3D Car Rendering: Empower the Automotive Industry

With advancements in design and engineering, the automotive industry has experienced significant transformations to fulfill consumer demands. Previously, traditional car design techniques and prototyping were used, which were costly, time-consuming, and limited regarding flexibility. However, automotive rendering techniques have changed the game now by improving visual communication among designers and manufacturers.

Through 3D rendering, automotive brands are delving into hyper-realistic details of cars before building physical prototypes of new car models. It enables designers to experiment with various materials and manufacturers to identify flaws early, reducing production risks and costs. Hence, gain more insights about auto rendering through reading this detailed guide and learn techniques to improve your 3D car renders.

Part 1. What is 3D Car Rendering?

Simply put, rendering is a process of calculating light interaction within a 3D scene by utilizing computer hardware and software resources. In this context, car rendering refers to computer-generated photorealistic images of cars, which is also known as Automotive CGI, computer-generated image. To generate a car render, you must have its 3D model loaded within 3D software.

Besides 3D modeling, the process involves texturing, lighting, and rendering engines that will craft a visually striking car image. Remember, rendering software employs advanced techniques like ray tracing and global illumination to stimulate realistic shadows and material properties of cars. Ultimately, you can achieve an accurate representation of how light interacts with the car surface and show glossy or metallic trims.

Part 2. Main Techniques for Creating 3D Car Renders

Since cars come in various materials and designs, 3D car rendering is the most challenging but rewarding area of the 3D design industry. Let us show you the main techniques involved in creating a 3D car render so you can understand the basics before delving into details.

1. 3D Modeling

One can begin by creating 3D models through leading software like Blender, Cinema 4D, or Autodesk Maya. Meanwhile, designers should pay attention to every component, from the interior to body panels and shapes. It even involves door handles, headlights, taillights, surface details, and car dimensions. The more they will ensure accuracy and realism, the higher the output quality they will achieve.

2. Texturing 

After creating 3D models of a car, the next phase begins with applying realistic textures to the surface. For this reason, high-resolution images of glass, paint, chrome, and leather are used. When textures are applied to 3D models, a sense of realism, depth, and visual appeal is created. Moreover, using a good texture reveals material details and accurate properties like roughness and reflectivity.

3. Lighting 

To create a naturalistic and impactful automotive render, lighting plays a crucial role, which is the third main technique. When point lights simulate focused sources like spotlights that highlight key areas, area lights facilitate soft and diffuse lighting from windows. In addition, HDRI lighting captures environmental conditions, including reflections, shadows, and sunlight, which creates a realistic ambiance.

4. Rendering 

Finally, generate a 2D image after rendering a 3D model, but remember the process may take several hours and even days based on complexities and desired realism. Moreover, automotive rendering considers materials, camera angles, and lighting that further impact rendering times. To achieve a deadline and fasten the process, get assistance from cloud rendering services like Fox Renderfarm instead of relying on local machines.

Pro Tip: How to Improve the Rendering Efficiency of CG Car Videos

Although the 3D car render process takes time on local computers, it is somehow achievable through high-end hardware resources. The actual obstacle is rendering a CG car video, which will prove troublesome no matter how expensive hardware resources you use. To streamline the process and improve rendering efficiency, you are advised to use a leading render farm service like Fox Renderfarm.

It eliminates users' dependency on local device performance for car 3D render videos by providing cloud rendering or computing. Users just need to upload their project file to the cloud, and this easy-to-use service will generate rendered video without consuming any of your local machine resources. Also, know that it provides both CPU & GPU rendering, which you can opt for based on project needs. 

Key Features 

• Multi-OS Compatibility: This cloud rendering service is available for Mac, Windows, and Linux systems with 99.9% uptime. It means regardless of your operating system the service is available for everyone.  
• Support Multiple Software & Plugins: Fox Renderfarm supports nearly all popular 3D software, plugins, and renderers for rendering 3D models. Some of the widely used are Arnold, 3ds Max, Autodesk Maya, Blender, Cinema 4D, V-Ray, Corona, and RedShift.
• Secure & Confidential: It is ISO27001 certified and a TPN-accredited vendor that guarantees your interests and assets security by all means. Additionally, it provides a non-disclosure agreement to further satisfy customers regarding projects' confidentiality.
• Massive SSD Storage: To ensure good rendering speed, it fires up thousands of rendering nodes and incorporates Raysync's high transmission speed. Besides, it provides high-performance SSD storage that eradicates I/O bottlenecks.
• Automatic Detection: It automatically detects the IT environment of your 3D car model projects and matches cloud infrastructure to meet the demands. You can consider its Hollywood-level productions as an example of its efficient service.

Part 3. What Software is Used to Render Cars?

Creating a 3D car rendering means customizing your own car by adjusting colors, wheels, and other accessories. If you are really interested in doing so, below are some general and specialized 3D software that you can utilize to tailor your car:

General 3D Software and Renderers

Normally, almost all 3D animation software can build a 3D car model and generate a photorealistic rendering. In this regard, some of the leading software applications are Blender, Cinema 4D, 3ds Max, and Autodesk Maya.

Conversely, the software that generates the final image is called "Renderer," which can be run on the CPU, GPU, or both. When looking into the most popular renderers, Octane, RedShift, V-Ray, and Arnold are the top choices. However, the most popular combination of 3D software and renderers for Automotive CGI is 3ds Max with Corona.

Specialized Automotive 3D Software

Other than general 3D software, specialized 3D apps are developed specifically for the automotive industry, such as Autodesk VRED and 3DEXCITE DeltaGen. These are robust tools designed to handle huge vehicle data sets since the visualization of still images is just one part these tools can offer. Although such software is expensive, it provides unmatched features to manufacturers.

CAD Software and Renderers

CAD software is considered a venue where artists design their car products through Solid Modeling and NURBS methods. After choosing a good renderer for CAD software, you can achieve design visualization without exporting it to another application.

As an example, one can think of Rhino3D with the V-Ray renderer combination. Also, Octane, RedShift, and Blender are good options for crafting stunning realism and fast rendering of complex car scenes.

Part 4. Benefits of 3D Car Rendering 

Beyond traditional visualization methods, automotive rendering provides countless benefits, some of which are discussed ahead:

• Environmental Benefits: Digital rendering eliminates the need for carbon footprints while shooting on-site requires significant CO2 emissions. According to studies, an average film produces enough carbon emission to travel to the moon and return 11 times.
• Control Every Detail: With CGI, designers have greater control over the car's appearance and details that physical setups can never match. They produce multiple renders with varied lighting and reflections so the final vehicle turns perfectly aligned and meets the highest standards.
• Visualize New Automotive Design: Seeing a new car model with a photorealistic quality is a good approach to judging the design. Thus, designers use rendering to decide location or studio for design review across different lighting and interactions.
• Cost Efficiency: Instead of physical setups, which previously involved transportation and logistics, auto rendering significantly cut production costs. Now, it's a lot easier to create CGI of cars by working on CAD models and converting them into good-quality data.
• Marketing & Consumer Feedback: Another benefit of car rendering is marketing the product before it is even manufactured. In this way, companies gather valuable feedback on time and shape marketing strategies as per response.

Conclusion

In summary, car rendering has been shaping the automotive industry by eliminating significant costs in a new product launch. This article has highlighted every aspect of 3D car rendering including its main techniques, benefits, and tips to improve CG car video rendering. Thus, meet deadlines and streamline computer-generated car product videos by getting rendering services from Fox Renderfarm cloud render.