Simulation Compatibility

CPU Simulations


Simulation	Source	Sensor
Interactive Simulation	Interactive Source Ray File Source Surface Source Luminaire Source Display Source Light Field source	Irradiance Sensor Intensity Sensor Radiance Sensor 3D Irradiance Sensor Camera Sensor
Direct Simulation	Ray File Source⁸ Surface Source Luminaire Source Ambient Source¹ Display Source Light Field source	Irradiance Sensor Intensity Sensor Radiance Sensor⁷ 3D Irradiance Sensor 3D Energy Density Sensor VR Immersive Sensor⁷ VR Observer sensor⁷ Human Eye Sensor⁷ Light Field sensor Light Expert Group⁶ Physical Camera
Inverse Simulation	Surface Source Luminaire Source Ambient Source Display Source⁵ Light Field source	Irradiance Sensor Radiance Sensor² VR Observer sensor Human Eye Sensor Camera Sensor^3,4 Physical Camera

Warning: During an Inverse simulation only, the first pixel of a sensor determines the medium in which the sensor is. Make sure the sensor does not overlap with two different media at the same time, otherwise you may generate propagation errors and wrong result.

Warning: Issue when sensor pixel size is larger than the size of geometry, in Inverse simulation only:

At the beginning of the simulation, a visibility map is computed. To compute it, a ray is launched at the center of each pixel of the sensor to know if the ray has intersected geometries or not.
During the simulation, rays are randomly emitted on all the surface of the pixel. If a ray emitted (during the visibility map computation) in the center of a pixel intersects no geometry, all rays emitted in that pixel will never intersect geometries.

This may then generate propagation errors and wrong result.

To solve this issue, you may use a sensor with smaller pixels.

¹When ambient and/or environment sources are enabled for direct simulation, only 2D and 3D irradiance sensors are taken into account.

²Only for colorimetric and spectral radiance sensors.

³ The SPEOS Lens System model (.OPTDistortion v2 version) is not compatible with a deterministic algorithm in inverse simulation.

⁴An Inverse Simulation, with Timeline deactivated and using a Camera Sensor, only generates a HDRI file (*.hdr).

⁵Inverse Simulations using Display Sources are not compatible with the FTG option activated (Fast Transmission Gathering).

Note: Geometries are embedded in the simulation even if not selected from the geometries list. For example, if a 3D Texture element is selected for simulation, its associated support body is also embedded in the simulation even if the support body was not selected as geometry.

⁶Only one Light Expert Group can be added to a Direct simulation.

⁷When a Direct simulation is composed of a sensor using the Gathering algorithm (Radiance, Human Eye, Observer, Immersive), and a polarizing surface state (unpolished, coated, polarizer, polar plate, optical polished, plugin, polar anisotropic surface), simulation results might not be accurate due to the fact that gathering does not take into account the polarization of the ray, acting as if the ray is unpolarized.

⁸When using a Ray File source in simulation, make sure all rays start from the same medium. Otherwise you will have an unrealistic behavior and may face differences between GPU and CPU simulations.

GPU Simulations

For an exhaustive list of GPU Solver limitations and non-compatibility, see GPU Simulation Limitations.

Files, components, sources or sensors that are not listed in the following table are not compatible with GPU Simulations.
GPU Simulations use the Monte Carlo algorithm.
GPU Simulations simulate all sensors at once.
CAUTION: As all sensors are loaded into memory at the same time, the Video RAM might become saturated when using many sensors.

Warning: Propagation errors are not managed by GPU simulations. This may lead to inconsistent results between CPU and GPU simulations. For instance, when a Surface Source is considered as tangent to a body.


Simulation	Source	Sensor
Direct Simulation	Ray File Source⁷ Surface Source Luminaire Source Ambient Source¹ Display Source	Irradiance Sensor Intensity Sensor Radiance Sensor⁶ 3D Irradiance Sensor VR Immersive Sensor⁶ VR Observer sensor⁶ Human Eye Sensor⁶
Inverse Simulation	Surface Source Luminaire Source Ambient Source Display Source⁵	Irradiance Sensor Radiance Sensor² VR Immersive Sensor VR Observer sensor Camera Sensor^3,4 Human Eye Sensor

¹When ambient and/or environment sources are enabled for direct simulation, only 2D and 3D irradiance sensors are taken into account.

²Only for colorimetric and spectral radiance sensors.

³Camera Sensors using dynamic parameters (Trajectory file and Acquisition parameters) in an Inverse Simulation using the Timeline is compatible with the GPU Compute.

⁴An Inverse Simulation, with Timeline deactivated and using a Camera Sensor, only generates a HDRI file (*.hdr).

⁵Inverse Simulations using Display Sources are not compatible with the FTG option activated (Fast Transmission Gathering).

⁶When a Direct simulation is composed of a sensor using the Gathering algorithm (Radiance, Human Eye, Observer, Immersive), and a polarizing surface state (unpolished, coated, polarizer, polar plate, optical polished, plugin, polar anisotropic surface), simulation results might not be accurate due to the fact that gathering does not take into account the polarization of the ray, acting as if the ray is unpolarized.

⁷When using a Ray File source in simulation, make sure all rays start from the same medium. Otherwise you will have an unrealistic behavior and may face differences between GPU and CPU simulations.

Note: Geometries are embedded in the simulation even if not selected from the geometries list. For example, if a 3D Texture element is selected for simulation, its associated support body is also embedded in the simulation even if the support body was not selected as geometry.

Speos Live Preview

For an exhaustive list of GPU Solver limitations and non-compatibility, see GPU Simulation Limitations.

Important: The compatibility between the Live Preview and VR Immersive/Observer sensor is in BETA mode for the current release.

Note:

Files, components, sources or sensors that are not listed in the following table are not compatible with Speos Live Preview.
Speos Live Preview is not compatible with propagation in ultraviolet or infrared.
Speos Live Preview simulations use the Monte Carlo algorithm.


Simulation	Source	Sensor	Materials and Components
Direct Simulation	Ray File Source Surface Source Luminaire Source Display Source	Irradiance Sensor Intensity Sensor¹ Radiance Sensor VR Immersive Sensor⁴ VR Observer sensor⁴ Human Eye Sensor	Speos Light Box, BSDF 180 file (.bsdf180), Unpolished file (.unpolished), Perfect/rough colored mirror files (.mirror), Anisotropic BSDF file (.anisotropicbsdf), spectral intensity maps (when used as input of a surface source definition) Complete scattering file - BRDF (.brdf), Coating file (.coated), Advanced Scattering file (.scattering), Simple Scattering file (.simplescattering), Mirror, Lambertian and Optical Polished built-in models, Non-fluorescent material (.material) files .speos360 file
Inverse Simulation	Surface Source Luminaire Source Ambient Source Display Source³	Irradiance Sensor Radiance Sensor¹ Camera Sensor² VR Immersive Sensor VR Observer sensor Human Eye Sensor

¹Intensity Sensors with Near Field activated are not supported.

²Camera Sensors using dynamic parameters (Trajectory file and Acquisition parameters) in an Inverse Simulation using the Timeline is compatible with the Live Preview.

³Inverse Simulations using Display Sources are not compatible with the FTG option activated (Fast Transmission Gathering).

⁴When a Direct simulation is composed of a sensor using the Gathering algorithm (Radiance, Human Eye, Observer, Immersive), and a polarizing surface state (unpolished, coated, polarizer, polar plate, optical polished, plugin, polar anisotropic surface), simulation results might not be accurate due to the fact that gathering does not take into account the polarization of the ray, acting as if the ray is unpolarized.