Ambient light doesn't show in renders

[CIM]

Don't even bother using ambient light

[Gremlin]

umm...
I dunno if your new, but ambient light is "default" lighting... it just illuminates the scene 100% from no real given direction. Umm, in 3dsmax I believe the ambient light is what is the "point light" in maya.

maybe im wrong, maybe im misunderstanding you and you know this already, and you mean its not showing up in the render...

in any case,
i tried :D

[Randolph]

AFAIK the Maya standard default lighting is done by a single directional light.

Other than the global ambient lights in other apps Maya's ambient light respects the ambient shading and its own position. By its "Ambient Shade" attribute you can control that. "1" means that it's acting like a point light, "0" means it will drown your scene in dull ambient light. So if it's set to "1" there's indeed no difference between a the default light and your ambient light.

Apart from that I echo CIM's advice. Ambient light isn't really the best solution at all, even it's better than the global ambient light in most other 3d apps. Try to use some point lights to set up a better fill lighting in your scene.

[CIM]

If you want a sort of ambient lighting, but with proper occlusion, then use Dirtmap (http://animus.brinkster.net/downloads/Dirtmap.zip) (for mental ray).

[Gremlin]

Originally posted by Randolph
AFAIK the Maya standard default lighting is done by a single directional light.

Other than the global ambient lights in other apps Maya's ambient light respects the ambient shading and its own position. By its "Ambient Shade" attribute you can control that. "1" means that it's acting like a point light, "0" means it will drown your scene in dull ambient light. So if it's set to "1" there's indeed no difference between a the default light and your ambient light.

Apart from that I echo CIM's advice. Ambient light isn't really the best solution at all, even it's better than the global ambient light in most other 3d apps. Try to use some point lights to set up a better fill lighting in your scene.
I was implying that the actual default lighting was the same as a ambient light, i was saying that ambient light is "default" and "generic" .....just clarifying that.

but yea, ambient light never really comes in handy except for me when im donig fantasy / surreal still images, with unrealistic lighting. :D

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