Photometric lights ?

[markf]

I am using a few photometric lights to represent under cabinet task lighting. I am using the target light as a line and have chosen a fluorescent light. Getting odd behavior

 

1)The light shines in the opposite direction of the target.

 

2)Quite often for no apparent reason the lights switch themselves from line to point. This is very inconvenient to find out at render time.

 

What's up with these screwy lights? Anyone else have trouble using these things? Is there another/better way to create a light like a 4' fluorescent strip?

 

Thanks for any help.

Edited January 16, 2009 by markf

[Peter M. Gruhn]

Switching to point is something I haven't seen yet.

 

I'm on a bit of a photometrics kick since the last project. They worked very nicely for me. Architect was even able to supply the exact fixture so I could go grab the IES off the manufacturer's web site.

 

I converted my fluorescent ceiling fixtures to free linear and that worked well.

 

I frequently need to use the xyz web rotation controls to get things set up right. For instance, I made nice linear lights and loaded up my web and a week later noticed that I was reading the web wrong and the default position was 90 degrees wrong and in need of a spin around to get it to align with the line.

 

But I wonder, and haven't tested, does it matter what we claim the light is if we actually have a photometric web?

 

> Switching to point is something I haven't seen yet.

 

I lied. I have seen it, but it happened after I formatted the hard drive, reinstalled everything and moved my photometrics to a different hard drive and the poor dear (Max) couldn't find them.

[Macer]

The only time that I've come across a photometric light that shines in the opposite direct to the target was when I used a web file for a light fitting that cast the light in a certain direction (might have been up instead of down?). I don't know if the ies file was made incorrectly or if max misunderstood it or what, but I just pointed it in the op. direction and all was good. I now pay more attention to what light fitting the ies web files I use are for!

 

May not be the problem in your case but I'd thought I may as well mention it.

[garyhasler]

...Quite often for no apparent reason the lights switch themselves from line to point.....

Mark, I recently discovered this: if I have a photometric light and choose an IES file for its web source, and I then make changes to the light parameters, then the next time I click the Reload button in a material bitmap, the light will revert to whatever settings were originally loaded from the IES file. I'm pretty sure this is what is happening to you.

 

I have submitted a bug report about this.

[markf]

Thank you all for your replies! It seems to happen quite often and I just had it happen again.

 

In the display panel, I have the lights set to not display in the viewports. I isolated the cabinet geometry that the lights are located at and made some minor modification to the geometry. Exited the isolation and then rendered. Whamo, the lights that were lines had mysteriously and very inconveniently changed themselves to point lights. Weird.

[garyhasler]

If this is reproducible, please submit a bug report so maybe someone at Autodesk will take some time out from their busy schedule (of buying other companies) to fix this!