Why you use LWF? and how?

[grasshopper]

are you outputting as tiffs or floating point doodas. hdr etc?

If it's tiffs try the settings as i've shown above

Vray Colour mapping -> Gamma correction - Muliplier 1.0
Inverse gamma 1.0
Gamma 2.2

Max/Viz Customize -> Preferences-> Gamma - Enable gamma Correction
display gamma 2.2
bitmap input gamma 2.2
bitmap output gamma 1.0

Anyway this seems to work for me and no plugins no mucking just consistancy.
PS. I'm using a flat panel Dell Ultra sharp and don't think it is callibrated very well so am waiting for PhotoshopCS2 to arrive so i can callibrate it properly i'm currently using 5.5 and don't even have adobe gamma correction installed but have callibrated by eye as much as possible.
Is there a standard gamma for LCD's??

[joconnell]

Lcds are apparently way more complex to calibrate but they're much closer to gamma 1.0 than anything - thats why their colour tends to look less rich than a crt. with a flat panel you're nearly working in linear colour already - they dont apply the same darkening curve to the mid tones that crts do.

[m_hinks]

Thanks grasshopper. With those settings you must get your maps to render correctly, but do you straight colours render correctly without using any colour correct plugin?

If so then it sounds like once you have that setup, you can use max as normal, and get the LWF effects.

cheers

[grasshopper]

not sure i'll check that out on Monday i'm off home and amn't working for the fist weekend in 5. Good luck and have a good one. I'll get back to you

[m_hinks]

Cool, im off too!

[RErender]

grasshopper's method will work only if your materials only rely on bitmaps for the final output. If your blending in solid colors, noises, gradients etc. then the best method is a colorcorrect on top of the diffuse stack, the other method being to adjust all of the swtches in the procedurals.

[m_hinks]

Hi,

Im just about understanding this LWF now. and after watching a couple of Gnomon dvd's where the process is explained in the interiors one, its def something I want to start using.

My only bugbare is that need to use the colourcorrect plugin on all colour swatches used. I have the gamma and bitmap input set to 2.2 in preferences, and I use the gamma correction colour mapping with .454 in inverse gamma to bake the curve in. If there was a way to make the colour swatches have the same selector, then it would be great.

[joconnell]

You can tick on a button in preferences that says "affect colour selectors" and "affect material editor" to do this - it's in max 8 anyway.

[grasshopper]

hi m_hinks in reply to your messege sorry i was going to get back to you wasn't i?

I haven't been using a lot of colour swatches since my last post but as RErender was saying i think using the colour plugin is the way to go with them. It seems pretty straight forwrd to use and i think all you need to change is the gamma setting.

For existing maps if you add it to your diffuse channel then select "keep old map as sub map" you don't need to recreate the map which is pretty usefull. I think thats the way i am going to approach it when i need it.

Another way off the top of my head would be to create a small texture of the colour you require in photoshop maybe 8x8 pixels. This way max would adjust the colour for you but i don't think you can always use bitmaps in gradient fill etc. Anyway hope this helps somehow but as i say i am not very experienced in this colour match game so let me know how you get on. i'll keep my eye on the post and update anything i can work out.

Hey Jo, is the "Is the affect colour selectors" & "affect material editor" settings in the preferences--->Gamma section because i don't see it. I am using Viz 2007 but i thought it would be the same as Max8.

CHEERS

[m_hinks]

Ok, Im back and im still struggling.

Ill discribe below what im doing, and hopefully someone can say if its correct or not!

Ive done a render of a box and floor, one is a colour and the other is a bitmap. So Im using this as a ref for getting the scane colours but needing less light and getting lighter shadows - the purpose for LWF i think!

I have set max preferences to gamma 2.2, input bitmap 2.2, output 1.0, effect material editor, and not effect colour selector. I also set gamma correction in vray to inverse gamma .4545. The render comes out a bit bright, but the bitmap and colour are correct, and after dropping the skylight by 0.1 the renders are near exact.

My main issue is I need to be able to set up the workstations once and maybe have a basic render preset, and then peeps can get on without having to adjust colours or bitmaps for the LWF.

Could anyone help me!!

Thanks

[grasshopper]

Ok, Ive been working away now for the last month with the workflow described above with no worries at all until yesterday when i was asked to produce some prints (all work to date has been viewed on screen).

To get the consistancy i mentioned above i have been working with photoshop colour management off. That seems to cause some problems when going to print.

We are using an external printer and when i get the prints back, although they are great quality they are much greener and over saturated.

If i assign an sRGB or Abobe(199 profile in photoshop the screen matches very closely to the print. Should i be appyling one of these profile before sending my images to the printer?

If so, that will mean i that I have to adust the colour in photoshop so that the image views how i wanted it originally (as it did with no colour management).

This will be a pain in the arse as a lot of my work will be getting viewed digitally and printed from now on. You spend so much time adusting, testing, tweaking and adjusting again in Viz/Vray to finally get the results your after then photoshop is going to undo all that and you have to start adjusting and tweaking again in photoshop. Is this right?

Does anyone have a solutoin for this? Printing and colour matching isn't something i've had to do much before so any input would be gratefully appreciated as it is doing my head in.

Thanks in advance

[teabag]

hello,
i use luxs method of applying LWF, my renders are very close to the images i see on the LCD.

Its very important which printing medium u use...for example different photopapers from cannon produce different color results as i have found out.

[grasshopper]

Yeah i read that post but the link is no longer working for the video. Don't suppose anyone can post a new link to it?

[glyph]

rather than start another LWF thread I'll tag my query on here:

with reference to the benchmark renders in the two main benchmark threads:
is it the case that everyone is using an accurate correction method?
'cos apart from the odd exception all the renders are virtually identical - shouldn't there be quite a few where users are working with 'wrong' calibration and we can clearly see midtone differences?
Or is it just that anyone dedicated enough to submit a benchmark render has it all sorted out?!
(Or maybe the images need to be displayed side by side)

[dlparisi]

is it the case that everyone is using an accurate correction method?
'cos apart from the odd exception all the renders are virtually identical - shouldn't there be quite a few where users are working with 'wrong' calibration and we can clearly see midtone differences?

As long as everyone has their gamma set to 2.2, the color values of the benchmark images will be identical. Calibration errors would only show up when someone tries to view any of the images on their monitor and system. Personally, I think that many people spend too much time worrying about the calibration of their monitor when it really doesn't have anything to do with the calculations inside of max, just how it's displayed on your screen. Yes, you should calibrate your monitor but I believe the true advantages are in how LWF affects the light calcs.

David