VRay Global Switches

General

The global switches allow you to control various aspects of the renderer globally.

Parameters

Geometry section

Displacement - enables or disables VRay's own displacement mapping. Note that this has no effect on standard Max displacement mapping, which can be controlled via the corresponding parameter in the Render dialog.

Lighting section

Lights - enables or disables lights globally. Note that if you uncheck this, VRay will use the default lights. If you do not want any direct lighting in your scene, you must uncheck both this and the Default lights parameters.

Default lights - enables or disables the usage of the default lights when there are no light objects in the scene or when you have disabled lighting globally (see the Lights parameter).

Hidden lights - enables or disables the usage of hidden lights. When this is checked, lights are rendered regardless of whether they are hidden or not. When this option is off, any lights that are hidden for any reason (either explicitly or by type) will not be included in the rendering.

Shadows - enables or disables shadows globally.

Show GI only - when this option is on, direct lighting will not be included in the final rendering. Note that lights will still be considered for GI calculations, however in the end only the indirect lighting will be shown.

Materials section

Reflection/refraction - enables or disables the calculation of reflections and refractions in VRay maps and materials.

Max depth - enables the user to limit globally the reflection/refraction depth. When this is unchecked, the depth is controlled locally by the materials/maps. When this option is checked, all materials and maps use the depth specified here.

Maps - enables or disables texture maps.

Filter maps - enables or disables texture map filtering. When enabled, the depth is controlled locally by the settings of the texture maps. When disabled, no filtering is performed.

Max. transp levels - this controls to what depth transparent objects will be traced.

Transp. cutoff - this controls when tracing of transparent objects will be stopped. If the accumulated transparency of a ray is below this threshold, no further tracing will be performed.

Override mtl - this option allows the user to override the scene materials when rendering. All objects will be rendered with the chosen material, if one is selected, or with default materials if no material is specified.

Glossy effects - this option allows the user to replace all glossy reflections in the scene with non-glossy ones; useful for test renderings.

Indirect illumination section

Don't render final image - when this option is on, VRay will only calculate the relevant global illumination maps (photon maps, light maps, irradiance maps). This is a useful option if you are calculating maps for a fly-through animation.

Raytracing section

Secondary rays bias - a small positive offset that will be applied to all secondary rays; this can be used if you have overlapping faces in the scene to avoid the black splotches that may appear. See the Examples section for a demonstration on the effect of this parameter. This parameter is also useful when using the 3dsmax Render-to-texture feature