What HDRI Packages here are compatible with Reality 4.1?

wargis

Doesn't anyone know which HDRI Packs in the shop are really compatible with Reality 4.1? I found some interesting products - Sphere of Light - Enviroment Lighting, DAZ Studio Iray HDR Outdoor Environments, Apocalyptic Plant Indoors Set 2 and Inane Glory's products like Dawn to Dusk. But I have found too little info how they will work in Reality (Lux Render), mostly this info is confusing like this thread - http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/50496/best-reality-4-light-package , where one user said that Sphere of Light - Enviroment Lighting will work, and another said it will not. This package was made for DS, but as I learned recently, it utilizes its own Skydome, and TIFF and HDR images as textures. What about IRAY products - as I've learned, they contain HDR images in the Textures folder, but no TIFF or IBL files.
In Reality I have the IBL Sphere prop, the same as Skydomes and I can apply different textures to this prop. I suppose there is a way to apply any HDR textures without Iray or DS presets to the Reality 4 IBL sphere, but I don't know how to do it right for such products. HiroProtagonist in that thread wrote how to make SmartIBL file for Skies of Economy -

[Header]
Name = "Skies of Economy Sunny 4"
Author = "Dimension Theory"

[Background]
; The image that appears in the DS viewport
BGfile = "SoE-Sunny4R.jpg"

[Enviroment]
; Gamma picked up from here
; EVfile name required (image used by Luxrender)
EVfile = "SoE-Sunny4.exr"
EVgamma = 1.000000

[Reflection]
; The image used by Luxrender
REFfile = "SoE-Sunny4.exr"

Can I do such SmartIBL with HDR images from abovesaid packages to make them usable in Reality 4.1?  In general - how make any HDR image to work in Reality 4.1 as the texture for IBL Sphere and as the source of light? Especially Sphere of Light - Enviroment Lighting and DAZ Studio Iray HDR Outdoor Environments - they look very attractive and simple to use. What must be the texture for BGfile, if there is no JPG or EXR files, just HDR files?

mjc1016

wargis said:

What must be the texture for BGfile, if there is no JPG or EXR files, just HDR files?

HDR images should display fine...

wargis

Yes, HDR images must be Environment Files (EVfile) and REFfiles, as it is in built-in sample IBL packages of Reality 4, like Chiricahua_Plaza, but this package contains several different files - BGfile = "GravelPlaza_8k.jpg", EVfile = "GravelPlaza_Env.hdr", REFfile = "GravelPlaza_REF.hdr" and any similar package with JPG and HDR files work properly in R4. But what to do with the single HDR file, how to convert it to JPG, especially without losing quality?
And one more question - if sometimes I need just lightning without Reality IBL Sphere texture, how to disable visibility for Reality IBL Sphere? I made its texture hidden in Materials Tab, but when using such IBLs as Chiricahua_Plaza, it is shown on render all the same. (I have almost null experience with IBLs, so ask such silly questions).

mjc1016

You don't need to...hdr should display just fine.

I'm not 100% sure, but I think you need to turn off the sphere and turn on 'premultiply alpha'.

Hiro Protagonist

You can use the HDR file from any package in Luxrender, assuming it's in a suitable format, and I would have thought they all are. "LatLong" is the usual, but Lux will also use "angular" (these are disk-shaped inside a square). It's the .hdr or .exr file that is loaded in the IBL section of Reality. However, in order to preview the IBL in Studio you will need a jpeg version, and that is loaded onto the "RealityIBLSphere" that appears in your Scene tab in Studio. This must be in LatLong format. This is for preview only and is not rendered, therefore the quality isn't important. I presume an .exr/hdr file would use a lot more memory in Studio so a jpeg copy is used.

The .IBL template I posted makes it easy to load both images in the right places if you are putting together your own IBL sets for Luxrender. You can also set the gamma in the .IBL file.

The most popular free IBL sets are from hdrlabs.com ("sIBL Archive"). I see these used all the time both with Luxrender and Iray. There are also some free IBLs from hdr-sets.com—these are very good quality, and quality is very important for getting good lighting from IBL.

You can render with an IBL in Reality/Luxrender without it rendering as a background image. It's the option in the Render/Output tab of Reality labelled "Transparent BG".

wargis

Thanks for explanatiions, Hiro Protagonist, you wrote the nice IBL template. I managed to get JPG images by converting HDR via Photoshop, although quality after reducing to 8-bits becomes worse. Now I can use these JPEGs as textures for IBL Sphere and BGfiles, it makes all work simpler.

mjc1016

Studio should preview the hdr and exr formats without the need to convert.  3Delight has had the ability to use both for a while now and that adds the needed dlls to Studio to use them as is.