Lighting and Environments

Lighting and Environments

Lighting and Environments

Light plays a big role in the overall look of the scene.

The same scene can look completely different with different lighting.

Even a simple cube with basic material can look interesting if the lighting is used wisely.

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Creating a beautifully lit scene requires some experience and skill. To make the process of creating a scene faster and smoother, Vectary defaults to global lighting, called Environment. You have at your disposal a library of different environment options (outdoor and studio). The environment has a number of settings: intensity, rotation of lighting, blurring in reflections, and others.

The second way to illuminate a scene is with local light sources. To better see how they work, turn off the global lights and add local lights.

It is also possible to combine both. There is no unique recipe, it all depends on the effect you are trying to reach.

Environment

What is the Environment?

Environment = Global illumination.

The image below is an example of an HDRi-map. Below you see just a png cover, But in order for such a map to work should be in .hdr format. The HDRi map is usually intended to be imported into 3D software to shape the Environment (global illumination).

In the image, there are areas with lights that will provide illumination to the scene. Such lighting can be adjusted in various ways or turned off altogether.

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Note that Environment and Background are not the same things. The Background is visible, and the Environment is a global illumination that works regardless of the selected background and its settings.

Vectary has its own Environment Library, which has two kinds of environments: studio and outdoor. You can also import your own image in .hdr .exr format.

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Check out https://polyhaven.com/hdris with a lot of free resources.

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Different environments can dramatically change the appearance of your objects and the scene as a whole. We encourage you to try different environments and change the settings. If you don't have enough environments in the Vectary library, you can find many other maps of them on the web.

Each Environment has the following adjustments for you to fine-tune as needed:

  • Intensity - By changing the intensity you can dim the light or make it barely noticeable. You can set an intensity value greater than 100, just enter the desired value. Or turn it off by setting it to 0.
  • Rotation - The angle at which the light falls on the object is quite important. Rotating the surroundings can reveal new results.
  • Hue - Change the shade of the light to create different moods.
  • Saturation - If the effect of the environment is too colorful or intense for your scene, a negative saturation value will correct this. Do the opposite if the color is not strong enough.
  • Shadow - Adjust the intensity of the shadows that arise from global illumination.
  • Blurriness - The HDRi map is visible on the reflective surfaces. With this setting, you can blur that reflection.
  • Resolution - Change the resolution of the HDRi map. Reduce the size to make your scene load even faster. Or increase the size to improve the quality of the map in reflecting objects.

Local light sources

There are four kinds of light sources at your disposal. There are different schemes of studio lighting arrangements (you can easily find them on the web). These schemes will help you understand the general principles.

It is easy to control local light sources in Vectary Studio. Take a look:

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1. Note that by default all light sources do not create shadows. This will have to be enabled in the right panel for each light source. 2. You can set an intensity value greater than 100. Just enter the desired value.

Dynamic

  1. Dynamic is disabled (non-Dynamic) — objects with Lightmap are ignored for diffuse reflection, but not for specular.
  2. Dynamic is enabled — light affects all objects in the scene, even if they have a Lightmap. Also, the Dynamic light sources will be ignored when baking Lightmap.

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Point Light

Point Light — light spreads equally in all directions, as from a normal incandescent lamp.

Spot Light

Spot Light — light is emitted in the form of a cone from a single point. You can adjust the size of the spot and its softness.

Directional Light

Directional Light — light is emitted from a source that is infinitely far away. That is, you cannot bring the source itself closer or farther away, but you can control the direction of the light. All the shadows cast by this light source will be parallel, ideal for simulating sunlight.

Rectangle Light

Rectangle Light — light is emitted from a rectangular plane on one side. You can change the width and height of the rectangle. For example a very long and thin light source.

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