This page provides a list of the render elements supported in V-Ray for Houdini.
Overview
The following render elements are supported by V-Ray. All render elements support native V-Ray materials, while some render elements also support standard Houdini materials, as noted in the table below.
Note: In order to render a correct Raw render pass, you need to also render the corresponding main element and filter. For example, Raw Reflection requires you to render Reflection and Reflection Filter. For Raw GI, you need GI and Diffuse, etc.
Supported Render Elements
| Render element | Houdini node name | Color Depth of EXR floating-point channels* | Description |
| Alpha | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Alpha transparency. |
| V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Atmospheric effects, such as Environment Fog. | |
| V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Image background, such as any Background Texture specified in the Environment overrides. | |
| – | 16bit/32bit | Expands as all beauty elements for the actual rendering. | |
| – | 16bit/32bit | Expands as all beauty elements for the actual rendering, Raw elements included. | |
| Bump Normals | V-Ray RenderChannelBumpNormals | 16bit/32bit | Normals generated by bump maps, in screen space (which is not the same as camera space). Use the V-Ray Sampler texture as an input for the V-Ray Extra Texture render element to get the normals in camera, world or object space. |
| V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | The caustics on the material. These caustics are present only when the Caustics option of V-Ray is enabled. This channel does not include GI caustics. | |
| Coat | V-Ray RenderChannelCoat | 16bit/32bit | Direct surface specular highlights coming from the V-Ray Material Coat layer used in the scene. |
| Coat Filter | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Reflection filter for V-Ray Material Coat layer. |
| Coat Glossiness | V-Ray RenderChannelGlossiness | 16bit/32bit | Returns a float value that corresponds with the Coat Glossiness value of the V-Ray Material Coat layer. |
| Coat Reflection | V-Ray RenderChannelCoatReflection | 16bit/32bit | Indirect reflections coming from the Coat layers of V-Ray Material used in the scene. |
| Coverage | V-Ray RenderChannelCoverage | 16bit/32bit | For each pixel, the final values for the render element are taken from the object that makes the largest contribution to that pixel. |
| Cryptomatte | V-Ray RenderChannelCryptomatte | forced 32bit (for multi-channel files) | Uses the Cryptomatte convention by Psypop to encode mattes into multichannel OpenEXRs. |
| Denoiser | V-Ray RenderChannelDenoiser | 16bit/32bit | Applies a denoising operation to the image after it is rendered (with the necessary channels). |
| Diffuse | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Pure diffuse surface color. |
| Direct Light | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Diffuse direct surface lighting. |
| DR Bucket | V-Ray RenderChannelDRBucket | 16bit/32bit | Identifies the render node responsible for rendering a bucket during Distributed Rendering. |
| ExtraTex | V-Ray RenderChannelExtraTex | forced 32bit (optional for multi-channel files) | Renders the entire scene with one texture mapped on all objects. |
| Global Illumination (GI) | 16bit/32bit | The diffuse surface global illumination. Only present if Global Illumination is enabled. | |
| LightMix | V-Ray RenderChannelLightMix | 16bit/32bit | Provides adjustment control to the lights in the scene from inside the V-Ray Frame Buffer. |
| Light Select | V-Ray RenderChannelLightSelect | 16bit/32bit | Extracts the contribution of a light or a set of lights to the scene to a separate render element. |
| Light Path Expressions | V-Ray Light Path Expressions | – | A tool for extracting specific lighting events from the scene to a separate channel. |
| Material ID | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | – | Material ID of the object. |
| Material Select | V-Ray RenderChannelMaterialSelect | 16bit/32bit | Renders only the object(s) assigned to a user-specified V-Ray compatible material. The material can be a top-level material or a sub-material of a V-Ray Blend material. |
| Matte Shadow | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Matte shadow part of the image. |
| Metalness | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Creates a black and white image, which can be used as a metalness mask when creating PBR shaders. |
| MultiMatte | V-Ray RenderChannelMultiMatte | 16bit/32bit | Creates selection masks based on an Object ID or Material ID. |
| Noise Level | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Shows the level of noise in the scene. |
| Normals | V-Ray RenderChannelNormals | 16bit/32bit | Surface normals in screen space (which is not the same as camera space). To output the normals in camera/object/world space, use the V-Ray Sampler texture as an input for the V-Ray Extra Texture render element. |
| Object ID | V-Ray RenderChannelObjectID | – | Returns solid un-shaded colors to represent a numerical identifiers set through that object's Attributes, Object Property, or assigned material. Useful for selection masks. EXRs and .vrimg formats store as integer values. |
| Object Select | V-Ray RenderChannelObjectSelect | 16bit/32bit | Stores only the object(s) called out with a specific Object or Material ID. |
| Raw Diffuse Filter | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | A solid mask of raw diffuse surface color information not affected by Fresnel falloff. |
| Raw GI | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Raw diffuse global illumination (not multiplied by the diffuse surface color). Only present if Global Illumination is enabled. |
| V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Raw diffuse direct illumination before it's multiplied by the diffuse surface color. | |
| Raw Reflection | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Pure surface reflection before it is multiplied by the reflection filter color. |
| Raw Reflection Filter | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | A solid mask of raw reflection information not affected by Fresnel falloff. |
| V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Pure surface refraction before it is multiplied by the refraction filter color. | |
| Raw Refraction Filter | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | A solid mask of raw refraction information not affected by Fresnel falloff. |
| Raw Shadow | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Raw light blocked by other objects. |
| Raw Total Light | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Sum of all raw lighting, both direct and indirect. |
| Reflection | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Reflections on the surface. |
| Reflection Filter | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Reflection filter (the color by which the raw reflections are multiplied to give the final surface reflection). This can be considered an alpha channel for reflections. |
| Reflection IOR | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Stores floating-point information that corresponds to the Fresnel IOR values of scene objects' materials. |
| Reflection Glossiness | V-Ray RenderChannelGlossiness | 16bit/32bit | Returns a float value that corresponds with the Reflection Glossiness value of an object's material. |
| Refraction | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Refractions of a surface. |
| Refraction Filter | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | The refraction filter mitigates the raw refraction layer. This render element returns the color by which the raw refractions are multiplied to give the final surface refraction. This can be considered an alpha channel for refractions. |
| Refraction Glossiness | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Returns a float value that corresponds to the Refraction Glossiness value of an object's material. |
| Render ID | V-Ray RenderChannelRenderID | – | Node render ID of the object that contributes most to the pixel value. |
| Roughness | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Bakes the Reflection Roughness values in a scene, creating a black and white image. |
| Sample Rate | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Shows an image where the pixel brightness is directly proportional to the number of samples taken at that pixel. |
| Self Illumination | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Self-illumination of the surface. |
| Shadow | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Diffuse light blocked by other objects. |
| Sheen | V-Ray RenderChannelSheen | 16bit/32bit | Direct surface specular highlights coming from the V-Ray Material Sheen layer used in the scene. |
| Sheen Filter | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Reflection filter for V-Ray Material Sheen layer. |
| Sheen Glossiness | V-Ray RenderChannelGlossiness | 16bit/32bit | Returns a float value that corresponds with the Sheen Glossiness value of the V-Ray Material Sheen layer. |
| Sheen Reflection | V-Ray RenderChannelSheenReflection | 16bit/32bit | Indirect reflections coming from the Sheen layer(s) of V-Ray Material used in the scene. |
| Specular | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Surface specular highlights. |
| SSS | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Renders just the subsurface part of the V-Ray SSS material on a separate layer. |
| Toon | V-Ray RenderChannelToon | 16bit/32bit | Stores results of V-Ray Toon rendering effect. |
| Total Lighting | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | Total lighting in the scene, both direct and indirect. |
| Velocity | V-Ray RenderChannelVelocity | 16bit/32bit | Surface velocity of an object. This render element is useful for generating motion blur in post-production. |
| Unclamped Color | V-Ray RenderChannelColor | 16bit/32bit | The unclamped or adjusted image color before Color Mapping settings are applied. |
| Z-depth | V-Ray RenderChannelZDepth | forced 32bit (for multi-channel files) | Z-depth of the surface. |
* For all image formats except EXR the render elements depend on their respective channels' output settings.