Blender Master Class

Balancing Render Time and Quality

When rendering any CG scene, the aim is to get the nicest render possible in the shortest amount of time. This can be tricky given the number of variables you can change, all of which affect how long an image will take to render. Still, there are some general principles.

Start simple and be organized.  Organize your objects onto layers to make it easier to render different aspects of the scene. Also, make sure you don’t have any unneeded objects in your scene on visible layers when rendering.

Experiment.  If your renders are slow, try changing one setting at a time to see what most affects your render times. For example, change a render setting or the number of samples on a lamp. Or enable or disable some aspect ...