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Make a Skydome light visible in reflections only.
Type:
Tutorial
Length:
8 min.
Tutorial resources
These downloadable resources will be used to complete this tutorial:
Transcript
00:03
The last stage of creating our product shot is to add a little bit of visual interest
00:08
by creating some reflections, especially on the ground plane.
00:12
So let's see what we have so far.
00:14
You focus to the physical camera view
00:16
and initiate an Arnold render view.
00:19
Go ahead and start that interactive production rendering
00:23
when it's finished. Let's create a snapshot. So we can compare that to a version
00:28
with some environmental reflections.
00:31
We can close the Arnold interview. Now,
00:33
now let's focus just on the sky dome,
00:35
we can turn off the other lights using the light explorer
00:39
that's found in the tools menu
00:42
in all global explorers,
00:44
light explorer,
00:47
there's a column for light on. So turn all the lights off
00:51
except for the Skydome, turn that one on
00:54
and we can also select the sky dome here directly
00:57
and go to the modify panel. We'll be working with its parameters here.
01:02
OK? Now let's rerun the Arnold render view
01:05
with focus on the perspective viewport, you can right click in there if you need to
01:09
and reinitiate the Arnold render view.
01:11
Start the interactive production rendering once again.
01:15
So we see now that we've got some illumination
01:18
in the scene as well as
01:19
some reflections on the floor, a ground plane.
01:22
You might notice some strange artifacts
01:25
in reflections from a sky dome.
01:27
We can zoom in there with the mouse wheel
01:30
or with alt and right mouse button.
01:33
So here's the artifact here that you might see
01:35
some jagged issues there in reflections.
01:38
Let's just do a region render on that so that we can just focus in on that.
01:43
The issue is coming from the resolution of the sky dome
01:47
and its default is only 1000.
01:49
You can increase that resolution to eliminate these artifacts.
01:53
Don't bother increasing the resolution beyond
01:56
the actual pixel value of the source map.
01:59
So this is an image that is
02:01
four K by two K.
02:04
Let's bring the resolution up to 2048.
02:08
That's the vertical dimension of the Skydome image.
02:11
And that's helped a bit, we're still seeing a little bit of jaggies there.
02:15
If we needed to eliminate that completely,
02:17
we could bring that up to the resolution of the source image.
02:25
Now we've eliminated that issue there completely.
02:28
But actually, in this case,
02:29
I'm gonna swap the image out for a different one.
02:32
And in order to enhance the performance interactively,
02:36
I'm gonna bring that resolution back down to 1024.
02:40
The image that I'm going to use is not going to create that reflection issue. So
02:44
we don't need to worry about that.
02:46
I just want to point out the issue because it
02:47
is a really common thing that happens with sky domes.
02:51
We'll go back to a 1 to 1 view
02:53
and we'll turn off the region rendering.
02:55
And now let's swap out this image for a different one.
02:59
We'll do that using the material editor. So launch the material editor
03:03
in the skydome, modify panel
03:06
in the color intensity section. We have a texture assigned
03:09
drag that map over into the slate, material editor view
03:14
and choose instance.
03:16
So this is the environment map we created earlier for material look development.
03:20
Now let's swap out this HDR I file
03:23
for something more appropriate to our final rendering.
03:26
Click to browse
03:28
in the current projects scene assets, images
03:31
select rural landscape four K
03:34
monochrome dot HDR.
03:37
Once again, that's a modified version
03:39
of a panorama downloaded from the website
03:42
HDR I haven.com.
03:45
Click open,
03:47
we see that it's much brighter
03:48
and it's actually a little bit overexposed.
03:51
Let's make some changes here.
03:52
We'll bring the exposure of the light down to zero
03:57
and let's align the image here.
03:60
We have the rotation here in the map. Let's set that to a value of 180.
04:05
And now that's giving me a more interesting result here
04:08
on the ground plane or floor.
04:10
I want this sky dome to really only
04:12
provide specular reflections especially in the floor,
04:16
we can make it. So the light does not emit diffuse or subsurface scattering
04:22
and that means that
04:24
we will be able to control the reflections in a non-physical
04:27
but more artistic way.
04:29
So we'll scroll down a little bit
04:31
and there's the whole section here, there's a roll out labeled contribution.
04:36
And by default, the light will affect all of the rendering components.
04:40
We see that all these values are set to one.
04:43
Even though the camera is set to one, we don't see anything in the background.
04:48
The camera rays are disabled up here
04:51
and shape, rendering
04:53
light, shape visible.
04:55
So if that is on
04:56
and
04:57
the contribution to the camera has a value of one, we'll see a background,
05:02
but we don't want that background. So we can set the camera contribution to zero.
05:08
So as I said, I really only want specular reflections
05:12
and maybe transmission rays.
05:14
So we don't want any diffuse or subsurface scattering
05:18
will set the diffuse contribution to zero
05:21
and the subsurface scattering contribution also to zero.
05:25
And now that light is only affecting the specular component
05:29
and possibly any transmiss components.
05:33
OK. Now that we've controlled the contribution,
05:36
let's set our final exposure and contrast,
05:39
we can do that over here in the environment map.
05:42
Let's bring the exposure down, we'll set it to a value of negative seven.
05:46
That's a very subtle effect. That's kind of what I'm going for here.
05:50
I don't want the background or environment to overwhelm the foreground or subject.
05:55
So I do want the exposure to be really low
05:58
but in order to give more visual interest here,
06:01
I want to increase the contrast of the map.
06:03
So bring the contrast up to a value of three.
06:07
And now we're starting to see some detail there,
06:10
but it's too bright now that we've increased the contrast
06:12
so we can bring the exposure down to negative nine.
06:17
OK. That's the effect that I was hoping for.
06:19
We got a pretty subtle effect down here,
06:21
but it is going to give some visual interest to our shot
06:25
so we can close some of these windows. We'll close the Arnold render view.
06:29
Close this late material editor
06:31
back in the light explorer, we'll re enable all of the lights,
06:35
then we can close the light explorer
06:38
and once again, run the Arnold render view,
06:40
right click in the perspective view just to make sure you've got focus there
06:44
and reinitiate
06:45
the Arnold render view, interactive production rendering.
06:48
Once that's finished, we can store another snapshot
06:51
and compare our two versions.
06:54
Here's the version without the environmental reflections
06:57
and here's the version with the environmental reflections.
07:00
So you can see that we've really improved the visual interest of our rendering.
07:05
So now we're ready to do a final production rendering.
07:08
So we'll turn off the snapshots by clicking on the little
07:11
eye icon
07:12
and we'll go into the render set up to enable our production render preset.
07:16
Once again, close the Arnold render view,
07:19
go into the render, set up dialogue
07:22
we previously created a preset for production rendering.
07:25
So we can choose that
07:27
preset
07:28
Arnold production
07:30
and in the categories pop up, load all of those categories.
07:34
Now, our resolution is 1080 by 1080.
07:37
If we go to the Arnold renderer tab,
07:40
we've got a ray depth of four and four for diffuse and specular
07:44
and we've got four specular samples to improve the quality of those reflections.
Video transcript
00:03
The last stage of creating our product shot is to add a little bit of visual interest
00:08
by creating some reflections, especially on the ground plane.
00:12
So let's see what we have so far.
00:14
You focus to the physical camera view
00:16
and initiate an Arnold render view.
00:19
Go ahead and start that interactive production rendering
00:23
when it's finished. Let's create a snapshot. So we can compare that to a version
00:28
with some environmental reflections.
00:31
We can close the Arnold interview. Now,
00:33
now let's focus just on the sky dome,
00:35
we can turn off the other lights using the light explorer
00:39
that's found in the tools menu
00:42
in all global explorers,
00:44
light explorer,
00:47
there's a column for light on. So turn all the lights off
00:51
except for the Skydome, turn that one on
00:54
and we can also select the sky dome here directly
00:57
and go to the modify panel. We'll be working with its parameters here.
01:02
OK? Now let's rerun the Arnold render view
01:05
with focus on the perspective viewport, you can right click in there if you need to
01:09
and reinitiate the Arnold render view.
01:11
Start the interactive production rendering once again.
01:15
So we see now that we've got some illumination
01:18
in the scene as well as
01:19
some reflections on the floor, a ground plane.
01:22
You might notice some strange artifacts
01:25
in reflections from a sky dome.
01:27
We can zoom in there with the mouse wheel
01:30
or with alt and right mouse button.
01:33
So here's the artifact here that you might see
01:35
some jagged issues there in reflections.
01:38
Let's just do a region render on that so that we can just focus in on that.
01:43
The issue is coming from the resolution of the sky dome
01:47
and its default is only 1000.
01:49
You can increase that resolution to eliminate these artifacts.
01:53
Don't bother increasing the resolution beyond
01:56
the actual pixel value of the source map.
01:59
So this is an image that is
02:01
four K by two K.
02:04
Let's bring the resolution up to 2048.
02:08
That's the vertical dimension of the Skydome image.
02:11
And that's helped a bit, we're still seeing a little bit of jaggies there.
02:15
If we needed to eliminate that completely,
02:17
we could bring that up to the resolution of the source image.
02:25
Now we've eliminated that issue there completely.
02:28
But actually, in this case,
02:29
I'm gonna swap the image out for a different one.
02:32
And in order to enhance the performance interactively,
02:36
I'm gonna bring that resolution back down to 1024.
02:40
The image that I'm going to use is not going to create that reflection issue. So
02:44
we don't need to worry about that.
02:46
I just want to point out the issue because it
02:47
is a really common thing that happens with sky domes.
02:51
We'll go back to a 1 to 1 view
02:53
and we'll turn off the region rendering.
02:55
And now let's swap out this image for a different one.
02:59
We'll do that using the material editor. So launch the material editor
03:03
in the skydome, modify panel
03:06
in the color intensity section. We have a texture assigned
03:09
drag that map over into the slate, material editor view
03:14
and choose instance.
03:16
So this is the environment map we created earlier for material look development.
03:20
Now let's swap out this HDR I file
03:23
for something more appropriate to our final rendering.
03:26
Click to browse
03:28
in the current projects scene assets, images
03:31
select rural landscape four K
03:34
monochrome dot HDR.
03:37
Once again, that's a modified version
03:39
of a panorama downloaded from the website
03:42
HDR I haven.com.
03:45
Click open,
03:47
we see that it's much brighter
03:48
and it's actually a little bit overexposed.
03:51
Let's make some changes here.
03:52
We'll bring the exposure of the light down to zero
03:57
and let's align the image here.
03:60
We have the rotation here in the map. Let's set that to a value of 180.
04:05
And now that's giving me a more interesting result here
04:08
on the ground plane or floor.
04:10
I want this sky dome to really only
04:12
provide specular reflections especially in the floor,
04:16
we can make it. So the light does not emit diffuse or subsurface scattering
04:22
and that means that
04:24
we will be able to control the reflections in a non-physical
04:27
but more artistic way.
04:29
So we'll scroll down a little bit
04:31
and there's the whole section here, there's a roll out labeled contribution.
04:36
And by default, the light will affect all of the rendering components.
04:40
We see that all these values are set to one.
04:43
Even though the camera is set to one, we don't see anything in the background.
04:48
The camera rays are disabled up here
04:51
and shape, rendering
04:53
light, shape visible.
04:55
So if that is on
04:56
and
04:57
the contribution to the camera has a value of one, we'll see a background,
05:02
but we don't want that background. So we can set the camera contribution to zero.
05:08
So as I said, I really only want specular reflections
05:12
and maybe transmission rays.
05:14
So we don't want any diffuse or subsurface scattering
05:18
will set the diffuse contribution to zero
05:21
and the subsurface scattering contribution also to zero.
05:25
And now that light is only affecting the specular component
05:29
and possibly any transmiss components.
05:33
OK. Now that we've controlled the contribution,
05:36
let's set our final exposure and contrast,
05:39
we can do that over here in the environment map.
05:42
Let's bring the exposure down, we'll set it to a value of negative seven.
05:46
That's a very subtle effect. That's kind of what I'm going for here.
05:50
I don't want the background or environment to overwhelm the foreground or subject.
05:55
So I do want the exposure to be really low
05:58
but in order to give more visual interest here,
06:01
I want to increase the contrast of the map.
06:03
So bring the contrast up to a value of three.
06:07
And now we're starting to see some detail there,
06:10
but it's too bright now that we've increased the contrast
06:12
so we can bring the exposure down to negative nine.
06:17
OK. That's the effect that I was hoping for.
06:19
We got a pretty subtle effect down here,
06:21
but it is going to give some visual interest to our shot
06:25
so we can close some of these windows. We'll close the Arnold render view.
06:29
Close this late material editor
06:31
back in the light explorer, we'll re enable all of the lights,
06:35
then we can close the light explorer
06:38
and once again, run the Arnold render view,
06:40
right click in the perspective view just to make sure you've got focus there
06:44
and reinitiate
06:45
the Arnold render view, interactive production rendering.
06:48
Once that's finished, we can store another snapshot
06:51
and compare our two versions.
06:54
Here's the version without the environmental reflections
06:57
and here's the version with the environmental reflections.
07:00
So you can see that we've really improved the visual interest of our rendering.
07:05
So now we're ready to do a final production rendering.
07:08
So we'll turn off the snapshots by clicking on the little
07:11
eye icon
07:12
and we'll go into the render set up to enable our production render preset.
07:16
Once again, close the Arnold render view,
07:19
go into the render, set up dialogue
07:22
we previously created a preset for production rendering.
07:25
So we can choose that
07:27
preset
07:28
Arnold production
07:30
and in the categories pop up, load all of those categories.
07:34
Now, our resolution is 1080 by 1080.
07:37
If we go to the Arnold renderer tab,
07:40
we've got a ray depth of four and four for diffuse and specular
07:44
and we've got four specular samples to improve the quality of those reflections.
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