Need some help with first Vray Interior Rendering

[loafer87gt]

Hi Guys,

I am attempting my first interior using Vray and am running into some problems. For lack of a better word, my renderings are looking very flat. I have read though all the posts I could find in regards to interior lighting (Flipsides interior scene and Vlado's tutorial were particularily helpful), but I still can't really get results that I am happy with. The main thing I am having problems getting to grips with is the Interior Lights strength / Exterior Sun Brightness / Color Mapping settings. For example, one would assume that in a space with a lot of light coming from outside, the brightness of the interior flourescent fixtures would appear diminished relatively speaking. How does one go about doing this, and what values do you folks typically use for such fixtures? Also, I have found that the only results I can get that I am somewhat happy with are achieved by raising the brightness multiplier, something that I have read is sort of a faux pas.

Scene wise, the reception area has a large double door with sidelights which should let a significant amount of sunlight into the small space. Inside, there are three flourescent fixtures above a display cabinet, and another flourescent and a ring of potlamps above the desk area. The hall ways are lit by a string of potlamps near the wall. I have seen that in some of your folks scenes that when you have a number of smaller fixtures nearby, that sometimes you use one Vray light to emit for all the sources. I tried this with the three flourescents in the reception area and it seems to work well.

Anyways, I was hoping that if one of you folks have some free time (whats that?) if you could please take a look at my scene and see if you see anything glaringly wrong, or offer any suggestions on how I could go to give the scene a little more punch. Unfortunately, I am still awaiting materials and finishing information so i just have everything set to a default grey material. Any advice or suggestions to get me going in the right direction would be much appreciated.

Here is a download to the scene:
www.jlvisuals.com/interior.max

Here is an image of the scene as it currently stands:

www.jlvisuals.com/interior.jpg

Thanks all,
Jason Lowe

[percydaman]

hmmm...I wouldn't say it looks too flat. Its really hard to tell how things are going to look until you have textures applied... Add textures and whatever else is going to be added, and I guarantee you your lighting in its current state wont look like that, and will need to be adjusted.

[vlado]

If you want more contrast in your lighting, you should make your materials darker, and your lights - brighter.

Best regards,
Vlado

[analogueWay]

Another thing to keep in mind is that most light has a slight color cast. Your incandescent (I'm assuming they're incandescent) lights in the ceiling cans will have a slightly orange cast, your fluorescent lights will have a slightly green or pink cast, and your skylight coming in through the window will have a blue cast (and, if you want to add a little more color depth you can cheat and give your sunlight a little warmth).

In a setting like in your scene, our eyes adjust to the brighter light and we can even perceive some color at the light sources. So, rather than make them bright white you may experiment with a little bit of color - matching the color of the emitted light.

I am guessing that the blue from the skylight coming in the window will make the most noticeable difference in your scene.

-Jeremy

[loafer87gt]

Thanks for the replies guys, and Vlado, words cannot describe how much I am loving your renderer. Although it is going to be a while before I become at all proficient with it, I already feel as if it has improved my renderings greatly.

Back to your reply, you said to make the materials darker and increase the brightness of the lights. This is kinda what I am having problems with: I am not too sure whether I should be increasing my darkness multiplier for my color mapping or increasing the overall brightness of my scene lights. When I increase the brightness of the lights I am finding that portions of the scene become blown out, whereas if I increase the darkness multiplier in the color mapping I find the scene loses its contrast and the image loses its punch.