Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

MiniLight VS MoonRay

Compare MiniLight VS MoonRay and see what are their differences

MiniLight logo MiniLight

MiniLight is a minimal global illumination renderer. It is primarily an exercise in simplicity.

MoonRay logo MoonRay

MoonRay is DreamWorks Animationโ€™s in-house 3D renderer, used to render all DreamWorks movies since How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World.
  • MiniLight Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-04-27
  • MoonRay Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-04

MiniLight features and specs

No features have been listed yet.

MoonRay features and specs

  • High Performance
    MoonRay is designed for high efficiency and performance, making it suitable for rendering large and complex scenes quickly.
  • Open Source
    Being open-source allows for greater collaboration and innovation within the community, providing users the ability to modify and improve the software.
  • Feature Rich
    MoonRay includes a wide range of features, such as global illumination, support for a variety of shading models, and node-based compositing, which enhance its rendering capabilities.
  • Community Support
    An active community can provide assistance, tutorials, and share assets that can help new users in learning and solving problems.

Possible disadvantages of MoonRay

  • Steep Learning Curve
    Due to its advanced features and capabilities, new users might find MoonRay challenging to learn and master initially.
  • Hardware Demands
    Rendering in MoonRay can be resource-intensive, requiring powerful hardware for optimal performance, which may not be accessible to all users.
  • Limited Documentation
    As a newer open-source project, MoonRay might suffer from limited documentation, making it difficult for users to find detailed guides and resources.
  • Integration Challenges
    While powerful, integrating MoonRay into existing workflows may require additional setup and adjustment, especially if users are transitioning from different rendering engines.

MiniLight videos

No MiniLight videos yet. You could help us improve this page by suggesting one.

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MoonRay videos

The MoonRay S Resin 3D Printer // Product Review & Highlights

More videos:

  • Review - The Next Big Action RPG?! โ”‚ Moonray NFT Game Review
  • Review - MoonRay - Andrew Pearce, Randy Packer, Mark Jackels, Dan McCann, & Keith Jeffery, DreamWorks

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to MiniLight and MoonRay)
3D Rendering
24 24%
76% 76
3D
24 24%
76% 76
Game Development
26 26%
74% 74
Architecture
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

Share your experience with using MiniLight and MoonRay. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, MoonRay seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 1 time since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

MiniLight mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of MiniLight yet. Tracking of MiniLight recommendations started around Mar 2021.

MoonRay mentions (1)

  • Guys, remember when DreamWorks dropped the bomb that MoonRay would be open source by 2022? I'm just hoping it's not slipping anyone's mind. Let's keep our fingers crossed for some sweet open source action!
    Hey guys, so I've been keeping my eyes peeled on this website, https://openmoonray.org/, for like 4 freaking months and lemme tell ya, not a damn thing has changed. And to make matters worse, people stopped gabbing about it after the 3rd week of August. I'm not even that tech-savvy, but I was genuinely excited to see what peeps could possibly create with this. But now it's almost 2022 and nada. What gives? Source: over 2 years ago

What are some alternatives?

When comparing MiniLight and MoonRay, you can also consider the following products

LuxCoreRender - LuxCoreRender is a physically based and unbiased rendering engine.

Adobe Dimension - Create high-quality, photorealistic images with the 3D tool made for graphic designers.

appleseed - appleseed is an open source, physically-based global illumination rendering engine primarily designed for animation and visual effects.

Malt - Blender rendering framework for Non-Photorealistic Rendering (NPR).

POV-Ray - What was then called STAR-Light, and later renamed to PV-Ray and ultimately POV-Ray, has therefore been on this planet for a whopping 9, 190 (or 11, 000) revolutions by now (plus another guesstimated 150 above it).

Cycles Renderer - Cycles is Blenderโ€™s ray-trace based production render engine and in development since 2011.