RenderMan 26

Knowing that the journey for Pixar’s RenderMan software began 37 years ago feels mind-boggling – but it’s still at the top of its game.

- Paul Hatton

The production renderer for animation and VFX work has helped to create breathtaking movies including The Lion King, Toy Story and Avatar. Even more impressive is that as of 2022, it had been used in over 500 films, including multiple Animated Feature Oscar winners. RenderMan is an industry-defining renderer.

With version 26 the latest release, it continues to go from strength to strength. Featuring improvements to its interactive denoiser, XPU tool and plugin updates, RenderMan is set to become increasingly popular as the first-choice renderer for numerous artists and studios.

INTERACTIVE DENOISER

Denoising technology has evolved exponentially in recent years. Thanks to technologies such as Intel’s Open Image Denoise and various rendererspecific implementations, denoising tools have not only improved rendering quality but also dramatically reduced render times. Before these developments, noise was reduced by throwing more samples into the scene. But nowadays, artists can leave the noise in the render and know it’ll be cleaned up in post.