Vray Light bug

[cpnichols]

When we turn on the shadow feature "store with irradience map" the light source is no longer reflected in the scene. It is like I turn on "invisible."

[vlado]

This is how it was coded to work... a vraylight with "store to irradiance map" will affect only the irradiance map calculation, but will be turned off for the final rendering.

Best regards,
Vlado

[cpnichols]

Well I mainly use the "store with irradiance map" feature to get the rich softshadows, it would be a shame to have to sacrifice the specular highlight. What other solution do we have? Basically you are saying that by doing "store with irradiance map" we are doing a diffuse light only, but have no ability to make a specular light only light. I guess we could do it by placing a big old object out there for it to reflect. Seems a little off as a solution.

[vlado]

Well, computing hilights would still require tracing shadow rays and sampling the light, which kind of defeats the purpose of the "Store will irradiance map" option.

Best regards,
Vlado

[cpnichols]

I see what you are saying. Unfortunately there is still a problem of it being unpractical to the user. Store with irradiance map is a huge advantage for area lights and areas shadows. Sacrificing the the reflection (hightlight/specular) is a disadvantage. While there is a solution (create and object that the scene can reflect in place of the light), it seems counter productive. But I would have to say I have done worse hacks in other packages, so it is all relative.