Overview#
When the live preview is not enough, you use the Render command to produce a final image. It opens a dialog with a choice of renderer.
- Local Renderer renders on your own computer in the background, so you can keep working.
- Cloud Renderer renders in the cloud and requires tokens in your account, depending on the settings; the dialog shows how many you need and have.
Both use the same scene: appearances, decals, environment, camera and depth of field. The differences are the engine hardware, speed and cost, and where results are stored.
Autodesk's help gives no token amounts for rendering; read them from the dialog.
Where to find it#
- Render workspace > Render > Render (opens the render settings dialog with presets or custom settings).
- Rendering Gallery: a thumbnail appears there when you start a render; once a progress bar shows under it you can click it to see progress. Finished local renders appear there too, where you can preview, re-render or save them. Autodesk's gallery topic says it shows cloud renderings for the active design.
Step by step#
Start a render#
- Frame your shot and finish scene settings.
- Click Render in the Render workspace.
- Choose a preset or custom settings, then choose Local Renderer or Cloud Renderer.
- Choose quality: Standard or Final. For local, Advanced settings shows a slider with four marked levels, Draft, Standard, Final and Excellent; quality is not linear along them.
- Resolution, aspect ratio, background and format options are set in this dialog; the API exposes resolution, an isBackgroundTransparent flag and a renderQuality value.
- If cloud: the dialog shows the tokens needed and your balance. Check before confirming.
- Click Render. A thumbnail appears in the Rendering Gallery.
Monitor and retrieve#
- Open the Render Gallery.
- Select the thumbnail to see progress.
- When complete, preview, re-render or save the image from the gallery.
- To re-render, select the thumbnail and click Re-render, then pick a preset or set the Render Settings.
- Drag a thumbnail into the Render on Save area to re-render it every time the design is saved; each version is stored and viewable from the thumbnail's fly-out menu.
Test cheaply#
- Duplicate your intended settings but reduce the resolution to something small (for instance 800 x 450) and the quality to the lowest preset.
- Render locally. Inspect composition, reflections and materials.
- Raise resolution and quality for the final.
Options reference#
| Option | What it does | Notes/default |
|---|---|---|
| Renderer: Local / Cloud | Where the job runs | Cloud needs tokens |
| Quality: Standard / Final | Two quality settings, similar results in local and cloud | Cloud offers only these two |
| Advanced slider (local) | Draft, Standard, Final, Excellent | Not linear |
| Resolution | Output pixel dimensions | Strongly affects time and cost |
| Tokens area (cloud) | Tokens needed and available | Shown in the dialog |
| Rendering Gallery | Thumbnails of renders | Re-render, Render on Save |
Quality levels in practice#
The local Advanced slider is marked Draft, Standard, Final and Excellent. Autodesk says Draft is meant for the quickest preview and Excellent for a perfect result, and that quality does not increase linearly along the slider. Cloud offers Standard or Final.
A sensible workflow:
- Draft: the lowest preset at small size, local, to check composition.
- Review: standard preset at screen resolution, for client or team feedback.
- Final: the highest preset you need at the target resolution, usually in the cloud if you have credits, or overnight locally.
Local versus cloud compared#
| Aspect | Local | Cloud |
|---|---|---|
| Cost | No tokens listed in the help | Requires tokens |
| Speed | Depends on your CPU/GPU | Generally fast and consistent |
| Your PC during render | Busy | Free |
| Connection | Not stated in the help | Cloud service |
| Large resolution | Depends on your hardware | Not stated |
| Predictability | Varies with hardware | Token amount shown in dialog |
Tips and pitfalls#
Tip: Do a local test before every cloud render. Credits spent on an image with the wrong environment rotation are wasted.
Note: not confirmed in Autodesk's documentation: which licenses include cloud rendering tokens, and whether closing Fusion stops a local render.
Tip: Local rendering runs in the background, so you can keep working while it renders.
Tip: Render at the final aspect ratio even for tests, so framing does not change later.
Tip: Name renders in the Gallery (for example "Hero v3 - Navy") so you can match them to design versions.
Note: not confirmed in Autodesk's documentation: that a submitted job uses a snapshot of the design.
Tip: Need a transparent background for compositing? Use PNG and verify the ground shadow behavior. Render a test patch on a colored backdrop in your image editor.
Further considerations:
- Output sizes beyond a few thousand pixels need significant memory locally; if the local render fails, reduce the size or move to the cloud.
- Noise is the visible sign of too few samples. If you see speckles in shadows or glass, raise the quality rather than the resolution.
- Keep a record of settings (environment, rotation, brightness, quality, size) so you can reproduce a render when the design is revised.
- For batches of colorways, create each variation in the design and submit one render per variation.
Quality presets, verified#
In the API the render quality is a value from 25 to 100. Autodesk documents that 75, the default, is the same as Final in the user interface and that 100 is the same as Excellent. The numbers behind Draft and Standard are not documented. The practical consequence is that the default is already a high-quality setting: if you accept it without thinking you may spend more time or credits than a review image needs.
| Purpose | Suggested setting | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| Composition and material check | Draft (local), small size | Seconds, not minutes |
| Review image for a team | Standard at 1920 x 1080 | Clean enough for decisions |
| Client or web image | Final (75) at target size | Documented default, good balance |
| Print, glass-heavy or chrome-heavy shots | Excellent (100) | Lowest noise on caustic-like effects and clear glass |
Worked example: estimating time and cost#
Render time scales with pixel count. A 1920 x 1080 image has 2.07 megapixels; a 3840 x 2160 image has 8.29, or four times as many. If a local render at 1080p and Final takes 12 minutes on your machine, plan for around 48 minutes at 4K and Final, and perhaps twice that again at Excellent. Rather than guessing, do one calibration: render a 960 x 540 image (a quarter of the pixels of 1080p) at your intended quality, time it, and multiply by four for 1080p and sixteen for 4K. This is a better predictor than the preset names, and it also catches scenes that are unusually expensive because of glass.
For the cloud, the dialog shows the tokens needed for the settings and your balance. Compare the figure for a small calibration size with the figure at your final size, and step down if the destination does not need the extra resolution. Cloud offers only Standard and Final.
Troubleshooting#
| Symptom | Likely cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Local render fails at large size | Memory limit (general guidance) | Reduce size, or use the cloud |
| Local render is very slow | Integrated graphics, many glass bodies | Hide small or hidden parts, lower quality, or use the cloud |
| Cloud job stuck in the Gallery | Not covered in the docs | Check your connection and sign-in; resubmit if the job never starts |
| Result looks different from the live preview | Different sampling, different quality | Compare at the same scene and quality; adjust exposure |
| Render ignores a late design change | Snapshot taken at submit | Cancel and resubmit |
| Soft or blurry local result at maximum quality | Image scaling or resolution too small | Increase pixel size, check decal source resolution and re-render |
| Transparent PNG has dark halo | Matte or shadow in the alpha | Disable the ground plane, or composite onto a matching color |
Workflow advice#
Treat renders like print jobs: lock the design first. Duplicate the design to a "render" copy or save a version before a long job so you can restore it. Write the settings (environment, rotation, brightness, exposure, camera Named View, resolution, quality) in the Gallery name, for example "Hero 3Q 1080 F75 env-studio-a". When a design revision lands, you can rerun with identical settings and the only difference will be the geometry.
For multiple colorways, make each variant in its own saved version, submit them in sequence, and name each render by the variant. For long local jobs (general guidance), use power settings that prevent sleep and close other GPU-intensive applications.
Practice exercise#
- Frame your Hero view and set the aspect ratio to 16:9.
- Run a Local render at 960 x 540 at Draft. Record the time.
- Run a Local render at 960 x 540 at Final. Record the time and the noise in shadows at 100 percent zoom.
- Using the calibration, predict the time for 1920 x 1080 at Final (multiply by 4), then run it and compare. Note the percentage error.
- Open the render dialog, choose Cloud Renderer, and note the token amount at 1920 x 1080 and at 3840 x 2160. Do not submit.
- Rename each Gallery render with its settings.
- Expected result: a table of three timings, a prediction within roughly 30 percent of the measured time, a note of two token amounts, and a decision about the lowest quality and size that satisfies your destination.
Related#
- In-Canvas Render
- Scene Settings and Environment
- Tips for Photoreal Output