How to achieve this effect?

#1

Hi,

I’m fairly new to Maya Lighting. I came across this image and would like to know how to achieve this effect in Maya. Any pointers would be very much appreciated :slight_smile:

Thanks.

#2

Ambient Occlusion, then inverted?

#3

The way it is illuminated is that the objects shader is a light source itself it looks like. Pretty much just a grid, with the white areas as illuminated sources. Now whether or not the image was made negative is to be seen, it looks like it though.

#4

@neuromancer1978

You’re right, the object shader acts as its own light source. I tried to replicate it by duplicating the objects, removing the faces i didn’t need on the outer geometry, and assigning an incandescent shader to the inner object. I then rendered it using final gather.

@MrChainsaw

Thanks, inverting the Ambient Occlusion works to an extent. But doing so also reverses the shadow / highlight areas, resulting in shadowed areas looking brighter than exposed ones. That doesn’t seem to be the case with the reference image. How should i go about it while preserving the natural shadows / highlights?

#5

Just use the LightSurface shader. It’ll make things much easier!

Example (sorry for the noise…) :

#6

The original image is just inverted AO.

If you want to make geo a light source:

  1. apply mia_material_x
  2. In the advanced attribute tab select the additional colour checker box and plug in mia_light_surface.
  3. In the light_surface shader attributes, turn up the FG contribution. This controls the amount of light the surface will produce through final gathering.
  4. Turn on Final Gathering in the render settings.
  5. Render.
#7

@Lowjack: See above post. (grins)

Also, if it’s just inverted, why are the bright light-spots being emitted from the object, then? I wasn’t aware that AO caused light emission.

#8

You’re right. There is more going on then just inverted AO. The solution is still posted above.

What is the also part of your statement? You forgot to ask the question?

#9

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