CGTalk - shadow question

iamcool

11-01-2006, 04:20 PM

I'm using Maya 7. I have a character standing in front of a wall. I have a light shining on the wall and the character which casts a shadow on the wall.

Is there a way to tell the wall to accept the shadow from the character but ingnore the light intensity/color so that I can light the wall seperately from the characer.

jeremybirn

11-03-2006, 03:58 AM

There's another thread (currently near the top of this forum) on shadows-only lights in Maya, that could be a great way to go. Even rendering all in one layer, you can link different lights to the wall than to the guy, but add the shadow with a shadows-only light.

You could also render 2 render layers: one of the wall (with the guy's primary visibilty overridden so he casts shadows without showing up) and one of the guy, then you can set up completely separate lights for the wall layer than the guy layer

You could also render in 3 layers: the wall without the shadow, a separate shadow pass, and then the guy that goes over it.

When you upgrade to Maya 8, another approach will become possible, because light linking can be completely separate from shadow linking in Maya 8.

-jeremy

iamcool

11-03-2006, 05:57 PM

thanks for the tip. I'll try the shadow-only light. I have been rendering everything on one layer up to this point. I don't have any experience with rendering on layers. I did some tests to see if I could figure it out. My shadow pass always came out solid black. I also had trouble witht the specular pass. Any tips on handling render passes? Any tutorials out there?

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11-03-2006, 05:57 PM

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