Tutorial 4 - Lighting

Using the various lighting tools found in 3D Studio Max it is possible to give a model a much more realistic look. Since in real life you typically see everything lit by daylight or artificial light adding lights to the scene is almost always benificial.

The lighting tools we used in tutorial 4 was the Target Spot and the Omni light. The target spot works just like a spotlight would, with light being generated and aimed in a particular direction to light up that area. It has many modifiers such as adjusting the intensity, area of effect or colour of the light.

The Omni light produces light in all directions, and can be used for light sources light candles or similar. We used this inside the pumpkin model provided  as well as a modified Target spot to generate a particular spooky lighting atmosphere.

Following this tutorial I watched a video guide on how to create a realistic outdoor lighting effect to use in my scenes. This guide also explained how to use the Arch and Design materials and mental ray renderer.

The finished scene with some simple objects: