Where's That Spotlight?

bobby77

I enjoyed working with earlier versions of DAZ3D 3-5 years ago.  I'm now getting back in the saddle with DAZ 4.9 for a new project.  

Overall, the interface looks great BUT I'm stumped on one thing... there's some sort of global light source not listed in the SCENE elements (so I can't turn it off) and any SPOTLIGHTS I put into the scene are visible in the work area but they DON'T RENDER, just the mysterious global light appears. 

I'm sure this is easy-peasy but any input would be great.

Thanks!

Bob

nonesuch00

^L to show them in the viewport or hide them in the viewport

When you render, there is an 'Auto Headlamp' that you probably will want to turn off to 'never' render since you are setting up your own lighting.

Richard Haseltine

I think you are rendering in Iray (which is the default engine) and that has an HDRI environment map on by default - go to the render Settinsg Pane, Editor tab and in the Environment group set the Environment Mode to Scene Only - that will leave only your lights. You will almost certainly then need to adjuist the Tone Mapping settings as your spotlights will be dimmer than the HDRI source.

nonesuch00

Another fellow said you should adjust the f-shop to 4.6 and the ISO to 400 for typical home indoor scenes.

bobby77

Thanks so much for your help, guys.  I found the following explanation which is the solution for my particular situation:

>>>

When you create a scene when using IRAY, there is a default Environment Map that loads. If you want to add your own custom lights, you need to change the default lighting so your custom lights show up. The following steps are for when you want to just see the lights you add, and not see the default lighting from the Environment Map and Auto Headlamp.

Go to Render Settings>Editor> Environment> Environment Map and choose None. See attached "Lighting". Then, go to Environment Intensity, and turn this to 0.  In this example, we have also loaded a pointlight.

nonesuch00

bobandersontn_f2b2a6556e said:

Thanks so much for your help, guys.  I found the following explanation which is the solution for my particular situation:

>>>

When you create a scene when using IRAY, there is a default Environment Map that loads. If you want to add your own custom lights, you need to change the default lighting so your custom lights show up. The following steps are for when you want to just see the lights you add, and not see the default lighting from the Environment Map and Auto Headlamp.

Go to Render Settings>Editor> Environment> Environment Map and choose None. See attached "Lighting". Then, go to Environment Intensity, and turn this to 0.  In this example, we have also loaded a pointlight.

Wow, I never saw those two steps before.

barbult

bobandersontn_f2b2a6556e said:

Thanks so much for your help, guys.  I found the following explanation which is the solution for my particular situation:

>>>

When you create a scene when using IRAY, there is a default Environment Map that loads. If you want to add your own custom lights, you need to change the default lighting so your custom lights show up. The following steps are for when you want to just see the lights you add, and not see the default lighting from the Environment Map and Auto Headlamp.

Go to Render Settings>Editor> Environment> Environment Map and choose None. See attached "Lighting". Then, go to Environment Intensity, and turn this to 0.  In this example, we have also loaded a pointlight.

If you don't want the HDRI environment light and only want the photometric scene lights that you added (spotlight, point light, distant light), the more common way to achieve that is to change the Render Settings>Editor tab>Environment> Environment Mode to Scene Only. You don't need to remove the Environment Map or turn Environment Intensity to 0.

Each camera that you add to your scene has a built in headlamp that illuminates whatever the camera is aimed at. By default that headlamp is in Auto mode. It will be rendered if you don't add any photometric lights to your scene. As soon as you add a photometric light, the Auto headlamp will stop being rendered. You can manually turn off the headlamp to prevent it from rendering in cases where you are using only HDRI environment lighting (no photometric lights) and don't want the additional harsh headlamp light. The headlamp can be turned off in the Parameters pane when you have the camera selected in the Scene pane (Parameters>Headlamp>Headlamp Mode).