AE 17.0 no 3d ray-traced option

[KimKvist]

After updating premiere to version 14.0 and after effects to 17.0, i was prompted to fix my graphics drivers for both my Nvidia quadro m2200 and intel 630.

I updated both, and Premiere is running fine now, but After Effects doesn't offer 3D ray-traced anymore.

How do i get that feature back?

My old projects doesn't work without 3D ray-traced.

[Rom1P · Accepted solution]

Hello.
Fixing yout grahics driver is useless : Adobe simply decided to remove the 3D Ray Trace rendering engine.
personally I consider it a gigantic step back, because being forced to go through C4D for a simple deformatin layer with motion blur and a little depth of field is a monumental idiocy. Why make easy when we can do very complicated ??

If it hurts you, adobe, let people choose to use 3D rendering by raytracing but do not remove it like that without saying anything ... I'm not about to update my 2019 version and I know a lot of graphic designers in france who are in this case ...

[Sterphy]

All of 2020 is a step back. 

[Mayon1988]

We want raytrace Engine back!!! Hope adobe brings it.

[Roland Kahlenberg]

Send in a Feature Request - https://adobe-video.uservoice.com/forums/911311-after-effects

And hope enough users back up the request to make the AE Team think and then perhaps return this feature.

[Roland Kahlenberg · Accepted solution]

The Ray-trace Engine was removed in AE 2020. You can use the Cinema 4D Renderer to extrude AE Text and Shape Layers. Unfortunately, not all features available in the raytracing engine is available in the C4D Renderer - but it's pretty close.

You can also look into installing BOTH AE 2019 and AE 2020 on the same system. This way, you get the benefits of both world and a BIG PLUS is that AEPs are interoperable across both versions as long as the features you use are available in both versions.

[Rom1P]

You said everything in this sentence :
"Unfortunately, not all features available in the raytracing engine is available in the C4D Renderer"

When you need simple but very useful functions like motion blur and depth of field, it's impossible without having to go through the extraction of 3D layers (EXR?) And go through a fake MB (CC ForceMB...)
To this it is no longer possible to open old projects to modify them. We have to keep a verisn 2019 "just in case" ... It's a very heavy management you will agree.

[Roland Kahlenberg]

Lots of AE users have multiple versions of AE installed. It's a case of setting up our systems to cater to issues beyond our control. You also have the prerogative to send in a request to bring back the raytracer or update the C4D render such that it has identical or better features than the raytracer.

[Rom1P]

Even if many users have several versions of installed, it does not solve absolutely the problem: already because it is necessary to maintain the payment of each license and especially because of one verison to another, the projects are not not compatible: it is enough for example that a project is created on a version with the use of certain particularities related to the version so that the project can not be opened on another version which does not integrate these peculiarities.
It is very restrictive, especially in a freelance environment where we may have to modify the project of someone else ...

As for Adobe to reintroduce the 3D engine, if Adobe decided to remove it, I doubt that it is possible ...

The concern is that the current workflow of some productions may be turned upside down, and the transision will not be as easy for companies as it has been faciel for Adobe to remove a useful function as the 3D engine. .

[Rick Gerard]

One more point. Ray-traced rendering was always buggy and slot, did not work very well or at all if you used the Adobe Media Encoder, and NVIDIA kept changing the standards. That is why it was deprecated then removed. 

If you want to extrude or bend layers and have a lot more control than you ever did with Ray-Traced rendering export your Classic 3D comp as a C4D file and open it up in C4D Lite. In all the years that Ray-traced rendering was available, I only used it once in a project for a client. I export comps to C4D files all the time. It is a much better workflow.

[Rom1P]

I've never had a problem with adobe's 3D RT rendering, even with AME, that's one of the reasons I used it since the CS6 with an nvidia gpu.
To go through c4d for a simple deformation of a layer is an enormity: a colossal loss of time, totally counterproductive. We go back to a workflow of 10 years ago back ...
So I'm not saying that everyone had the usefulness of this 3D engine in AE, but some if, and contrary to what beuacoup seem to think, it was very powerful and allowed to waste a lot of time in production than to go from to each other between ae and c4d.
By forcing users to go through c4d to animate and / or modify a simple layer curvature for example, and return to AE, return to c4d to adjust the depth of field, change the motion bur sampling and so on, it's a great addict to the workflow.