[brodie_geers]

If I use physical sun the shadows are too sharp. In the real world light reflects off of all sorts of things and creates softer shadows.

If I use HDRI the coloring seems good but the shadows are extremely washed out.

I've never gotten sky dome to look good, much less realistic.

I could use physical w/ other emitters to produce softer shadows but this doesn't seem to be a realistic approach. My scenes are quite large and you can only make emitters SO powerful. If I move the emitter far away it can't get enough power to make enough difference. If I bring it closer then the lighting becomes uneven and unrealistic.

Right now I'm going to try an HDRI/physical sky combo w/ the sun power turned down. I still don't think this will give me any softer shadows though.

Has anyone gotten some good exterior shadows that can help me out?

-Brodie

[Mihai]

Depends on what time of day, and also if it's an overcast day which diffuses the direct sunlight a bit, but since Maxwell doesn't have a cloud system the direct sunlight will be pretty sharp, just as it is in the real world.

http://ferenc.biz/pictures/midday-shado ... ietnam.jpg
http://freethumbs.dreamstime.com/1/big/free_17342.jpg
http://sunship.currentsky.com/gallery/s ... /kids2.jpg
http://www.news.wisc.edu/wisweek/16-Nov ... _20035.jpg

[Bubbaloo]

I'm not sure, but can't you mess with the atmosphere settings to get softer shadows?

[Richard]

I prey for the ability to adjust these in multilight! The option to adjust with and without sun levels would be great!

I'd love to know if Brians suggestion about atmosphere works!

Another option I use is to use multilight and low the sun power way down 4-7 then adjust to camera to very slow shutter and high iso. This doesn't effect greatly bu is still an improvement.

The best way mate is to export two renders one with physical sky and one skydone and combine in PS, the results are staggering! I did some tests once and the lighting I thought was stunning! I cant do all works like this as I just dont have the computing grunt! though the skydone really bought out the texture tiling and bump !

[Richard]

Also mate if you have PS (I think CS3 on) it has shadows and highlights editor under Image > adjustment > shadows and highlights.

It can do wonders with shadow lighting!

[kami]

I agree with Mihai that they are correct for a sunny day, but if it's not 100% sunny and dry you really have problems creating correct shadows in maxwell due to the mentioned problems.

I'm not sure, but can't you mess with the atmosphere settings to get softer shadows?

I tested it several times: it can't be done. You can get the shadows less dark. But you can't get their edges softer ...
I also opened several threads concerning that problem and I really hope there will be an option in the future.

cheers,
kami

[brodie_geers]

Thanks for all the replies.

The best outcome I've had so far seems to relate a bit to Mihai's comment. I used HDR w/ the illumination channel disabled. Directly over my model I placed a large plane textured w/ a cloud material from the gallery and made it Hidden to Camera.

That did seem to soften the shadows somewhere between HDR lighting and Physical lighting but fine tuning the transmittance to get just a bit of softness seems to be really tricky. I'm going to try and tweak it and see if I can get a better outcome. I'll post an image if I can get something decent.

Richard, your solution sounds pretty intriguing too. I've never quite understood sky dome so I haven't really used it but your suggestion sounds pretty good. Like you say, though, that takes a lot of computing power. Probably not something I'll be able to use as I typically render over night as it is. Could come in handy occasionally though.

As Kami said, decreasing the sun power or altering the atmospheric conditions didn't seem to do anything at all. I think clouds have a lot to do with soft shadows but I think a lot of it is also the light bouncing around the area from trees, buildings, etc. I'd hoped upping the planet's reflectance value would help mimic that but it doesn't. Upping the amount of ozone or water in the atmosphere doesn't do anything for shadows either. Basically you just get a darker scene for the most part with crisp shadows. Once you adjust your shutter settings you're back to where you started.

-Brodie

[Richard]

Brodie

Mate I think most of what softens shadows is the light pool created by the sky, hence why I look out now the building across the road in shadow from my building at this time in the morning still has shadows created under the eaves etc.

The shadows further deminish under cloudy skies due to a more bright sky created through the contained moisture in clouds catching light!

[choo-chee]

I use another solution: I create a big emitter where I want more light and very soft shadow, give it full trans. and 1.0 nd to make it invisible, and it gives softer shadows all around... usually I use it for interiors that need more soft light through windows, but it can work here too.

[brodie_geers]

choo-chee,

I think this method would work better for me if I could make an emitter infinitely powerful. My problem with this method was that my scene is quite large so I had to use a very large emitter. It gave softer shadows but the light falloff (I may be using that word incorrectly) was all wrong. The bright spots and dark spots that were created due to my emitter being closer to some parts of the model and further from others (the distance from the base of my building to the emitter was, say, 5x the distance from the emitter and the closest point to the ground). It looked like a scale model.

If I moved the emitter far enough away so that the falloff was more even I had to make the emitter larger and then it just wasn't powerful even if I maxed the settings and cranked multilight up to 1000000 or whatever the highest value is.

-Brodie

[choo-chee]

duplicating the emitter some more ? like a half-sphere around the scene ?

[brodie_geers]

That could have some potential. Probably hurt my benchmark but sometimes you have to wait for perfection Good thing we've got multilight.

-brodie