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Working in the Dark

DarkElfDarkElf Posts: 518
in The Commons

Hello All.

I am wondering about something ... when I load certain sets everything suddenly goes dark and I cannot see anything. For example ... I had a few characters in my developing scene and posed them and so forth. Then, I loaded Stonemason's Willow Creek and everything went dark and I could not see what I am doing.

Why does this happen and how can I work around this?

Thanks for any help.

Comments

  • JOdelJOdel Posts: 6,322

    If a set comes with its own lights it sometimes cancels the basic worklights. Or some sets come in with settings to turn the worklights off so you need to add your own lights.

    And a lot of light sets replace whatever lights are in a scene, rather than adding to them.

  • IceDragonArtIceDragonArt Posts: 12,908

    Up above the viewport screen is a tiny little box with lines.  Inside this drop down box you can click on preview lights and you will be able to see your scene while working on it.

  • Serene NightSerene Night Posts: 17,704

    Ctrl L will toggle lights on and of in the viewport 

  • benniewoodellbenniewoodell Posts: 2,000

    Yeah, what I usually do when this happens is I simply put a spotlight from my current view, spread angle wider to light up the view and then just turn it off before I render out the shot. 

  • DarkElfDarkElf Posts: 518
    edited November 2018

    WOW! Awesome! Thank you all for your replies!

    IceDragonArt, your suggestion works superbly as does yours Serene Night! The only difference is that the Control L is just a bit quicker.

    Thank you everybody! laugh

    Post edited by DarkElf on
  • DarkElfDarkElf Posts: 518

    So, can anybody tell me why this happens since the Stonemason scene has lights in it? Why can I see nothing in the scene when there are lights there?

  • benniewoodellbenniewoodell Posts: 2,000

    If you're talking about like the signs or the fluorescent bulbs, those are in the surface tab and not in the lights. I don't know the exact reason, but I realized that if the light is coming from the scene itself and the luminensce is found in the surface tab, it won't show until you render. 

  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 108,889

    Also, OpenGL can usually show only the first 8 lights - one of which is reserved for the camera headlight even if it isn't on. If the first seven actual lihgts are not shining in a helpful direction then the scene will be dark unless you use ctrl-L or the emnu command to toggle Preview Lights off, or adjust the priority of the lights so that those shining on the area you wish to look at are first.

  • IceDragonArtIceDragonArt Posts: 12,908

    Glad I could help.  I always forget about the Ctrl L shortcut for some reason lol.

  • StonemasonStonemason Posts: 1,230

    I think the only lighting in that set is the sun/sky system..if your using the cameras that came with Willow Creek then it'll be the headlamp making things dark,I leave this switched off as it adds lighting that I don't want into the scene..you can swicth it back on in the cameras paramaters

  • DarkElfDarkElf Posts: 518

    Not sure why I didn't get notices of all these new posts I got since I last looked.

    I got notified after the first one. Hmmm. Oh well. Guess I shouldn't expect anything better from DAZ's website.

    Thank you all for your replies. I seem to remember hearing about certain lights that do not show until rendering.

    Headlamp off ... thanks for the type Stonemason.

    I try to check back in case there are any other replies I don't get notified of.

  • IceDragonArtIceDragonArt Posts: 12,908

    One more tip, if you don't ever use the headlamp you can set up a scene with just a camera with the headlamp off and save it as your starter scene.  I have mine set up to load automatically when Studio launches, so I never have to remember to turn the headlamp off. 

  • FSMCDesignsFSMCDesigns Posts: 12,846
    IceDragonArt said:

    One more tip, if you don't ever use the headlamp you can set up a scene with just a camera with the headlamp off and save it as your starter scene.  I have mine set up to load automatically when Studio launches, so I never have to remember to turn the headlamp off. 

    I use this free light set often and it comes with a headlamp blocker

    http://www.valzheimer.info/2016/11/va2016-rgb-hdri-soft-lights-for-daz.html

     

  • Richard HaseltineRichard Haseltine Posts: 108,889

    You can turn the Headlamp off in Render Settings too, though you would still need an auto-load scene or preset to apply that. The camera setting is an over-ride for the Render setting, it isn't necessary to use that.

  • DarkElfDarkElf Posts: 518
    IceDragonArt said:

    One more tip, if you don't ever use the headlamp you can set up a scene with just a camera with the headlamp off and save it as your starter scene.  I have mine set up to load automatically when Studio launches, so I never have to remember to turn the headlamp off. 

    Hmmm. Thanks for this tip also IceDragonArt.

    Also, thanks for the tip and link FSMC Designs.

    Richard, good to know it can be turned off in the settings too.

    Thanks for all the additional tip all. Glad I came back to check since I never got notified ... again.

  • dragotxdragotx Posts: 1,147
    IceDragonArt said:

    One more tip, if you don't ever use the headlamp you can set up a scene with just a camera with the headlamp off and save it as your starter scene.  I have mine set up to load automatically when Studio launches, so I never have to remember to turn the headlamp off. 

    That's also the best way to get your preferred render settings to save and load every time, if you use anything that's not the default
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