[brainspoon]

Hi
i decided to get deeper into 3d lighting, but in the classic way. not that global illumination stuff. i will buy some books about this topic, but i also wanted to read some opinions and strategies from people with pratical experience.
my interests are in lighting complex rooms and outdoor scenes. how to work with shadows and bounce lights.


My Artwork

[Frog]

"digital lighting and rendering" by jeremy birn is an ok book on this subject, the only CG-related lighting book I know of anyway.

This may sound odd, but I found that learning about photography is what really got me understanding light, whether natural or artificial. You will learn a lot about lighting by reading books that deal with photographic lighting, and all the techniques and theories from photography and film can be ported over to 3d.

At the moment it's far more efficient to fake all the effects of GI and caustics using standard lights, not only does it give you a much greater understanding of why light behaves the way it does but it also leads to much faster render times

[Lunatique]

Lighting theories from photography definitely helps.

Some of the main lessons in photography that could apply to 3D lighting would be basics like:

1)key light(your strongest light sourse)
2)fill light(secondeary light source to prevent completely blacked out shadows)
3)back light(to create the nice halo effect)
4)bounced light(same as fill light, done with reflectors)

It doesn't really get more complex than the combination of the 4 lighting sources. I think if you know how to use them in combination, you'll be able to light just about any kind of scene.

Just do a search on photography lighting techniques and you'll find tons of sites.

Here's good one to start you off. It's really for glamour photography, but the knowledge will apply to anything else:

Garage Glamour Photography Lighting Tips

[ March 11, 2002: Message edited by: Lunatique ]

[brainspoon]

thanks for your answer. all you said was clear to me befor. my intentions was that maybe someone would share his production experience, for example setting up a a complex room with lots of stuff in it. might be possible that everybody could learn something new here.
if you watched my homepage you can see that the kitchen was my first try in realisting lighting.
the hangar needs lot of work to look good. until now i have no concept for a good light design for it.

[brainspoon]

and thanks for the link

[Anthony]

Matters of Light And Depth by Russ Lowell has some good photo/film info in it. Reads on a pretty basic level.

[balistic]

I'm a professional 3D lighting designer. Here's something I posted to another thread:

General tips for interesting lighting:
- Don't be afraid of shadows. The detail contained in darker areas is often a very important part of the definition of a scene's atmosphere and mood.

- Consider color. Don't make all your light sources gray. And there's no rule that keeps you from using a cool key light with warm fills . . . it can be an interesting reversal of the norm.

- Remember that light affects the air. We exist in a volume of gas that can be illuminated . . . don't just light surfaces, remember to light volumes.

- You don't always need to highlight the most important part of a scene. Sometimes a portrait is much more powerful when the subject is in relative shadow.

- Remember to cast shadows. I am amazed at how often 2D artists neglect this. They'll "shade" their drawings, but they won't actually put in cast shadows.

- Lighting that originates from near the camera is going to suggest flash photography. Its usually undesirable, but you can use it to intentionally create a feeling of confrontation.

- Don't forget radiance. Light doesn't stop when it hits a surface (unless the surface is black), it assumes the color of that surface and will influence surrounding surfaces and volumes.

Other advice:

- Study Pixar. Their lighting artists are unmatched.

- 3-point lighting has very little use outside of character glam shots. You will almost never be able to use it in an environment that gets shot from different angles. Lighting an environment is much trickier than lighting a lone character . . . focus on that challenge and you'll be better off.

[brainspoon]

hey thanks Brian
that are tips i'm searching for. in most cases i have to light rooms. i'm using maya and experienced the problem that it gets very slow when you use light links. i hoped to speed up rendering with it, but opening scenes and such stuff takes 10 times longer or more when i have links in it. if you saw the hangar on my page, it's one of those scenes. i also have the problem, when i try to achieve some radiance i loose much of the contrast.
i watched your homepage and have to say that your work is where i want to get.
i hope that we will get a project at work, that requires more realism not that game look.