The IES lights are staying… but I am not opposed to changing those 2 lights above the table… providing I don’t get ugly reflections (like what occured with that area light, and whatever light changes would be made can’t dramatically change the rest of the elements in the room. I’m very happy with every element in the dining room except for the bottom of the glasses. If I have to make a choice… the glasses will stay as they are and I’ll just live with it.
The glass certainly looks better, but without knowing what you changed, I can’t really comment. The first question I have though is the floor and ceiling enabled in this example. Just FYI I have been rendering at about 3000 samples,
OK, if the scene is to stay “as is” anyway, there’s no need for me to delve deeper into the rabbit hole and I call it quits…
Just increase the max bounces and the glossy bounces until you’re happy with the result.
My render above also had optimized material setups for the walls, which should help Cycles clear up the scene…
…and some changes to the IES lights (to make them brighter for glossy rays). But if they are not to be messed with, I won’t bother to prepare screenshots.
On a side note: Cycles was designed for consistency and speed in animation rendering and was not exactly made to solve tricky indoor lighting situations or to adaequately reproduce photometric lights. Many other render engines might serve you better with scenes like this.
-Can you post a screen grab of the render settings you used so I can see how many bounces and what other settings you did for the example in post #22
-It is just those outer perimeter of IES lights that I want to stick with. The 2 lights above the table could be changed … how is lit above the table in your example? I just don’t want to drastically change the look of all the other elements on the table and around the room.
-I had to strip the wall image texture that I am using in the scene (I don’t have the rights to post it), and I just replaced it with a plane diffuse shader that was close to the same color. Can this wall material set up be implemented where image textures are being used?
some changes to the IES lights (to make them brighter for glossy rays)
Feel free to change the 2 ies lights above the table to accomplish what you mentioned. The use a rig for moving around and changing
overall strength and color. somewhere inside that cage is a point light… I guess most likely that would be the place that tweeks would occur in the node editor.
-Did you end up changing the material of the glass in your first example? Previously the wine glass was just simply a glass shader
I appreciate the time you have put into this problem.
That wall shader trick plays nicely with any kinds of textures, see here for reference and a before (#1) and after (#3) render.
Still thinking I might be overlooking something: In the file you uploaded are no lights directly above the table? At least I can see none other than the IES lights around the walls.
No other materials than the one for the walls have been changed: Glass is still pure glass shader.
Damn…your right I just looked back at the file I uploaded… I’m going to add them into the file, rename the blend file and upload it to DB and then I’ll post the link…sorry about that
-just confirm one final thing for me … did you have both the floor and ceiling enabled when you did that render?
Here is the new file with the lights above the table… I moved the ceiling to a different layer and forgot to move it back to layer 1. Hey Im guessing its getting late in Germany, so please get some sleep and worry about it later… unless your a night owl like me
Glass/Refraction should have some option on the shader how to behave when caustics is turned off, which you will do for animation. Right now, everyone is probably handling it their own way (I know I am, currently rendering out a test anim), which doesn’t provide consistency.
I’m still a bit unsure about the overall lighting/time of day situation. You have the full set of interior lights turned on, but your other renders of this scene seem to show a daylight scenery outside…?
Anyway. If we’re talking daylight, I thought a sky HDR for the environment would be nice, which will also shed quite a bit of side light onto the tableware and helps with the glass (The lights above the table don’t do much.):
This is 1.000 samples with your wall material (+ portal light for the window). The “tricky AO wall material” I used last time rendered that scene about a minute faster, but left a weird slightly greyish tint in the glass, so I wonder if it is worth to investigate that further at all.
With both max bounces and glossy bounces I went the full 128, as - depending on the glass mesh - you otherwise might see dark stains:
@Ikari I want to first thank you for all your efforts. Last night I did some test renders using identical render settings that you posted. I didn’t make any changes to the wall. The bottom of the glass looked just like it did previously (dark bottom) After much swearing I’ve come to a decision … . cycles wins … I lose I need to move on, and I don’t want you, or anyone else, wasting any more time on this one problem.
Let me address the lighting question … There is a panoramic 2d image of Vegas that circles the entire suite. That is what you see when you look out the windows. It is a daylight image. You do get a little blue light that spills in from that. I could not include that with the test file because of copyright issues.
As you know, there is currently an HDRI image being used only to help light the rooms. There is a sun, and there are the IES lights that I am using for interior lights to visually show nice downlighting on the walls and I also use it in the wall sconces and table lamps. I did already do testing with portals… There was no improvement at all. These are very large windows with a lot of additonal light sources
so I’m guessing that is why the portals aren’t helping.
It has been brute force throughout this project when it comes to rendering and lighting. Each 720p render I make takes an average of 3-4 1/2 hrs and I still have to do a little post noise cleanup in photoshop. I do lots of different camera angles on each room so I really can’t take the time to change the lighting on each camera angle to accommodate cycles whims.
You have helped me out on a number of other issues I’ve had, and I hope you will continue to follow the project and offer suggestions and help. I really do appreciate your efforts. But I can’t waste, or have you waste, anymore time on the bottom of a wineglass.
All the now bright, “highlighted” parts of the candleholder are in fact reflections of the area light above. And in a way glossy is all about reflection. If you disable the visibility to reflection rays for the area light, you will indeed disable all reflection highlighting on the candle holder from that light.
Also remember: are you comparing your rendered image to “what is actually on a table in front of you” (having carefully replicated the lighting that exists there), or are you … most likely … comparing it to a photograph that you found in a magazine?
In the latter case, you should avail yourself of some books about photographic studio lighting for close-up subjects. Learn how the pro photographers actually produce those “realistic” (and “appealing”) photographs. Also look at equivalent books on videography. The lighting situation that your “accustomed eye” accepts as “real(istic),” in fact is very different indeed from what’s actually present on the set, just off-camera. If you want to replicate what you see in those pictures, you’re going to need to replicate what they actually did.
For the “black” glass, check if you have AO enabled (world settings), and if you have, specifically check the distance setting. It can have a pronounced effect on glass/transparent/refractive materials.
