Compositing 101

[tct70]

Hi all,

Been using vray for a while now but only recently started to make use of the render elements in 1.5. Many of these I've found to be extremely useful but I am really scrabbling around in the dark to a great extent, simply because everything I do is trial and error (more error that trial to be honest).

Whilst I'm a great fan of learning from experience I would like to know if there is anything (book, DVD etc) I should have to hand for properly compositing still images using render passes in Photoshop. There seem to be a number of publications on compositing, but I don't want something that is not relevant to the tools I have.

There are some elements that I simply don't understand, and some I understand, but don't know how to utalise in Photoshop.

Any pointers would be greatly appreciated.

Trev

[joconnell]

The really broad rule is that pretty much anything that adds light such as specular, reflection or a diffuse pass gets screened or added on. Anything that takes light away like a shadow or vray dirt pass gets multiplied.

[tct70]

Thanks..............a good start.

Now specular is something I don't understand. I often read posts about using fall of maps and specular maps but have no clues as to their uses.

I'm sure this is one of only a mountain of things, but I need to start somewhere.

Trev

[percydaman]

i would do some googling for good lighting and compositing books and dvds. Its a huge field with alot to digest.