GI in thick woods

[Crayox13]

Hi,
I have a sort of a cottage scene. Lots of bushes and trees. The problem is that the light doesn't enter it enough. I tried both translucency (with light multiplier 5) and 2 sided objects but my forest is still too dark. I want that greenish hue and light in it.

How to make GI go through leaves and create that effect?

thanks in advance for your suggestions

[jacksc02]

Why dont you fake it with a dome light that has a green-ish colour to it?

[Crayox13]

Wouldn't dome cast the light also from the outside?
Now I have the vray sky in the environment. I want "normal" colours on the outside, but greenish cast in the forest. Ok, it's really not important that it's green, but that the light comes through leaves. Especially GI and indirect illumination.

[Neilg]

Is there a particular reason you cant do it in post?

[Crayox13]

Not very good with post. But also, the problem is that my forest around the cottage is almost black. I'm trying with GI multipliers now for the leaves. I don't want them transparent, as leaves aren't, but maybe just a bit transparent for GI. Will have to look into that.

[joconnell]

Not exactly the answer you're looking for but that's kind of correct - If you've got proper trees they provide a pretty solid canopy from the light blocking most of it off entirely, so you'll get pretty solid black shadows on the underneath like in this photo:



If you were actually standing inside a forest and taking a photo, you'd have to open up your cameras lens or slow down it's shutter speed to adjust for the darkness so if you had any spots of light from the sky breaking through the canopy they'd be really burnt out like this:



It's a bit like going from outside to inside in terms of exposure so if you want to get some brightness in the forest you've two choices. One is to fake it and put a light source in there to add some inner lighting, the other would be to open up your forest in places and allow some light through. You could either removes trees in places that they won't be seen or lower the amount of leaves each tree has, though doing that can often take away from the surface that they need to have nicely shaped shadows.

[samuel_bubat]

Better try with some suitable exposure. With a Camera Exposure you will never get it right. Also "rapping" the GI Multipliers is never a good idea.
Just use Reinhard Tonemapping for example (Others should do the job as well). There you can turn your scene as bright as you want without bleeding out
certain areas. areas.

[Crayox13]

Yes, you guys are right of course. It IS a question of light dynamics. I will try to play with that. Also a separate GI channel did help a bit in post. I just added it in PS.

On the other hand...I wonder if there was an option to make objects like leaves let through more light and make the light their colour, like an override, it would help a lot!

[Morne]

Well in that case you could just do it "real nasty and dirty" by excluding the leaves from casting shadows, then put a green glass over the top of the trees and hide it from the camera. That way it will be bright in the forest and also the light in the forest will have a green tint (depending on your fake glass cheating thingamabob) you could have a leave texture in the oppacity or refraction of the glass thing to still get leaf shadows on the ground and branches

[Crayox13]

Hm, one big problem with this is that I use proxy trees, and MS, so I can't really exclude leaves from shadows...hm....I could exclude the whole tree. We'll see, I hope I won't have to do that. I'm taking several suggestions from here and using them all I think it'll work. Thanks guys!

[3DMK]

Hm, one big problem with this is that I use proxy trees, and MS, so I can't really exclude leaves from shadows...hm....I could exclude the whole tree. We'll see, I hope I won't have to do that. I'm taking several suggestions from here and using them all I think it'll work. Thanks guys!

You must use Vray 2 sided material on your leaves.....this will make your leaves look more realistic & allow more light into the forest floor.

Do not exclude trees from shadows...it will look shit!

You can also use an Override Material with a lighter green for the leaves so they bounce more GI.

Also use Light Cache for secondary bounces as this method produces the brightest GI.

Hope this helps

[nils_p]

Maybe try add a V-ray Ambient Light with a soft greenish tint?

[duke2]

You can also use an Override Material with a lighter green for the leaves so they bounce more GI.

Hope this helps

Listen to this man! In particular, override the shadow with something that is transparent with a green tint.