Hi Rauko. I am a long time follower, but not one to comment often. I am a long time Daz Studio user as well. I enjoy watching others explaining how they use the tools, and always learn something new along the way. Thanks for all the time and effort you put into making these videos. Your artwork always looks great and lighting so key to that and can never be covered enough.
Thanks for watching (and now commenting!) - I appreciate it. We're always open to learning - I'm learning new stuff and new ways of doing things everyday!
Scene lighting is one of two things I've been struggling with most lately. HDRIs make outdoor lighting pretty easy to do, thanks to what you taught earlier, but my indoor lighting seems to take forever and still look mediocre, so thanks for the ongoing lessons! The other thing I've been wrestling with? Rooms with exterior window views. (e.g Orbit Apartment or Polished Living in the DAZ store, just to name two random examples). People say "oh, just Photoshop in an image into the render -- but this always looks unconvincing to my eye. Been working on putting HDRIs beyond the windows, but it's hard to find HDRIs which include both convincing ground and sky for a "backyard view". I've been learning to make my own, but it's been a bit of a time-consuming misery business thus far. Anyway, thank you for all you do, it's *very* much appreciated! Be well!
Hey there - indoor lighting will be slower because we're talking about an enclosed space with few (if any) escape routes for the light and so it just keeps bouncing around. Take the scene at the beginning of this video inside the cube. It's a completely enclosed space and so takes an age to render (comparatively) because the light has nowhere to go other than to bounce off another wall. For indoor scenes - make sure there are enough natural escape routes for the light to get out of the room .. so make sure there are window or open doors. In extreme cases (when not using a HDRI but just scene lights) - take the roof off the room .. you might not get perfect lighting, but it should allow the light to escape and not bounce around for ever. As for the scenery outside of windows .. avoid the Photoshop option. As you say, it looks garbage as the lighting won't match (unless you're good with PS). I either use the HDRI image itself to provide the scenery outdoors (so you'll have to pick your HDRI more wisely) and put a bit of Depth of Field on the camera to blur it a bit .. or, add a second environment into the scene .. so, if I'm doing a scene in an office - I'll merge a city block into the scene a position it to provide the background outside of the window. It might put a little more strain on your system as it will eat up a bit more memory and might slow the render down a little bit - but it will give the best results.
I just saw this now (online issues). Thanks so much for the reply! I’ll take what you advise to heart and push onward. If I have any consistent success, I’ll let you know here on your channel. Thanks again for taking the time to advise and encourage, as always. Be well!
Thank you so much for your tutorials for Daz 3D, I've been learning a lot thanks to you and others... I am developing my own visual novel and your helps has been incredibly useful. I can't thank you enough.
Wow, what a return, haven't seen you in a while great work as usual. Could you look at doing a render of a women in a pool or river.. with lights coming through the water illuminating the scene? I'd love to see a tutorial on that.
Hey Richard - I had a break over Xmas and was a little slow getting back on the horse, so to speak! That's a very specific request .. So .. is she underwater with the light from above (like sunlight) .. or is the light itself from underwater?
Awesome work, thank you for the tutorials! One proposal - it would be really curious to know how you do the post in photoshop to tweak the colors. Likewise, I hope that even more people will find your channel, keep doing the amazing art!
Thanks - appreciate it and glad you like! With the photoshop stuff - I don't do much. I'm certainly no expert using it. I just use curve layers and different blending options to play around. And that's the key word - I play around not really knowing what I'm doing until I end up with something that looks ok! I've thought about doing a video on it but I'm not good enough with PS to avoid doing things in a way and then have 50 comments of people saying "Ohh . you should do it like this it's simpler .. " .. 😀
@@RaukoDaz3D I really like how VDBs look in still renders. No issues so far, but I really want to dedicate more time to test OpenVDB. Keep up the good work.
Hey there - yeah, that's what I was hoping for when I dropped it in - wasn't sure it would work as I wanted it to at the time, but thankfully it did! GPU is a NVIDIA 4090
There's only really one notable difference between a regular Point Light and a Linear Point Light and that is your able to set the Falloff for the Linear PL. Light normally falls off (dims) in a predictable way the further you get from the light source by using the inverse square law in physics - so for example as the distance from the light doubles the intensity drops to a quarter. With linear lights you can play around with this by adjusting Falloff Start and Falloff End (you might have to Select the Linear PL, right click on the Light tab and "Show Hidden Properties" to be able to see these sliders. A regular Point Light is a more realistic light whereas a Linear PL allows to play with the laws of physics somewhat to get some specific lighting effects.
How do you deal with white surfaces that become unrealistically bright when you point a light source at them. Is there another way to fix this rather than having to change the surface colour to an ugly shade of gray?
A white surface is always going to reflect the most light .. can't get around that .. but you can mitigate it somewhat by either changing the angle that the light hits it or the angle of the camera looking at it. If you want to get more Daz technical about it - you can select the object in the Scene and then look in the surfaces tab for the glossiness and specular settings - sometimes even just the slightest bit of gloss / specular can cause a white surface to shine bright. Look to playing around with "Glossy Reflectivity" (decreasing) and Glossiness Roughness" (increasing) and the similar Specular settings. This might solve your issue but it also might need a combination of things .. even in the worse case, sadly, making the surface slightly grey if these other ways don't give the results you want. EDIT : Did you sort out your "posing" problem? I've got the notification about your comment on the Partial Posing .. but somehow UA-cam won't let me see the comment on the actual video ..
@@RaukoDaz3D Thank you very much for that information. I will keep it in mind while trying to fix the problem I have. Regarding the posing, I was being a blind idiot. I had missed a step and I had deleted that comment. That is probably why you couldn't see the comment on the video. I just want to say thank you for the videos you have made on Daz Studio. They have been extremely helpful.
Hey there - Ghost lights were "broken" in 4.20 and 4.21 .. you can find a workaround here : ua-cam.com/video/K5A-uc2GRno/v-deo.html In 4.22 they've changed again and I'll be doing a video on them in 4.22 very shortly!
Fantastic overview, as always! You do a wonderful job explaining things. Two questions, if I may: -I THINK I read somewhere how rendering with point lights is much more time-consuming than with spotlights. True? I can imagine that this scene, in particular, took quite a while to render because it's so dark. -What software are you using to develop your visual novel on? If it's Ren'Py, perhaps you'll start doing tutorials on that, as well? It's always looked so darned intimidating. I know there's tons of material out there on it, but your ability to explain things clearly could lessen the learning curve for many. Thank you again!
Not really on the speed side of things - I've just run a test on the Spot and Point in the cube scene I had at the beginning of this video .. Spot light finished in 11m 7s and Point Light in 9m 53s over the same number of iterations. My guess is that the point light is putting out more light in general in the full 360 degrees whereas the Spot light is just putting it out in it's cone and so the scene is filling with light The main speed related issue with scene lights (either of them) is that we tend to use them mostly indoors and as such indoors are generally "darker" and lack a good number of escape routes for the light (ie, windows) and so they will be slower compared to an outdoor scene lit up solely by a HDRI. As for Renp'y .. yes, I'm doing it in Renp'y and I have often thought of doing a series of videos on it .. but what's stopped me is that I don't do Renp'y conventionally .. I'm from a coding background - been coding since I was a kid and for most of my adult working life - so I tend to delve into deep into coding and do things my own way rather than the conventional Renp'y way, so I'd probably have to relearn the Renp'y way to do videos on it if that makes sense? I might do one day .. so watch this space!
@RaukoDaz3D Thanks for the detailed and quick reply! Yeah, that's the thing with Ren'Py...having to know the coding to get the best use out of it. I've done a LITTLE coding, but it's been years, and I'm too old to dive into it again. Good luck with everything!
Never noticed one could change a pointlight into a sphere! Thanks!:-). By the way, any particular projects you make DAZ images for? VN, games, something else?
Yeah, both spot and point lights can be changed into whatever shape you see in the list. As for projects .. lots .. :) .. Some just for the sake of doing images .. I am indeed working on a soon-to-be-released Visual Novel at the moment - details on my Patreon page linked in the description above (nudge nudge!) .. and .. Well, nerd time .. I started working in Daz initially because I wanted images for characters / scene images in my tabletop roleplaying group .. done 100s for it over the years ..
@@RaukoDaz3D Cool! Perhaps You'd be interested in doing a shout out? I am the creator of Peasant's Quest (if that rings a bell). Your tutorials have really helped me a lot.
Whenever I add a point light or spotlight to an indoor scene everything turns black. I can barely see enough to position the lights and can't see to position props at all. You don't seem to have that problem. How do I stop everything turning black when I add a light?
Daz by default is in "Preview Lights" mode .. the most pointless mode ever in the existence of any software. It tries to simulate what would happen when you put lights in a scene. The thing is : It doesn't. 😁 To turn it off : Go to the menu at the top of Daz .. Windows > Preview Ligts ... That's it.
This is just a comment for the sake of a comment 😄 Yesterday I watched 15 videos about light, and the remaining three today. 😱 I am filled with strength! Sorry for my English 😅
Asset Links:
Model : tinyurl.com/3axhvj8x
Hair : tinyurl.com/38f4sn2t
Outfit : tinyurl.com/mrnebf9h
Environment : tinyurl.com/3ap2b3x9
Hi Rauko. I am a long time follower, but not one to comment often. I am a long time Daz Studio user as well. I enjoy watching others explaining how they use the tools, and always learn something new along the way. Thanks for all the time and effort you put into making these videos. Your artwork always looks great and lighting so key to that and can never be covered enough.
Thanks for watching (and now commenting!) - I appreciate it. We're always open to learning - I'm learning new stuff and new ways of doing things everyday!
Scene lighting is one of two things I've been struggling with most lately. HDRIs make outdoor lighting pretty easy to do, thanks to what you taught earlier, but my indoor lighting seems to take forever and still look mediocre, so thanks for the ongoing lessons! The other thing I've been wrestling with? Rooms with exterior window views. (e.g Orbit Apartment or Polished Living in the DAZ store, just to name two random examples). People say "oh, just Photoshop in an image into the render -- but this always looks unconvincing to my eye. Been working on putting HDRIs beyond the windows, but it's hard to find HDRIs which include both convincing ground and sky for a "backyard view". I've been learning to make my own, but it's been a bit of a time-consuming misery business thus far. Anyway, thank you for all you do, it's *very* much appreciated! Be well!
Hey there - indoor lighting will be slower because we're talking about an enclosed space with few (if any) escape routes for the light and so it just keeps bouncing around. Take the scene at the beginning of this video inside the cube. It's a completely enclosed space and so takes an age to render (comparatively) because the light has nowhere to go other than to bounce off another wall. For indoor scenes - make sure there are enough natural escape routes for the light to get out of the room .. so make sure there are window or open doors. In extreme cases (when not using a HDRI but just scene lights) - take the roof off the room .. you might not get perfect lighting, but it should allow the light to escape and not bounce around for ever.
As for the scenery outside of windows .. avoid the Photoshop option. As you say, it looks garbage as the lighting won't match (unless you're good with PS).
I either use the HDRI image itself to provide the scenery outdoors (so you'll have to pick your HDRI more wisely) and put a bit of Depth of Field on the camera to blur it a bit .. or, add a second environment into the scene .. so, if I'm doing a scene in an office - I'll merge a city block into the scene a position it to provide the background outside of the window.
It might put a little more strain on your system as it will eat up a bit more memory and might slow the render down a little bit - but it will give the best results.
I just saw this now (online issues). Thanks so much for the reply! I’ll take what you advise to heart and push onward. If I have any consistent success, I’ll let you know here on your channel. Thanks again for taking the time to advise and encourage, as always. Be well!
Cool! Thank you!
No problem!
rauko my hero thank you for all your nice tutorials youre the reason my life got better , siginificantly !!!
Ha! Thanks for that .. appreciate helping out in my small way!
Thank you so much for your tutorials for Daz 3D, I've been learning a lot thanks to you and others... I am developing my own visual novel and your helps has been incredibly useful. I can't thank you enough.
Glad to help out and thanks for watching! Keep at it and don't give up!
Good tutorial and an impressive result. Thanks
Thanks and glad you like!
Excellent video. Simple, yet with great results. Love it.
Thanks! Glad you like it - and thanks for your support over on Patreon. Really appreciate it!
Wow, what a return, haven't seen you in a while great work as usual. Could you look at doing a render of a women in a pool or river.. with lights coming through the water illuminating the scene? I'd love to see a tutorial on that.
Hey Richard - I had a break over Xmas and was a little slow getting back on the horse, so to speak!
That's a very specific request .. So .. is she underwater with the light from above (like sunlight) .. or is the light itself from underwater?
Very informative. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.
No worries - and thanks for watching!
Awesome work, thank you for the tutorials! One proposal - it would be really curious to know how you do the post in photoshop to tweak the colors.
Likewise, I hope that even more people will find your channel, keep doing the amazing art!
Thanks - appreciate it and glad you like!
With the photoshop stuff - I don't do much. I'm certainly no expert using it. I just use curve layers and different blending options to play around. And that's the key word - I play around not really knowing what I'm doing until I end up with something that looks ok! I've thought about doing a video on it but I'm not good enough with PS to avoid doing things in a way and then have 50 comments of people saying "Ohh . you should do it like this it's simpler .. " .. 😀
Sounds reasonable @@RaukoDaz3D, thanks for the reply
It's a beautiful character and render. Have you played with VDB renders as well?
Thanks, and thanks for watching. I've not really played with VDB. Do you have any particular issue with it?
@@RaukoDaz3D I really like how VDBs look in still renders. No issues so far, but I really want to dedicate more time to test OpenVDB. Keep up the good work.
Fantastic video! Thanks!
Excellent result! When you put the final light in, behind the column, it really made the scene look real. Can I ask, what video card do you have?
Hey there - yeah, that's what I was hoping for when I dropped it in - wasn't sure it would work as I wanted it to at the time, but thankfully it did!
GPU is a NVIDIA 4090
Great vid... I noticed in the dropdown list a 'Linear' Spotlight?
There's only really one notable difference between a regular Point Light and a Linear Point Light and that is your able to set the Falloff for the Linear PL.
Light normally falls off (dims) in a predictable way the further you get from the light source by using the inverse square law in physics - so for example as the distance from the light doubles the intensity drops to a quarter.
With linear lights you can play around with this by adjusting Falloff Start and Falloff End (you might have to Select the Linear PL, right click on the Light tab and "Show Hidden Properties" to be able to see these sliders.
A regular Point Light is a more realistic light whereas a Linear PL allows to play with the laws of physics somewhat to get some specific lighting effects.
@@RaukoDaz3D Ah cool, thanks for that.
How do you deal with white surfaces that become unrealistically bright when you point a light source at them. Is there another way to fix this rather than having to change the surface colour to an ugly shade of gray?
A white surface is always going to reflect the most light .. can't get around that .. but you can mitigate it somewhat by either changing the angle that the light hits it or the angle of the camera looking at it.
If you want to get more Daz technical about it - you can select the object in the Scene and then look in the surfaces tab for the glossiness and specular settings - sometimes even just the slightest bit of gloss / specular can cause a white surface to shine bright.
Look to playing around with "Glossy Reflectivity" (decreasing) and Glossiness Roughness" (increasing) and the similar Specular settings.
This might solve your issue but it also might need a combination of things .. even in the worse case, sadly, making the surface slightly grey if these other ways don't give the results you want.
EDIT : Did you sort out your "posing" problem? I've got the notification about your comment on the Partial Posing .. but somehow UA-cam won't let me see the comment on the actual video ..
@@RaukoDaz3D Thank you very much for that information. I will keep it in mind while trying to fix the problem I have.
Regarding the posing, I was being a blind idiot. I had missed a step and I had deleted that comment. That is probably why you couldn't see the comment on the video.
I just want to say thank you for the videos you have made on Daz Studio. They have been extremely helpful.
How I can solve the problem of ghost lights in 4.21 version?
Hey there - Ghost lights were "broken" in 4.20 and 4.21 .. you can find a workaround here : ua-cam.com/video/K5A-uc2GRno/v-deo.html
In 4.22 they've changed again and I'll be doing a video on them in 4.22 very shortly!
Fantastic overview, as always! You do a wonderful job explaining things. Two questions, if I may:
-I THINK I read somewhere how rendering with point lights is much more time-consuming than with spotlights. True? I can imagine that this scene, in particular, took quite a while to render because it's so dark.
-What software are you using to develop your visual novel on? If it's Ren'Py, perhaps you'll start doing tutorials on that, as well? It's always looked so darned intimidating. I know there's tons of material out there on it, but your ability to explain things clearly could lessen the learning curve for many.
Thank you again!
Not really on the speed side of things - I've just run a test on the Spot and Point in the cube scene I had at the beginning of this video .. Spot light finished in 11m 7s and Point Light in 9m 53s over the same number of iterations. My guess is that the point light is putting out more light in general in the full 360 degrees whereas the Spot light is just putting it out in it's cone and so the scene is filling with light
The main speed related issue with scene lights (either of them) is that we tend to use them mostly indoors and as such indoors are generally "darker" and lack a good number of escape routes for the light (ie, windows) and so they will be slower compared to an outdoor scene lit up solely by a HDRI.
As for Renp'y .. yes, I'm doing it in Renp'y and I have often thought of doing a series of videos on it .. but what's stopped me is that I don't do Renp'y conventionally .. I'm from a coding background - been coding since I was a kid and for most of my adult working life - so I tend to delve into deep into coding and do things my own way rather than the conventional Renp'y way, so I'd probably have to relearn the Renp'y way to do videos on it if that makes sense? I might do one day .. so watch this space!
@RaukoDaz3D Thanks for the detailed and quick reply! Yeah, that's the thing with Ren'Py...having to know the coding to get the best use out of it. I've done a LITTLE coding, but it's been years, and I'm too old to dive into it again. Good luck with everything!
Never noticed one could change a pointlight into a sphere! Thanks!:-). By the way, any particular projects you make DAZ images for? VN, games, something else?
Yeah, both spot and point lights can be changed into whatever shape you see in the list.
As for projects .. lots .. :) .. Some just for the sake of doing images .. I am indeed working on a soon-to-be-released Visual Novel at the moment - details on my Patreon page linked in the description above (nudge nudge!) .. and .. Well, nerd time .. I started working in Daz initially because I wanted images for characters / scene images in my tabletop roleplaying group .. done 100s for it over the years ..
@@RaukoDaz3D Cool! Perhaps You'd be interested in doing a shout out? I am the creator of Peasant's Quest (if that rings a bell). Your tutorials have really helped me a lot.
Whenever I add a point light or spotlight to an indoor scene everything turns black. I can barely see enough to position the lights and can't see to position props at all. You don't seem to have that problem. How do I stop everything turning black when I add a light?
Daz by default is in "Preview Lights" mode .. the most pointless mode ever in the existence of any software. It tries to simulate what would happen when you put lights in a scene.
The thing is : It doesn't. 😁
To turn it off : Go to the menu at the top of Daz .. Windows > Preview Ligts ...
That's it.
@@RaukoDaz3D Thank you! Thank you! Why have I never seen this from anyone else? It would have saved so much time. You're the best!
thanks a lot !
You're welcome!
😱
I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing .. 😀
This is just a comment for the sake of a comment 😄 Yesterday I watched 15 videos about light, and the remaining three today. 😱 I am filled with strength! Sorry for my English 😅
@@sergomers557 Ha! That's good .. I'm glad you like .. now go and create some art!