Iray daz 4.8 beta new guy need help with HDRIs I can't find a good tutorial for iray
smtelephone_cb7254b03a
Posts: 35
Can anyone show how to use an hdri properly for iray in daz 4.8? I can't seem to figure it out. Thanks!
Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
224 S 200 W, Suite #250
Salt Lake City, UT 84101
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2024 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
1. Click on Render tab
2. Click on Render Settings tab
3. Click on Environment menu (make sure that Editor is active in upper part of the tab)
4. Click on the little box on the left of the Environment Map field to get a menu, select Browse and navigate to .hdr map you wish to use.
If you wish to render your .hdr image (that the picture is visible in render) set Draw Dome option to On.
Thank you very much for the how to and picture. So I am using the tropical beach hdri from hdr labs ibl. I want to use the image in my render and when I do it comes out blurry. Do I need to add the high res jpeg to somewhere besides the hdr in environment map? If so where do I want to put the jpeg? Thanks again!
Yesl, that particular one is good for lighting only...the hdr is not high enough resolution to use as a backdrop.
For Iray, I'm not sure where to put the hi-res jpeg...I've not done any renders that needed it.
Oh ok so from what I understand now the tropical beach hdri itself is blurry? So this would be used for lighting purposes only?
Yes, that's about the size of it...it works alright as a 'distant' backdrop if all you want is some of the sky showing through other foreground geometry or something, but not as a 'beach shot'.
I've played around with most of the ones from the sIBL site and most of the HDRIs aren't good enough to stand on their own as backdrops, that's why many of the sets have a hi-res jpeg included. Rule of thumb for those images...if it's got a hi-res jpeg, it's probably because it needs it for backdrop use.
How does Iray use HDRI…which I assume stands for high-def something something. I'm familiar with the sky-domes. Does Iray turn a sky dome into a lighting source?
HDRI = High Dynamic Range Image.
And no, not the dome, but rather the HDR image, itself, is used for lighting as if the scene you are rendering were actually present at the time and location the HDR image was made.
Thanks. So this isn't a dome that I would load in and see in the scene? How does daz or Iray use this image then? Does it take the colors of the image and treat them as an invisible dome? Or an overhead light source?
Hi,
I have just had a quick look. The "tropical beach hdri from hdr labs" comes with 2 HDR image. 1 is small, the other is a 3k image(19MB), are you using the larger HDR image/file?
By default, the image is loaded on to an infinite sphere. In the render settings, where you load the HDR, near the top of that list is "Dome Mode" with a drop down menu for various options, such as "Infinite sphere" and "Finite sphere". The "Finite sphere" option allows you to set the size of the sphere used. The setting for that will appear in the list as "Dome radius" when that option is selected.
Correct me if i'm wrong, but,
1)can we just use HDR image as lighting without any other lighting source in Iray?
2)i'm not sure how to turn off the sun in environment map, I've switched the physically scale sun to "off" but its still showing lights from sun in Iray renders.
It's a bit more involved...
The image is used by the renderer as lighting information...just like a scene light. The bright spots of the image are brighter lights...the dim, dimmer lights. The whole image is sampled and the lighting information is what is used during the render. This is one type of global illumination.
Now where it gets even more complicated is when you have the image also 'visible'...and whether that visibility is just for setup/preview purposes or where it actually is used to provide a scene element (usually backdrop/sky).
Thanks again. fascinating stuff.
I've played with this tutorial a bit:
http://basic3dtraining.com/biggest-daz-studio-iray-secret-fabulous-lighting/
I loaded a setting and character and created this primitive…made it a light, then cranked the lumens up to 800K. And it does create a very nice render in iray. I do wonder about workflow…because in the main window the scene is totally black and there's no way to see what you're doing without rendering. Perhaps turning the camera headlight on to pose and then off to render is one way to work.
Yes, but for good lighting and good shadows it needs to be a very good quality HDR image...there are several listed in the various Iray threads...with the Pixar Campus being on of the most widely used.
To expand on a bit of theory that may be useful: as previously stated, 'HDR' stands for 'High Dynamic Range'. Your eyes and the real world are remarkable things, really. On a sunny day, you can simultaneously look at very bright objects (even some that have metallic sun glint) and pretty deep shadow; in photographic terms, your eye has a range of about 24 f-stops. Amazing thing. This huge range of brightness levels is what is referred to by HDR. Now, in a computer, brightness levels are typically sixteen bits, with a range of 0 to 65535. This compares to the actual eight orders of magnitude between deep shade and bright sunlight. So an HDR image, instead of storing these numbers as integers, stores them as floating-point numbers, i.e., the exponential notation you learned about in science class, giving them a huge range. A jpeg image, with its small range, cannot provide realistic light to a scene, nor decent shadows -- the difference between the darkest and brightest areas is just not enough. An HDR image, though, encodes the relative brightness of the sun, and can be used as an environmental light source that casts suitable shadows.
Note that your monitor and your OS software in general cannot display such a wide range (you don't want to be blinded looking at the bright part of such an image!), so 'tonemapping' is done when displaying HDR images to map them into your monitor's color space.
I wonder if it is a good idea for Iray to be the default renderer in DS. Considering that it is very different, especially in lighting, from 3delight, and that the tutorials use 3delight materials and lights, it may lead to a great deal of confusion for new users.
Yes, a lot of confusion. Nice results, but a new process to get them. The biggest trick is the difference between what you see as you work on a scene and what you get in the render.
I've just been told over in the Show Us Your Iray Renders III thread that you can also add a non-blurry image to the Environment tab if you create one using Windows-Panes/Tabs. Some HDR sets come with a blurry image for lighting and a sharp one for backdrop use (the free ones from Rift3D do).
Yes, but for good lighting and good shadows it needs to be a very good quality HDR image...there are several listed in the various Iray threads...with the Pixar Campus being on of the most widely used.
Thank you for the clarification. Can you link me the forum section with good iray HDRI or Hdr images you mentioned. I tried the search bar but can't seem to find the section.
Thank you for the clarification. Can you link me the forum section with good iray HDRI or Hdr images you mentioned. I tried the search bar but can't seem to find the section.
The 3 Show Us Your Iray Renders threads...
Part 1 http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/53690/
Part 2 http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/54734/
Part 3 http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/56019/