Realistic Lighting Of Foliage

[GRDesign]

After many visualization projects and countless hours tweaking lighting setups I'm finally getting to the point where I can get lighting and shading of vegetation to look as natural as I would like it to.

One Targeted Spot Light, a series of V-Ray Lights of varying color and intensity and this lighting setup is complete.

Let me know what you think about the following rendering from a current project that I'm working on:



~ Graeme
DALEY RENDERINGS
www.daleyrenderings.com

[Morne]

To be honest, it looks a bit flat to me...
And I fail to see why you need a gazzilion lights for this?

Could you maybe post a top view wireframe showing where you positioned the lights relative to the plants. Maybe then I can understand from which direction your thoughts were coming from.

I must just add that the thumbnail of this looks nice...

[alexyork]

I have to agree, I'm afraid. I don't think those countless hours were very fruitful! You should be able to make this look much better with just one sunlight, which will be your main light source on all exterior projects anyway most likely.

The key with these things is good texture maps for the bark and leaves and some careful shader work to get light to fall and scatter nicely through the leaves, with some reflections etc. There are lots of tutorials out there for this. Most of the time a simple setup is more than enough.

I'd go back to the drawing board, simplify your setup with one single sunlight and go from there.

[squintnic]

yep looks flat - almost like scanline....
i would start again

this thread has some excellent tips and discussion
http://www.ronenbekerman.com/forums/...c-foliage.html

[MoonDoggie]

Was a scene a couple years ago that had a beautiful setup with a 2sidedmaterial for the leaves and painted vein maps for the leaves. Looked amazing, I can't find it right now though.

I do agree though with the above. Make the leaves reflective should differentiate the flatness.

[Pixelcon]

plenty of good reading here: http://www.ronenbekerman.com/forums/...c-foliage.html

[Franx]

Was a scene a couple years ago that had a beautiful setup with a 2sidedmaterial for the leaves and painted vein maps for the leaves. Looked amazing, I can't find it right now though.

This one perhaps?
http://www.peterguthrie.net/blog/200...torial-leaves/

[MoonDoggie]

Bingo, should have known Guthrie was behind it! DAMN YOU PETER!!!!!

[yyk]

The thing with those 2sidedmaterial setups is they might look nice in certain situations like closeups but it's still far from the organic look of actual leaves.

[joconnell]

Here's a great discussion on leaves: http://www.chaosgroup.com/forums/vbu...27-VRay-leaves

And I'd tend to agree with the folks that vray does very realistic lighting so there shouldn't be any need for extra lights in an outdoor situation. I'd stick in your sun and sky, and the tweak the materials til they look right - easier said than done

[Pixelcon]

I do think HDRI lighting kills vray sun/sky, including foliage rendering. Just getting that subtle variation in colour across the leaves' reflections makes for a more interesting look.

[deflix]

I'm pretty sure this post was a wind up.... Graeme am I right?

[squintnic]

haha really?
damn i fell for it....thought it was real!

[peterguthrie]

Bingo, should have known Guthrie was behind it! DAMN YOU PETER!!!!!

[evil laugh]

[alexyork]

You got us, Peter!