Lighting: A couple of questions

[Jet]

I have been using a software called Accurender which works with AutoCAD and can provide photorealistic images. Since I am teaching myself max I have been getting much better with just using this interface and oneday hope to be able to use it as a total stand alone package for my architectural renderings. One of the problems that i am having is with lighting techniques.

I have been reading a couple of books and things, and in my eyes if a light is in a set of plans in a specific location, one would think that that is where it should be in the 3d model. All my renderings come out looking like bright cartoonish lighting. no realism at all. If anybody has any advice, or any suggestions, or any solid resources in reviewing this or to practice, please let me know. I have spent so long on this model and i have it imported now and would like to be able to render it now, but it is coming out pretty ugly.

Using max 3.1

 

jet

[kid]

have you started playing with the colour, multipier, attenuation, decay, and all the other light settings or are you just dropping a light in and rendering?

 

Lights in Max aren't like real lights at all, unless you are using ies data. You need to approach lighting very differently in Max. Like if there are 20 downlights in a ceiling, you might set each light multiplier to something like 0.05 or around there.

 

It just takes a lot of experimentation but it gets easier.

[Jet]

wow, i probably would have never tried to put in a .05 any kind of light. I think that I will try that, I am going to post a result from my last render on the interior that I am working on right now.

Are there any equivalency tables for the light sources and the multiplicity value out there that would help to better place a value setting on a light before selecting it?

The attached is what i typically get so

as you can see i definately need practice. Can you do me a favor. If you were doing this one, show were you would put the light sources at and its values, i want to use that as a model while learning. thanks, anyone.

 

Jet

[bigcahunak]

Like kid said - unless its an IES light (which it isn't as you are using 3.1) you would need to "trick" the scene with more than one light.

Something to start with:

Copy (instance) that light you have there (2 or 3 of them), spread them around, lower the multiplier and exlude the ceiling, and maybe even close ny walls planes (depends on render result).

If ceiling turns too dark, add another directional light from the bottom up, illuminating the ceiling only.

Hint: Unlike real life, lights don't have to be placed inside the room...

Hope it'll help.

Good luck.