Lighting Challenge #8: Haunted Hallway

#101

Thanks for the comments Jeremy. You are right as usual, the moonlight doesn’t decay as much as it should. I think that playing around with that will help add a bit more contrast to the scene and help to make it a bit more readable. Thanks for the tips.

Also, I really like your first image, it has a great range of light to dark and a terriffic erie feel to it, and I think that the colors work very well together. In my opinion the colors of the fill lights in the second image are a bit too saturated, and just don’t read quite as well against the green from the hallway. However I think that the intensity of the stairway light in the second image works a bit better than one in the first. Either way, very nice updates, I really like where its going.

-Brian

#102

Hi all,

Nice contest as always, thank u Jeremy!

Well i just set that cam for the moment, and the position of the main light.
Here is a basic render to catch the “mood”…
I will work on lights, and on that silly C4D radiosity this sunday!!! lol

Some nice renders from now, congrats to all !!!

see u soon,
jc

#103

Ok, so I decided to do some experimental stuff…
Read on I’ll explain the technique I used…

While I was trying to simulate GI on my scene, I came up with an idea that I would like to share…

-I simulated GI with spot lights placed behind main surfaces such as walls to simulate light bouncing (witch is not a new technique nor do I clam that I invented it)…
-I used tightly controlled falloff curves on my bounce fill lights (still nothing new)

-I was planning to use AO to simulate the shadows from the fill lights, But…
AO pass tends to be completely directionless and it completely killed the directionality on my fill lights

-so to compensate for that I tried rendering 2 AO passes one with fast falloff and one that spreads out a lot more

-In the composite I mixed the 2 AO passes based on the distance from the fill light I was occluding so that:-
1- the areas very near to the light source gets no occlusion at all.
2- areas a bit further gets fast falloff occlusion
3- and areas far from the fill light gets a smoother falloff occlusion

here’s an example of how the Blended AO pass looked for one of my fill lights…

and here’s the fill light it was occluding.

Here’s an Image with the traditional AO.:smiley: (With wide spread)

and Here’s an Image with my variable spread AO.:thumbsup:

There’s defiantly strong disadvantages working with that technique, however it’s experimental stuff so why not try it out. (And I do like the result)

The biggest disadvantage is the huge number of passes I had to render.
For every fill light that you intend to occlude with that technique you need to render 2 passes:
1- the fill light isolated
2- a pass mapping the distance between that fill light and the sampled point.

One more disadvantage: it’s still AO so it’s not physically accurate.

I’ll be posting more about the technique, when I’m done with the scene.

One more thing…

This technique is not sth I read in a tutorial or a book, I’ve made it up :), so it’s up to further revision, if you think there’s sth wrong about it or there’s a way to make it work better, I waiting patience less for your comments

#104

@Jeremy
Love those new colors :thumbsup: adds quite a bit to the image, but I think it’s quite a catchy difference in hue and saturation between the arch and the upper part of the wall, I think it needs to be toned down a bit.

#105

Good work everyone, and thanks for your comments, jeremy.
I know that my image is too dark. I looking for a particular atmosphere, very different from yours for example. In your scene, as in many of the others, the light comes of at the top. It could represent the exit(release), the end of the nightmare. In my image, I would want on the contrary that we do not know what there is at the top. Here is the atmosphere I’m looking for.
Excuse I for my English. I do my best to express myself without faults.

#106

I am about to give up on my moonlight - I changed the color for this render to:

H:240
S:.120
V:1.00

What color do you guys use?

Handpainted seamless wall paint that I made, and used as bump as well.

#107

I agree some of these tests have too saturated a fill color, I’m experimenting with different ways to inject extra saturation into the dark tones like colored occlusion and highly saturated photon colors. I’ve gone back to something without GI because I like the contrast better, but still using this occlusion pass colored with depth:

colorocc.jpg1024x768

Here’s the result including this pass:

Test10.jpg1024x768

-jeremy

#108

Here is another update.

I’m almost at the limit of my abilities, so any suggestion to make it better is more than welcome.

@diabolo: for your info in this image the moonlight is h:212;s:40%;v:86%. This is Cinema 4D and looks like it reacts different to the tool you are using to light color.

@jeremy: about the light-bulb looking weird was my crappy attempt to make it look broken. I hope this time looks better.

#109

Looking very good Jeremy. Ok now a question for you or anyone else who might know how to fix this. Why is it when I use GI sometimes I get light coming through places where it shouldn’t (ex. where the wall meets the floor)? Why does it do this and how do I get rid of it.

#110

In my case, using Mental Ray with Maya, I just added some cubes above the landing and staircase. To avoid artifacts, they have “primary visibility” and “casts shadows” both turned off in render stats in their attribute editor window, and they are not present in the occlusion pass. When rendering with GI, they prevent light from leaking through where it shouldn’t, even if the photons are bigger than the thickness of the landing in the stairwell.

-jeremy

#111

Meteoro - Maybe the moonlight would be more convincing if it lit up the sides of the window and other nearby surfaces? I think the human shadow is a little ambiguous as to what he’s doing, now that you see more of it he has a bulge in front of his midsection that looks more like a sexual figure than something haunted. On the lightbulb, maybe you could post a photograph of what you’re trying to depict, then it would be easier to suggest how it could look.

-jeremy

#112

Hi, this is my little contribution (sorry for my english:) )
i’m a c4d user
i add four area light for the wall
one area light for the sun
one omni light for the lamp
two volumetric light
one environment objet (2%)

effect:
glow
colormapping

Thanks for this challenge

#113

Jeremy I was wondering how did you get the color in your occlusion pass. I have never seen that before. I have only seen black and white. What exactly is the color used for?

#114

pioupiou I like your rendering a lot. the sun light is really convicting to me.
I just wished to see the color of the sky through the 2 windows especially the left one.
Other than that great work.
A lot of great stuff here either.

#115

Thanks for your comment Lazzhar :slight_smile:
A sky have been added.

#116

Another test.

Using a yellow spot light with area shadows for the main light.
3 blue area lights with soft shadows closed to windows.
A HDR pics around that scene.
Rendered with the basic radiosity of C4D R9.2

Please sorry for that low preset radiosity… it will be better at the end, but i have to be soft with my old slow computer ! :slight_smile:

I tryed to keep safe a sort of weird atmosphere, comments are welcome, before i start to play with shaders. :wink:

jc

#117

Hi Jc (it’s me, xander)
I really like the angle of your camera and your lighting.
The only thing i yould like to see are the window’s bars shadows.

#118

Akwavox: The cam angle looks very nice, you get some interesting shapes created by the stairs, and slightly Escher-esque feel - neat :slight_smile:
Diabolos: The tileable texture is ok, but wayy too big in scale.
MinaRagaie: Interesting technique, and the results are nice, too.
Jeremy - Good one. And the colored occlusion trick is clever, even if it’s only very subtly visible.

Ok, here’s mine. Changed a bit from the sketch, but it’s always like that, with the image having a life of its own:

#119

Sorry for the late answer.

Thanks a lot guys … i am really glad you like it :slight_smile:

i’ve rerendered the wires:

and a link to the large version:

link :wink:

I know that the concept of the image is very macabre … but that was my intention…
some sort of friendly warm lighting with a hard contrast that will catch the viewers eye.

@ mer … Yes i’ve used Ambient occlusion for the subtile shadows, where the objects
hit the ground and the walls … because i used very soft shadows for the second (bounce) light pass… and in C4D the objects will look as if they are floating above the ground … even with a very low shadow bias and high shadowmap.

I’ve also began a new concept … but the time and my patience was running out
to finish it … but i will work later on it.

@ Jeremy … your image is turning out great. I love the specularity of the painted walls…
and especially the contrast in your lighting.

@ azazel … wonderful colours!

@ meteoro … the first thing i’ve noticed while viewing your image is the stiff standing shadow of the man … i would set him to an interesting pose … because that will add some dynamic.

@ akwavox … the lamp in such a short distant in front of the back wall is looking a bit stange :wink: … the perspective i great!

@ all … keep up the great work … the challenge is wonderful!

edit:

sorry i’ve forget to add the second concept :wink:

#120

mium ChrRambow, i like your second concept.