By: etr9j

etr9j — Fri, 05 May 2006 17:19:41 +0000

Cool, it was actually part of an interesting render challenge at http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread?t=62140.