Using HDRI - some questions

[Cesar R]

Tonight I decided to install max 2011 and downloaded the fryrender demo.

So far I am liking it. As I am getting ready to try a more complex scene I decided to try to use HDRI to light the scene and I have some questions:

 

The official manual (PDF) says: "The power of the environment in fryrender is relative

to that of a standard sky at noon. So if you set

a white environment with Power=100% you will get

an illumination intensity equivalent to that of a sky"

 

What does this mean in plain English?

 

Is there a relationship between the color picker and the HDRI map?

 

Here is a screen shot that I am hope you guys can help me with:

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]44078[/ATTACH]

 

I loaded an HDRI image to the environment map. I am presuming that item #2 "power" will control the influence of the HDRI on the scene?

 

When there is an HDRI map loaded, item #1 "environment color" becomes an environment tint that overrides the color lighting of the HDRI map?

 

I also wonder why is that my HDRI do not contribute to the lighting too much. Whereas on the image below form an Fry user, it seems that the HDRI is doing all the work.

 

http://www.hypergraphics.it/fry/jabal3.jpg