Textures for VRay plane lights?

[Streetwise]

Anyone know of some nice textures for plane lights that might mimic that of a softbox for product photography?

[joconnell]

Vraysoftbox map or do a bit of a google - http://oliverwolfson.com/studio-light-hdr-images/

[Streetwise]

Vraysoftbox map or do a bit of a google - http://oliverwolfson.com/studio-light-hdr-images/

Thanks for that. For some reason, I guess I didn't think about the fact that the textures would have to be HDRI. Duh. I though that maybe the light somehow went through a bitmap or something. That makes sense now.

So for mapping type, I assume you just use the 3dsMax standard? Also, if my panel is square and the HDRI image is rectangular, does it conform to the panel size, or scale to fit? What about something like an umbrella image?

Thanks.

[joconnell]

Yeah you'd stick to picking a hdri image to suit the aspect of your light for the most correct results but the image will just map to the width and height of your light. If you've got a flat, mirrored surface where you'd likely see the reflection of the light cleanly it might not look as nice if it's clearly stretched or squished but for more curvy surfaces where the reflections warp over them, you won't notice the difference.

[Streetwise]

So it sounds like this technique is used mainly for more accurate specular reflections in a product and not so much in terms of actual lighting? I'm lighting a piece of furniture (no specular highlights) and can't really see a difference between HDRI maps or just the standard VRay plane lights.

[joconnell]

Yeah I'd say you're right - small subtleties in lighting are kind of lost on very diffuse things - you'd see a bit more richness in the colour of the light and in the shadow colours but the main benefit as you say is that you've more natural looking reflections and speculars - with plain vray lights they'd have a very harsh edge on them compared to a light in real life.

[muoto]

textures on vray light planes increases the rendering times * a lot * i found out. So i don't use them anymore...

[Streetwise]

textures on vray light planes increases the rendering times * a lot * i found out. So i don't use them anymore...

Good to know that. Thanks.

[kagemaru]

We use hdri from Serge Aleynikov, named Photo Studio Lights HDRI.
They're excellent. I can't give you an exact link since he used to host his website on behance and it's kind of discontinued right now, so i suggest to search for it as soon as you can.

[joconnell]

textures on vray light planes increases the rendering times * a lot * i found out. So i don't use them anymore...

Yep and a lot of the niceness of the light gets averaged down to a far simpler colour anyway. The pixar lighters use a normal area light for the source of their light and also the speculars but have the light turned off for reflection. They then make a plane at the same size as the light in roughly the same place and put their hdri map on this and make it a reflection only source, no GI or direct light being emitted. The other benefit is because they're two different objects, you can move your reflection source independently which gives you a bit more control to "place" the reflection on the surface of an object more precisely.

[Streetwise]

The pixar lighters use a normal area light for the source of their light and also the speculars but have the light turned off for reflection. They then make a plane at the same size as the light in roughly the same place and put their hdri map on this and make it a reflection only source, no GI or direct light being emitted.

Now that's pretty clever. What a great tip!

[joconnell]

There was a talk about cars that used this - they had their lighting setup exactly as they wanted it but sometimes the reflection of the light happened to land on the surface of the main character in a sub optimal place. Since the card was responsible for the reflection they could just grab it and move it about so they could place it exactly where they wanted it without ruining other stuff.