increase samples by surface or object?

[nigma46]

Having some issues in scenes where small details are taking a while to smooth out noise. Is there a way that specific objects can be prioritised for sampling? Or should I trust the adaptive sampling? How can I know it is working well though? I'm paranoid that samples are being wasted on flat surfaces and not where I need them. The optional sample count layer doesn't convinve me samples are going to the right places either. Also, my convergence layer is blank black, does that mean something is not working?

[B.Y.O.B.]

Checking the "Noise" and "Samplecount" AOVs usually gives a good idea where the adaptive sampling is concentrating the samples. Bright areas in the "Noise" AOV are considered noisy and will be sampled more often, which you should see in the "Samplecount" as brighter areas as well.

The "Convergence" AOV is a bit different. The smaller the value in there, the more noise-free and converged the pixel is considered to be, with an ideal noise-free pixel having the value 0. However, if I remember correctly, noisy pixels also have a pretty low convergence level, something around 0.05 for a slightly noisy area. So it usually doesn't give you good information if you look at it because all the values are near black most of the time.

[Sharlybg]

Also knowing a bit more about the scene can help to spot why thoses object are slower compared to the rest of your scene.
Maybe there possibility to make theses object more efficient to render.