Tutorial Uber Area Lighting: The Basics

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  • Yonas AngYonas Ang Posts: 108
    edited October 2013

    SS added at post above, ignore the crooked leftside wall >.<<br /> thanks

    Post edited by Yonas Ang on
  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    Sorry but I am still not understanding where the cube is and what you are trying to achieve. Can you break it down for me please or show me a screenshot of what it looks like in the viewport window and not a render. Where is the cube exaclty?

    Also what version of Daz Studio are you using DS 4.6.1.17?

  • Yonas AngYonas Ang Posts: 108
    edited December 1969

    Yup, the latest DS 4.6 updated 4.6.1.17
    Here is the image of my viewport

    Blue strokes = where the emmision come from, the cube / elevator door rim
    Red strokes = area where didn't get lit

    Capture.JPG
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  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    So which part did you apply Area Light Base to, the doors? Sorry I am just having a hard time understanding, probably due to some heavy pain killers I am on due to being on a bus that had an accident recently.:)

    Also Ambient is onlly if you want something to glow and plays no part in emiting light so I would drop ambient to 0%.for now.

    Where did this mesh/cube like object come from?

  • Yonas AngYonas Ang Posts: 108
    edited November 2013

    Sorry, my English is bit messed up, sometimes it's hard for me to make a structured sentence

    The mesh of the light source is from the blue stripped area, and
    I want to lit the elevator door which is red stripped area

    Wish you get well soon Szark ^^

    Post edited by Yonas Ang on
  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited November 2013

    Right I understand now but I think you are misunderstanding how these lights work.

    The only part of that blue stripped area that would cast any light on to the doors is a small narrow strip on the inside of the blue stripped area surrounding the doors and really that is not much space to emit light to get what you want. I think you would be better off thinking of another way to light this.

    Or you could make that inside edge a Material Zone of it own so that inside egde is the light source so you can really amp up the instensity without over lighting the whole scene.

    Post edited by Szark on
  • Yonas AngYonas Ang Posts: 108
    edited December 1969

    Szark said:
    Right I understand now but I think you are misunderstanding how these lights work.

    The only part of that blue stripped area that would cast any light on to the doors is a small narrow strip on the inside of the blue stripped area surrounding the doors and really that is not much space to emit light to get what you want. I think you would be better off thinking of another way to light this.

    Or you could make that inside edge a Material Zone of it own so that inside egde is the light source so you can really amp up the instensity without over lighting the whole scene.

    It works, by assigning the inside edge to the new surface and have their own lightning setting. Thank you Szark, didn't cross my mind that we have that function in DAZ, I rarely used it unless for very detailed scene.

  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    My pleasure and we got there in the end which is what matters. :)

  • NovicaNovica Posts: 23,859
    edited December 1969

    Svark, OT- I hope you are okay, sorry to hear about the bus accident. Hugs from Florida. You take care of yourself. Hope everyone around you pampers you!

  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited August 2019

    (Even bigger OT)
    Thank you Novica, very kind of you. I have some heavy duty meds and I should be back to my normal self in a couple of weeks, as for pampering well I only have me (as my family live in New Zealand) :) To be honest I was more concerned with the elder lady in front of me, on that bus, who went flying, bumped her head and landed on the floor facing the opposite direction with her leg twisted and trapped under the seat. I didn't leave until the paramedics told me she would be fine. I am old school and care about others, not like the rest of the passengers who just wanted to get off as quick as possible. Many didn't even show concern. I hate what the world is turning into sometimes.

    Post edited by Szark on
  • Yonas AngYonas Ang Posts: 108
    edited December 1969

    This tutorial really open up my eyes what DAZ and 3Delight engine could achieve if you know how to utilize every feature they have.
    Before, I was only playing with default DAZ lightning that have lot of limitation, but now I could make even more realistic render.
    My advice to other newbie like me, don't be shy to look for tutorial and ask question of what you don't understand.

    Here is the example what you could do with this Uber Area Lighting

    http://fav.me/d6t2uq7
    (Deviantart link)

    Thank you Szark, and cheers!!

  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited November 2013

    Thank you ang_deedee well you certainly learn quickly, impressive and nice lighting in that image. I am glad it helped.

    Post edited by Szark on
  • NovicaNovica Posts: 23,859
    edited December 1969

    This tutorial really open up my eyes what DAZ and 3Delight engine could achieve if you know how to utilize every feature they have.

    Here is the example what you could do with this Uber Area Lighting
    (Deviantart link)
    Thank you Szark, and cheers!!

    TOS states family friendly doesn't it? Including links? A warning of Mature Content needs to be put on that. All ages visit the forums.
    That said, it's beautifully done with the lighting.

  • fixmypcmikefixmypcmike Posts: 19,565
    edited December 1969

    Novica said:
    This tutorial really open up my eyes what DAZ and 3Delight engine could achieve if you know how to utilize every feature they have.

    Here is the example what you could do with this Uber Area Lighting
    (Deviantart link)
    Thank you Szark, and cheers!!

    TOS states family friendly doesn't it? Including links? A warning of Mature Content needs to be put on that. All ages visit the forums.
    That said, it's beautifully done with the lighting.

    Deviant Art has Mature Content filters, which are set for that image, so the link is permissible.

  • Yonas AngYonas Ang Posts: 108
    edited November 2013

    Szark said:
    Thank you ang_deedee well you certainly learn quickly, impressive and nice lighting in that image. I am glad it helped.

    Thank you Szark

    Novica said:

    TOS states family friendly doesn't it? Including links? A warning of Mature Content needs to be put on that. All ages visit the forums.
    That said, it's beautifully done with the lighting.

    Thank you Novica, and thanks for the tips, I completely forgot about that, and will be more careful about that ^^ from now on, but as fixmypcmike mentioned thankfully Deviantart has that function, and I always set mature content 'on' for images like that.


    Deviant Art has Mature Content filters, which are set for that image, so the link is permissible.

    Post edited by Yonas Ang on
  • ChoholeChohole Posts: 33,604
    edited December 1969

    Szark said:
    Thank you ang_deedee well you certainly learn quickly, impressive and nice lighting in that image. I am glad it helped.

    Thank you Szark

    Novica said:

    TOS states family friendly doesn't it? Including links? A warning of Mature Content needs to be put on that. All ages visit the forums.
    That said, it's beautifully done with the lighting.

    Thank you Novica, and thanks for the tips, I completely forgot about that, and will be more careful about that ^^ from now on, but as fixmypcmike mentioned thankfully Deviantart has that function, and I always set mature content 'on' for images like that.


    Deviant Art has Mature Content filters, which are set for that image, so the link is permissible.

    Yes and as an add on to that. When people do want to post an image that wouldn't pass the DAZ 3D TOS we do actually recommend that they post it at Deviant Art and just post the link here, as long as the filters are applied, for just that very reason. It does have the filters we currently lack here.

  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    thanks mike and cho...Didn't get any notifications of reply again.

  • edited November 2013

    Having a good bit of trouble getting the uber area light to work. Doesn't seem to be putting out any light whatsoever when I render, so everything just comes out black. I've got the light applied to a plane, then parented to the camera, just like in your posts. I've attached a screenshot in case I've got something set up wrong.

    Thanks for your help. :)

    Edit: Well after reading through the thread a bit more, I've found out how to get the light working, now the problem is that, for some reason, everything is coming out horribly underlit. Even when I've turned off all other lights in the scene. (top attachment)

    Test_2.png
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    Test_Setup.png
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    Post edited by mirage.dragon.myrgon_58afcf7f16 on
  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    Where is the Area Light Plane positioned. It might need a couple to do what you want but without knowing what you are trying to achieve I cannot help.

    At least you got it working..first stage complete..now to refine it. ;)

  • edited November 2013

    Szark said:
    Where is the Area Light Plane positioned. It might need a couple to do what you want but without knowing what you are trying to achieve I cannot help.

    At least you got it working..first stage complete..now to refine it. ;)

    The plane is parented to and positioned with with the camera.

    The weird thing is that even if I move the camera so that you're looking down on the model, the lighting still looks like it's coming from below.

    As for what I'm trying to do, well...at the moment, just test and learn. :) I don't have any end result in mind. But playing with new lighting tricks is fun, if frustrating. :P

    Thanks for the quick reply!

    Test_4.png
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    Test_3.png
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    Post edited by mirage.dragon.myrgon_58afcf7f16 on
  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    You haven't got any more lights hidden away in the scene somewhere have you? I am off to bed in a few minutes but tomorrow I will do some testing. What DS version exactly are you using?

  • edited November 2013

    Szark said:
    You haven't got any more lights hidden away in the scene somewhere have you? I am off to bed in a few minutes but tomorrow I will do some testing. What DS version exactly are you using?

    Nope. The only light, other than the area light plane, is the AreaLight - HeadLamp Blocker that loads with the Area Light texture.

    The version I'm running is Pro 4.6.1.33 x64.

    Post edited by mirage.dragon.myrgon_58afcf7f16 on
  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    I finally got around to testing.

    DS 4.6.1.33 32bit
    Genesis 2
    One Area Light plane loaded from the Content Library Pane (Not Smart Content)
    Rotated Area Plane on the X axis by 90 degree
    Parented Plane to Camera
    Positioned the Area Plane on a slight angle downward toward the subject as shown below.
    Increased Intensity to 200%
    Render below.

    areatest2a.jpg
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    areatest2.jpg
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  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    and this render looking through the camera the area light is parented to.

    areatest2b.jpg
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  • edited December 1969

    That's really odd... I'm starting to think that something is really wrong with my settings, but I don't know what. The only difference that I can see is that I'm only using the one camera, the one that the plane is parented to, that I'm running the 64 bit version, and that I'm using Vicky 4... My settings are pretty much the same as what you described. I've even tried to take out things other that the character. It's almost like the light is coming from the head lamp blocker, instead of the area light plane. :/

    screenshot.png
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    Test_5.png
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  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited November 2013

    OK delete the plane, leave the blocker for now and load an Area Light Plane from the Content Library and try that. If a new Blocker gets created delete the old one.

    A Blocker is something to let the render engine know a light is in the scene as Area Lights don't work like normal lights and need help to communicate with the render engine.

    And if you notice my last render above was used with the camera I used to parent the area plane to so I doubt that has anything to do with it.

    Post edited by Szark on
  • edited December 1969

    That seems to have done the trick! Though I'm not entirely sure what that trick was. What do you think was causing the problem? And I'm assuming that being so badly blown out can be adjusted by changing the intensity?

    Test_6.png
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  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    No I don't know why and when I get a chance I am going to text this more and if a bug is found I fill out a bug report.

    Blown out could be down to light intensity and/or the specular/glossiness of the surfaces. Scale the plane up with decrease intensity and make the shadows more softer.

  • edited December 1969

    Played around with the intensity and falloff a bit and this is what I ended up with. Thanks again for all your patience and help! :)

    Experimenting_with_Sammy_2-small.png
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  • SzarkSzark Posts: 10,634
    edited December 1969

    Excellent results, the cloth dynamics look good too. My pleasure to help where I can. From a composition point of view my I suggest not cropping her feet off. :)

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