Direct Lighting, Final Gather and/or Global Illumination

#1

Hey guys,

I have been practising with different lighting techniques in Maya recently. So my question is this - Is it better to use direct lighting techniques or to use something like final gather and global illumination? Of course using final gather is much easier but it increases my rendering times quite dramatically.

I am interested to know the approaches that you guys take when working on lighting projects.

Thank you in advance,

Ian

#2

This question gets asked quite a bit and there are so many factors involved in this decision, that nobody can just give you an answer but yourself. Some questions to ask yourself:

Is it an animation or a still frame?
What is your deadline?
How many CPU’s are you rendering on?
How complex are your scenes?
Are the lights in the scene static or dynamic?
What style are you rendering?
etc…

In the end it’s what looks best and can be finished on time.

Personally I don’t have the time to be able to use Final Gather for animations at work because of deadlines and render capabilities but for still shots I use it if I have the time.

#3

Thanks Dan…

I am trying to learn all methods and rules about basic lighting principles in 3D. Been reading a lot and really enjoy learning this kind of stuff. I used a few old tutorials that I have from Digital Tutors and Gnomon to help with this. DT mainly talks about how to use GI and FG, whereas Gnomon mainly talks about direct illumination principles.

On another thread I read that FG can actually speed up your workflow quicker than direct lighting. What is your experience of this? At the moment I have only played around with basic scenes, nothing complex yet.

And an off topic note - I noticed your surname, are you Polish?

#4

FG is definitely faster to setup than a direct lighting rig, it’s usually the render time that ends up being the issue. If you have the time/machine power to use it then go for it.

Obviously it’s not an automatic solution to use a global illumination feature like FG. It’s just another tool to use to get the end result and is not necessary or practical in every situation.

As for my surname, my great grandfather came over to the US from Poland many years ago.

#5

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