WIP Advanced Lighting Techniques

[senor-cojones]

Hey everyone,

Well this is my first 'proper' post on here- I don't often like to show my work. Thought Id post my near complete renders of a project I've done for university. Basically it was to light 2 scenes- one has to be interior night and day, one exterior summer and winter and additional marks are awarded for more advanced techniques like HDR/DoF/Caustics. Decided to put it up here, as although they are nearly finished I'd like any C+C people have so I can improve it and also maybe ask a few questions.

Aiming for the most aesthetically pleasing renders possible.... here they are;

Interior Day:



Interior Night:



Exterior Summer:


Exterior Winter:



Caustics (The pawn on the bottom has been rotated so it doesnt look like it has a unwelded vert/artifact):


High Dynamic Range Imagery/Depth Of Field:



All of the above are rendered using Mental Ray in 3DS Max 2009 and are using Mental Ray Arch And Design Materials. Interior is lit using Mental Ray omnis/spots and exterior using a Mental Ray Daylight System.

Currently the winter one is heavily WiP- it doesn't look wintery! So a few questions if I may ask- any C+Cs? Does anybody know how I can lighten the glass/image in the interior daylight? It should be totally clear glass... but the image still appears grey... I suppose I could just post process in Photoshop. Also does anyone know how to create reliable water and ice shader/texture/etc to use on the pool?

Anyways I'm happy so far- Im just continuing to tweak.

Thanks for looking

P.s. The first scene should look familiar :P Taken from the arch/design and chess set tutorials from here (I did do all the modelling/texturing myself alongside the video) and it has my own spin on it- the video will be fully referenced- but there are no marks for modelling- all marks are from lighting/how textures react to the light. Some people have used prefab scenes (used for competition work) for their scenes.

[gopalkrishnareddy]

nice work.........so if you can explain the lighting techniques it would be very useful to the beginners.....

[BiroBoy]

Not only beginners, my lighting skills suck

[solarkid]

Your caustics could use some work in my opinion. Blur them and tone down the photons. Real-life caustics almost never look that crisp or bright.
Your winter scene could have had the loungers put away and a pool tarp or frozen water added for extra effect.
Other than that, keep up the great work.

[dmacb]

Good work!

This might be a small detail but... your day and night scene (interior) show the same room... but the image outside the window shows a completelly different background!

[BiroBoy]

Just looking at it a bit closer and I recognise quite a few things from the interior renders, this wouldn't be from the tutorial Kristopher Lee did would it.

It's not a problem if it is, it's just I recognise the room shape, Furniture and the lamp on the table.

[senor-cojones]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

Yes- the interior started as following that tut (great tut btw!) and I added things like a new window and extra details so I could use extra things to bump my marks up.

They are the same room and the background is different- the problem was I couldnt find a nice high res image to use that was the same angle/night and day/right light etc- and I havent ventured out in to Stafford just yet to take pictures- Ive got other module work to complete. Anybody know where I could locate night/day images of the same location?

The winter render is still heavily wip- If i cant nail creating an ice material then ill create a pool tarp- The reason the loungers aren't stacked away are because I wanted to basically have the same scene in each- just with a change of textures/lights (purely my decision) I think I'll get it down looking more wintery in the textures/lights and then render it out, then stack them away and render again

I wouldnt mind writing a tut/demo of the light set up (it did take a few hours to get to these stages tho :P) but as of right now I've got 3 other modules to complete before the 15th of december. Possibly over xmas ill write something up if anybody is interested?

Thanks

[solarkid]

Free is free and there will always be appreciative people out there who will make use of your shared knowledge.

[ashton]

All your renders look nice.
First image is very real.