Replicating a polarizer effect

[xteeejx]

Hiya,

Anyone know if there's a way to acurately-ish replicate the effect of a circular polarizer? I deal with polarizer (polarized?) footage quite a lot and it's difficult to match the exact effect in-render especially on glass etc. and usually end up doing something with a fresnel pass in the comp.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!
-TJ

[dre4mer]

Seems like since it's basically dealing entirely with the reflections, you could animate removal of a reflection pass to accomplish this effect in comp pretty well?

[xteeejx]

Yep! Sort of. Depending on the angle of the light source and rotation of the polarizer, you can get some unusual facing-angle based reflection falloff on non-metallic objects. Like abruptly going from 0-100% reflectivity over a couple degrees. I've been controlling the reflection with custom facing-angle ramps but it seems a little hacky.

It would be nice if there was a more accurate way to handle it but I'm probably asking a lot.

Thanks!