working on lighting

[SgWRX]

so how's this? please ignore the chair leg problems, material mix up. i think the lamp in the corner is probably too bright and the leather material needs a reduction in bump. so this is MR, max9, FG + GI

 

thanks

steve

[shaneis]

Try turning the lamp lights off and tuning the sunlight correctly first. Once that is done, turn it off and tune your lamp lights. That should help you get each light to the right level and help you see how each light is contributing to the scene. The lamp lights don't seem to match the spread that you'd expect - are you using an omni/ point lights for the lamps? If so, switch them to two spotlights each - one pointing up, the other down and tune them again. That should give the impression of light being cast through a shade. You could also leave the omni in there and turn-off the shadows - use it only to emulate the bulb's glow so you have fine control over the way the lampshade is illuminated. See attached.

 

On another note, there needs to be some occlusion under your furniture. It appears too brightly lit under the chairs.

 

Keep it up,

 

S.

[SgWRX]

i can't for the life of me get a light like the example you posted. however, i was playing around with photometric lights and got good results using one pointed up and one pointed down. however, i couldn't get rid of a shadow-line between the two. main problem i run into is a real sharp edge shadow from the lamp shade on the walls (using mr omni for example). i liked the photometric lights and doing the area shadows with the mr omni, but then the mr omni isn't a real light. i suppose that's what exposure control is for. anyway, getting the light to show through the shade, ha! no clue.

 

so here's a few of my latest progress. just using mr sun/sky for this. GI and FG. i kind of like this, it's real high contrast. the lamp shades have translucency. there's some grain which could probably be dealt with in GI and FG. but i also remembered that for example, the leather material, needs some higher glossy samples to smooth it out. i think in this one it's 32?

 

EDIT: i don't have the windows in this, posted a question over in Mental Ray section about why. seems that i don't get photons through the windows. although when i noticed that i was using a MR spot to simulate the sun rather than the mr sky/sun.

[SgWRX]

(no number 1)

2. not sure i like the blue edges in the fringe of the direct light

3. direct light is a little too hot, though you can see some slight detail. not sure what the best tweak for this is

4. lamp shades could probably use wire frame details

5. there's no actual glass in the windows! keep getting GI problems even though it's a&d mental ray glass

6. window frames could be redone

7. more glossy samples in the leather material (looks a little grainy yet)

8. sky bg should be more washed out, less color and yeah, it looks like we're floating in the clouds

9. a few jagged edges here and there

10. needs a few more odds and ends and the rug sucks.

 

so other than that, any comments? this has been my lighting test. i am using MR sun/sky with FG and GI only.

 

thanks

[shaneis]

so other than that, any comments? this has been my lighting test. i am using MR sun/sky with FG and GI only.

 

thanks

 

 

2. Tone-down the BG plate, it's too saturated - a quick tweak in Photoshop should fix it. Then try to make the mrSky the same colour as the BG plates blue.

3. The "sun" needs muting a bit too, first make it's colour (R-0.75, G-0.75, B-0.75), then adjust the intensity back to a better level.

4. See the attached images for how to do a decent lampshade. Note tha I had to put an ambient light in the scene to quickly mimic GI - you wont need it as you're using real GI.

5. Check this link for all your A&D problems...

http://mentalraytips.blogspot.com/

7. See above link again

8. You could get a whole new BG or even create one using the existing plus some tree-line etc. Make sure to give it some Gaussian blur in PS and even a slight tint to colour correct the image.

10. Yes, that rug does suck.work without it for a while - once the lighting is done, then put the rug back and fix it up.

 

All the best,

 

S.

[SgWRX]

thanks. i actually came up with something similar with your light using only two photometric lights. but i'll play around with your suggestions, lighting the shade with it's own light for example.

 

the big challenge of this scene is: my camera is pointed out the darned windows! in photography, in order to get the room lighting like it is in this render, the scene outside the windows is going to be blown out. you have to think of what you want to accomplish.

 

checking "exterior daylight" gives great out the window lighting, in fact great exterior lighting. but then you've just killed your indoor lighting.

 

unchecking "exterior daylight" ...

 

in photography, i'd use fill-flash. ideally, it'd be a nice soft source of light. it would cast diffuse shadows away from the camera (or wherever the fill light was used - probably two softboxes, one on either side as far from the camera as possible) that would most likely overpower any diffuse lighting from the "sky", coming in through the windows.

 

exterior daylight+ lights in the room are probably the only best way to get this image "correct". the render in this post is probably probably accurate.

 

will post as updated.

 

EDIT: oh, i mean the render without the bg plate, if i take that out and render you get the blown-out white bg. when i use the "exterior daylight" option, then i get the mr physical sky bg.

 

thanks

[SgWRX]

i did a little experiment this morning. the sun at an angle such that one of those windows was allowing sunlight to hit the floor. so not even full noon sunlight yet. also, my blinds are closed, white metal blinds.

 

there is about an 8-fstop difference between the room being diffusely lit approx like the render (without the clouds) and when the blinds are visible and not blown out.

[shaneis]

the big challenge of this scene is: my camera is pointed out the darned windows! in photography, in order to get the room lighting like it is in this render, the scene outside the windows is going to be blown out. you have to think of what you want to accomplish.

 

 

I agree that the ones without the BG look better/ more correct. I actually prefer that blown-out look. It's much more dramatic. If it were me, I'd forget about the BG and try to get the interior looking as good as you can get it. Having those real-world camera effects is going to help the image look more realistic. I suppose that's the hard part in rendering - mimicking the artifacts of the camera lens/ aperture/ film. I wouldn't go too far and try to create a light/ camera set up that would be impossible in the real world - sure you can push it a bit, but it quickly starts to look CG after that. Similar to "pushing" the ISO/ shutter speed on a SLR camera - work well if you do it a bit, after that you lose all contrast and definition of form or venture into "special effects" photography

 

Unfortunately I cannot help you with Max specific problems - I'm a Maya user. Hopefully someone else can help you there. I've attached two shots (they're not mine - from myMentalray.com). Each is a similar lighting situation to yours and has one with blinds, one without. Hopefully they will give you some reference to work from.

 

All the best,

 

S.

[SgWRX]

thank you sir, great comments to help keep things in perspective for me! i have yet to dive into HDRI lighting, that'll be next. like you point out though there gets to be a point of looking artificial albeit some images can really look good in and of themselves without regard to realism. same holds for photography. HDR photography, man i've seen a lot of examples where they just look so bad you want to puke - 8 different exposures combined together... but again, there are some that just blow you away.

 

I agree that the ones without the BG look better/ more correct. I actually prefer that blown-out look. It's much more dramatic. If it were me, I'd forget about the BG and try to get the interior looking as good as you can get it. Having those real-world camera effects is going to help the image look more realistic. I suppose that's the hard part in rendering - mimicking the artifacts of the camera lens/ aperture/ film. I wouldn't go too far and try to create a light/ camera set up that would be impossible in the real world - sure you can push it a bit, but it quickly starts to look CG after that. Similar to "pushing" the ISO/ shutter speed on a SLR camera - work well if you do it a bit, after that you lose all contrast and definition of form or venture into "special effects" photography

 

S.