Camera Exposure vs. Light Adjustments

[Alan Iglesias]

My statement agrees with everything you said!

You may have misunderstood me to mean that I am somehow looking for a physically correct rendering...I assure you I am not. I just enjoy using a renderer based on things (lights and cameras mostly) I see in real life so I can make a nice-looking render faster, easier, and with more versatility.

YMMV!

-Alan

[Alan Iglesias]

Once I have a scene set up with the lighting the way I want it, none of the 20 or so cameras have the same exposure values, each one is set up individually (like it would be in a real world situation.)

Love being able to do this...during training I have been bringing my 7D to class and actually shooting different spots in the room to show how changing exposure works in high contrast areas. Then we do the same thing in Vray..very cool!

Wow, I didn't realize this was such a hot topic around here...

To the folks that don't use the Vray camera's exposure: believe me, I'm not trying to change the way you do things, it's none of my business! And I'm not trying to say that you are wrong in any way. Its just that to me, it is very cool the way the Vray camera works with the renderer and I just want others on the forum to understand how good it can be if they wish to use it this way.

As a consultant, I'm very big on sharing something that I think works very well (there is not enough of this in the world!), so please excuse my enthusiasm...

-Alan

[3ddesign]

Thanks to all for the discussion and ideas. I have another question. After checking the exposure box and adjusting the camera exposure settings to get the rendering to "look right" (similar to the consultant's rendering) the render time was cut in half. I'm pretty sure I didn't touch the lights, just changed camera settings. Is there any logical reason this would happen? Like I posted at the start, could someone enlighten me as to what is happening internally in Vray when camera exposure settings are changed? - Craig

[Neilg]

Vray is adaptive based on visible noise, so it only does what it needs (all the dmc/threshold stuff) - dark scenes don't get sampled enough (and render quicker), ones which are too bright get over sampled (and take longer).
It's why getting gamma & lighting right is important, it makes removing noise & optimising scenes unpredicable/difficult if you're off in either direction.