There was a mention in dev meeting notes about making Cycles the default renderer. I do like Cycles and use it a lot, but isn’t this too early? AFAIK imports and exports won’t work, because Cycles nodes have their own structure and content.
If conversion between, say, types like OBJ and FBX (etc…) and Cycles nodes exist, then I’m a supporter. But if this means broken import-export pipelines, I guess this is very strange idea.
Anyone knows what is going to happen?
Probably… what will happen, is that it will happen shortly after release… During the next release cycle the import / export python modules will get updated to make cycles materials as well.
Too Early? no, it is pretty much feature complete in terms of functionality.
It will not happen before the next release… But more then likely will be part of the release after.
I’d probably wait awhile still, but I don’t care much either since switching it back is pretty easy. Cycle’s baking workflow is clumsy to say the least (confusing setup, lack of anti-alias, cage extrusion has no visible indicator). Texture Paint mode with it is still iffy as well (lack of GLSL, confusing setup, etc). While major issues for me, these seem to be minor issues for how most people use Blender, so may as well switch Cycles to default I suppose.
I just worry that converting Cycles nodes to and from import/export functions might be bigger job than the devs suppose. I seriously hope I’m worrying a non-issue, but the import/export functionality is quite complex area. I have modified some Pyhon code in some exporters (minor things, for my own needs) and there were dragons there.
Importing an fbx already creates cycles nodes… (as long as cycles is selected as renderer when you import)
So it does… Or tries to. Actually it generated whole bunch of nodes but the whole mess didn’t show in render. Well, it wasn’t FBX generated by Autodesk product, it was 3D-Coat output, so there might be problems… (Cool to know that this kind of functionality has been under develpment, though.)
I guess, however, that we should pray that devs have enough energy to check all this. Otherwise, it might be safer to keep 2.71 for some time…
It was of course inevitable, but personally I think it could wait until we get an official uber-shader as the default when adding new materials. Learning shading must be really hard when you have to actually add the nodes yourself, instead of BI’s friendly way of having everything there for you that just needs to be tweaked or turned on.
Anyone else agree?
Totally agree!
Plus, to be a worthy default renderer cycles should have a way to avoid self-shadowing or even better provides a proper shadow-catcher for compositing!
@Michael W: Actually the nodes in FBX import were probably OK (more complicated than I’d use). But the image texture nodes were missing, so I guess this is the same as tryin to import Poser models was; possible, but you certainly need to sweat. 
@gregzaal: I think this uber-shader also would solve many script writers problems, so I think it would be good idea. I.e. it would be “stable platform” for import-export paths and and for common user needs. Yes, nodes are as understandable, when you have the experience; however, the common set for most 3D apps is so strong influence that one shader to cover the common ground would be a good idea.
+1 for these too. Not like now, with numerous Cycles and compositor nodes. Simpler.
Great point, didn’t even think of that!
Don’t they mean having Cycles selected as default render and not replacing BI with Cycles completely ?
As long as i can still disable Cycles in the addons from the user preferences so i can get Blender Internal as my default settings, i have no problem with them doing Cycles new default.
Currently I have Maxwell Render as default, because I saved the startup file this way, so should not be a problem to set our own preference, or am I missing something?
paolo
I haven’t been following this closely, but my understanding was that, since most people were starting to switch to cycles and now that it is more complete, they would be switching to Cycles at some point, but Internal would still be available as an option. However, I don’t think much work has been done on Internal.
At least, that was my understanding. And I admit, I haven’t been following it too closely.
Sure why not, Cycles is a great renderer.
Ive been a blender user for some months now and I’ve used both BI and cycles. My system is a basic laptop at the moment with an integrated graphics card. Nevertheless I can achieve suprisingly much even with my basic setup. I actually like BI ! I’ll probably get shot down in flames for saying that but it’s relatively quick and produces pretty good results for me. Ive no doubt having also usd Cycles that it is technically the superior renderer but people dont always need or want the full kaboodle for every task. I will remain delighted with blender as long as BI doesnt end up getting stripped out and if it retains its current capabilities. If Cycles was to be the default then I’ll remain happy as long as I can still choose between the two.
Dropping BI is not an option.
I second that. I have yet to dive into Cycles; too busy learning the rest of Blender.
They shouldn’t have cycles being the default unless they provide at least shadows control as BI has (you can tint shadows and control the intensity much better than in cycles) as well as light groups and ‘This layer only’ options. I do all kind of tricks with these settings that are much more complex to achieve in Cycles and you usually have to do a lot of compositing work to have similar results.