Ceiling Area Lights Casting Sharp Circle/Edge on Walls

[amv256]

I am attempting to render an interior with radiosity in 3ds max 7.

 

I have created a single large rectangular photometric area light to cover the ceiling (which, in the texture, is covered in many small lights that I wish to approximate). The room is 20' tall and the light is 60'x60' and placed just below the actual ceiling plane.

 

The attached picture shows two very odd, sharp circular edges being cast onto the big blocks in the center of the room. I can get the rest of the light and shadow in the render to look perfect (not as depicted in the attached image), but no matter what I do, I cannot get rid of these circular edges on the blocks.

 

I have looked all over the documentation and played with just about every conceivable parameter. How can I get rid of these?

[abicalho]

Try rendering using "Re-Use Direct Illumination".

[amv256]

The problem isn't related to radiosity or even shadows. It's entirely based on the area light itself and it's basic illumination. For some reason, it's casting a hard-edged circular shape on the scene no matter what I do to it.

 

I also created a brand new scene from scratch to mimic this one, and even after verifying that every parameter was at its default, I got the exact same problem.

 

Since interior lighting with area lights basically wouldn't be possible if this circle was always present, there must be something I have wrong here.

[abicalho]

Alex,

 

Yes, I know about it. It's a limitation of the Scanline renderer. What I gave you was a workaround to get it to work.

 

If you're using mental ray, you can control the Area Light Sampling options, but that unfortunately does not work for the Scanline renderer.