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What is the Corona Image Editor?

Updated

Youtube tutorial - Corona Image Editor with Chaos Corona

 

1. Corona Image Editor

2. CXR Image Format

3. Example Uses

4. Batch Editing CXR Images - This explains how to edit multiple CXR files at once (for example, apply one post-processing or LightMix preset to 100 frames of an animation). 

 

The Corona Image Editor

mceclip0.png

 

The Corona Image Editor (CIE in short) is included in the Corona installer and by default it installs into:

  • 3ds Max - C:\Program Files\Chaos\Corona\Corona Renderer for 3ds Max\Image Editor
  • Cinema 4D -  C:\Program Files\Chaos\Corona\Corona Renderer for Cinema 4D\Image Editor

It also creates a desktop shortcut when installed. 

 

CIE is a portable, standalone application that allows loading a Corona EXR (.cxr) file and applying all post-processing operations which are available in the Corona VFB to it, including adjusting LightMix, running Denoising, LUTs, bloom and glare, without the need to re-render. All of this is done without running any 3D software. It can be seen as a standalone version of the Corona VFB with extended functionality.

 

The CIE user interface is inspired by the Corona VFB, sharing its look and feel. Below are some features and benefits of using CIE:

  • Lower system requirements than working with an image inside any 3D software - it can be run and used on a less powerful computer.
  • It is not necessary to have a scene loaded while you are working with your images, so you can denoise Corona renders outside of the rendering process, reducing the memory requirements significantly.
  • All LightMix and post-processing settings can be easily shared between the VFB in any host application and the CIE.
  • No need to copy settings manually: CXRs from the VFB are automatically loaded with them.
  • It also works with regular, non-Corona EXRs (in Float format). It is possible to add bloom and glare to them, apply your tone mapping settings, LUT, etc. Denoising and LightMix are not available for such EXRs because they do not have the necessary “hidden” auxiliary data.
  • Supports drag-and-drop to quickly load the images.
  • Saves to EXR, PNG, JPG, JPEG, BMP, HDR, IFF, JP2, J2K, RLA, SGI, TGA, TIF/TIFF
  • You can associate the CIE with EXR and CXR files and open them just by double-clicking.
  • Ctrl+O and Ctrl+S can be used for fast image opening and saving.
  • It is a portable application, works with just unpacking, no installation is necessary (license activation is required, though).
  • It is included with any Corona license.

 

CXR Image Format

The Corona EXR image format (cxr) is almost identical to the standard EXR format,  with the one difference being the additional data that is saved within the file. This additional data includes all render elements (also ones which are not exposed to the user, which are used during the denoising process), and rendering statistics such as rays per second, noise level, Corona version, etc. To save an image in the Corona EXR format either:

  • In both 3ds Max and Cinema 4D: click on the vertical arrow next to the Save button and select "Save CXR": 

    Save-CXR.png
     
  • In 3ds Max: go to Render Setup > Scene and press the "Save CXR..." button:

    scene-save-cxr.png
     
  • In 3ds Max: go to Render Setup > Common and set your Render Output to save in the CXR format. Then just render your image to have it saved automatically.

    Corona_8_CIE_save_to_CXR_from_Max_dialog.png
     
  • In Cinema 4D: go to Render Settings, configure your Output, and pick the CXR format under the Save settings. Then just render your image to have it saved automatically.
    Note: you can ignore other format settings such as bit depth and dithering - they are not taken into account anyway. 
    C4D-save-CXR-format.png
     

Note:

  • If you click the "Save" button in the upper left corner of the VFB, this will save only your currently visible render element ("render pass" in Cinema 4D) in the format of your choice. The exception is selecting the Beauty element and clicking "Save" - if you save to the CXR format, this will save beauty along with all render elements, such as LightMix, just like in the case of using the "Save CXR" option. 
     
  • If you click on the vertical arrow next to the "Save" button and select "Save all", this will save each render element (render pass) as a separate file using the format of your choice.
     
  • If you click on the vertical arrow next to the "Save" button and select "Save CXR", this will store all the information from the VFB (all render elements, including the LightMix, tone mapping, denoising data, etc...) inside a single CXR file. This file can be used to resume rendering later, post-process in the Corona Image Editor, perform denoising later, and so on. 
     
  • Alternatively, in 3ds Max you can click "Save CXR..." in Render Setup > Scene and this has the same effect as clicking "Save CXR" in the VFB.

 

Example Uses

1. Denoising a CXR image
If you saved your image in the CXR format without performing the actual denoising, and with the "Gather data for later" denoising option enabled, you can open this image later in the CIE and perform denoising there. To do this, simply load your image into CIE, expand the "Denoising" rollout in the "Post" tab, and choose "Full" from the "Mode" dropdown. 

CIE-denoising.png

 

2. Using LightMix
You can save an image with all LightMix layers included and then adjust the LightMix settings in CIE. To do this, simply load your image and select the "LightMix" tab. You will see exactly the same settings as in the Corona VFB, including the options to save and load LightMix presets: 
 

CIE-lightmix.png

 

Batch Editing CXR Images

CoronaImageBatch is a script for batch image processing. It can be used to process multiple images at once using custom .conf files, which can be saved using the GUI version of CIE, or edited manually. Help file and an example CXR file are included in the below ZIP archive.
 

Example use: save 100 frames of an animation in .cxr format, perform specific post-processing operations and denoising on all of them, output all of them in .png format.

 

Download:

 

Note: you can run the CoronaImageCmd.exe application with additional command line parameters:

 

New in Corona 11:

Starting from Corona 11, the Corona Image Editor Command-Line Interface (CIE CLI) now includes a "--batch" parameter for optimized and faster processing of multiple files. This feature allows you to process multiple input files independently, making the batch editing significantly quicker.

 

Usage:

The "--batch" parameter can be used as follows:

CoronaImageCmd.exe [arguments] --batch input-1 output-1 input-2 output-2
 

In this command, "[arguments]" are optional settings you might want to apply to all images in the batch. For example, to enable bloom and glare for all images, your command might look like:

CoronaImageCmd.exe --set "Bool bloomGlare.enabled = true" --batch image1.cxr output1.png image2.cxr output2.png

  • While using "--batch", every provided input image must be followed by its corresponding output file name.
  • The --batch parameter is not compatible with <weight> argument, as weights are used when multiple input files are being processed together to generate a single output file.
  • We have also added the "--batch" parameter in the updated "CoronaImageBatchUpdated.bat" script, which allows for faster processing of multiple files.

CoronaImageCmd.exe --list-examples
This will print a list of various use cases of batch editing and short explanations of how to make them work. 

CoronaImageCmd.exe --help
This will print general help. 


See also: Corona Image Editor at the Chaos Documentation Portal

 

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