[jvanmetre]

HDR is great for single shots...are people using it for
animation lighting too?

Suggestions much appreciated.

jvm

[KurtS]

I don't have much experience with this, but unless the camera is moving, I see no reason why HDRI should not work just fine with animation?

[jvanmetre]

That's just it, my camera is moving...

jvm

[deadalvs]

what type of shot do you have ?

a lot of reflection ?

[jvanmetre]

I've got a camera rotating around an object...yes, with reflections. The reality of working with HDR (from HDR Studio) is that I can set up a scene fairly quickly just using the HDR to illuminate and as background, but when animating, it's considerably different -- I've got to pay more attention to dark areas in the HDR that show up in the background -- it's just the nature of the beast.

Any tips on balancing HDRs and background -- let's say for a white background and floor, and using HDR to illuminate. I think it's just test, test, test...

If I write long enough...I can just answer my own questions!
jvm

[deadalvs]

hehe...

an other tip:

maybe also think of using just a very small HDR, like 128*256px for the actual lighting (gives a smooth blurred light setup, dome-like) and simply use a different map (NON-HDR) as actual reflection map.

[Bubbaloo]

And throw some emitters in there so you're not relying on complete hdr illumination.

[jvanmetre]

deadalvs

Do you mean taking an hdr, scale it down in photoshop then saving as a new hdr?

jvm

[deadalvs]

yes, exactly.

imagine an HDR lighting setup as a giant light dome built with a spotlight at each pixel of the sky, shining down to the origin. now it makes sense that the less pixels you have to calculate the faster. and you really can go to values of 128 * 256 (normally spherical projections are in 1:2 ratio)

if you compare to a traditional light rig with up to 64 lights it's pretty clear than 256 * 128 is still a lot more.

the other point that bubbaloo mentioned is also important to clear up shadows, not only to be able to control the brightnesses. theoretically, an HDR should produce the same lifelike shadows as in the scene where the actual HDR was taken. but depending on the renderer you use, that needs super-hires HDRs and thus is totally inefficient.

so just add some sort of sunlight emitter too, which will give you crisp shadows plus good highlights.

* * *

also, when lighting (non-HDR) interiors it's usually a good idea to add some very-low intensity emitters to the scene to help clearing up areas with no direct lighting, just simply to give them some tiny value of light for faster getting rid of the noise.

make sense ?

[jvanmetre]

deadalvs-

Makes sense...will try it out.

jvm