There are other render elements that are not included in this guide that you may need depending on the type of project, such as VrayZDepth for DOF,VrayRefraction to control the opacity and VrayExtraTex combined with Vray Dirt to create an ambient occlusion pass. Providing you are using the V-Ray frame buffer, leave all the settings as they are. This can then be used to color pick areas within your render to adjust in post (Fig.02).

VrayMtlID: As long as you have given all your materials within your scene a material ID, the resulting render element will be a mix of solid colors that correspond to a material ID.

VraySpecular: The surface specular highlights.

VrayReflection: The reflections on the surface.

Combined with the VrayDiffuseFilter the result will be VrayLighting

VrayRawLighting: This element works in the same way as the VrayRawGlobalIllumination.

VrayDiffuseFilter: The pure diffuse surface color, combined with VrayRawGlobalIllumination it will give you VrayGlobalIllumination.

This allows much more control in post processing

VrayRawGlobalIllumination: The difference between VrayRawGlobalIllumination and VrayGlobalIllumination is that the raw version is not multiplied by the diffuse color.

Within the V-Ray render settings go to the Render Elements tab and add the following elements: You can find an easy to follow step-by-step guide here I strongly recommend setting this up as it will improve many areas within your workflow. To view a full list of render elements that V-Ray supports, click here Before I start, I would like to point out that I will be using a linear workflow with a gamma 2.2 setup within 3ds Max and V-Ray. V-Ray has multiple render elements - some are compulsory whereas others are not. Without render passes you would end up rendering the image again and that is not the best way to go if you have a deadline looming. The whole process of saving out the different render passes may seem like an extra task within your workflow, but it will save you a lot of time, especially if you wish to reduce the reflection of a material or change the color of an object. These passes can then be compiled together in Adobe Photoshop (Fig.01). The purpose of rendering out multiple passes is that it allows you to tweak all aspects of an image such as global illumination, direct light, diffuse, reflection, specular etc.

Vray photoshop