Best solution for sky domes?

[beestee]

I have been messing with it for days now, and i am about to give up. I cannot seem to exclude the skydome from the environment lighting. I have tried doing it from the VrayMtlWrapper and from the Object Settings in the rendering dialog, but no dice. Just wondering how everyone else handles this. TIA!

[shytigercp]

re

I had problems w/ that to. I have to use an appropriate map for the material (set to spherical enviornment) for and assign it to the enviornmetal background. I use vrays enviornment to evenly light up the scene.

ST

[beestee]

Thanks for the suggestion! I have tried to use that method before, but i have a problem with the image sizes. Adding the ground area below the sky adds a lot to the file size, and is quickly depletes my resources. Is there no way to exclude an object from the environment lighting? If that functionality isn't already there, it would be a handy feature to add!

[egz]

Thanks for the suggestion! I have tried to use that method before, but i have a problem with the image sizes. Adding the ground area below the sky adds a lot to the file size, and is quickly depletes my resources.

You don't have to add the bottom part to the image, just use the following setup in the bitmap to only apply it to the top half of the environment.

[beestee]

Wow! I learn something new every day! Thanks egz.

In the meantime, just in case anyone wanted to know, i found out how to exclude the light dome from the environment lighting. Deep in the recesses of vray.info i found this. Unchecking the "Visible to Reflection/Refraction" in an objects properties worked fine, but, as would be expected, nothing will reflect the image used on the skydome.

One question about the spherical environment method. Is the environment mapping relative to the camera or the scene? I will toy with it for a few more hours, thanks guys!

[shytigercp]

re

Yes it does move reative to the camera...I'm in the process of incoporating an enviornment now. My problem now is that I get a big seam in the sky....but I got rid of that by checking Mirror

[flipside]

Unchecking the "Visible to Reflection/Refraction" in an objects properties worked fine, but, as would be expected, nothing will reflect the image used on the skydome.

Then add that map to the reflection override slot in vray parameters too