Animator Prep

[ntxdave]

OK guys, I need some real help this time. I am preparing a model to render an Animator animation. I am having some real problem getting some lighting that will work. I have captured my current setup and need you to tell me what to do. I have tried several different types of lights and settings and I just do not seem to be able to come up with something that works. As you can see, everything is too dark.

Twilight & Animator Animation.PNG (387.06 KiB) Viewed 11621 times

[tuna57]

Dave , If your just wanting show the car moving through the wash equipment and it doesn't leave the building this is what I'd try, I'd make the model a rectangle with no openings, big enough for the car and equipment. If I'm reading stuff right you only have one point light powered at 400w ? If that's correct I'd copy a string of them down the space power them back down to 100w - 150w run a test and adjust as needed, Either adding more lights closer together or boosting up the power. I'd be inclined to add lights before jumping power above 150w - 200w . If I couldn't get even enough light coverage with point lights next choice would be an emitter below the ceiling. If I've understood the tutorials correctly though emitters will have slower render times.

[Fletch]

This 2x4 light fixture mounted at 9' ceiling heightprovides 4500 lumens, so insert SPOT lights spreading light down at your model, hotspot 90, falloff 160, set power to 4500 Lumens, and color temperature at 4000 kelvin.

Place them at similar spacing, height, location to real life - so if you would hang light fixtures approximately 6' apart, then place them in your model the same way.
Place as many fixtures in your model as you would place in real life.

Now, under Tone Mapping pull-down menu in the Render Window Dialog bottom-right-hand-corner, choose "Simple" tonemapping and boost the exposure of the rendered image from default "1" to "1.5" or "2" and so on until you are satisfied. This must be tested before rendering the animation. Be sure to render the animation with same exposure settings.

The other Tone Mapping alogrithm is my favorite, but for beginners, boosting exposure in Simple Tone Mapping should be sufficient.

A 400w bulb would be pretty standard on the ceiling of a large space like a car wash. Not a problem. Be sure to set light powers and exposure of camera to be reasonable to real life.

Use the Light Preview Scene of the Parking Lot , not the office space, for previewing your light fixture, as it's the situation that is closest to your case in your rendered image.

[ntxdave]

Great feedback Fletch. I did several things........

1. First I lowed the ceiling quite a bit
2. Next, I went an created a couple of light fixtures (looked at the ones in the link but did not see how to download them so I build my own very simple ones
3. Then I started trying the various settings you recommended. I also tried with different light types (primarily spot & point)
4. Lastly I tried a variety of settings under "Simple" and wound up with:
   1. Tone Map: Exposure 1.70 Gamma 1.40
   2. Temperature Adjust: Desired 6000 Unadjusted 6400

Since I have not wall on the camera side of the room I still have what appears to be an external influence even though I have the sun turned off and Physical Sky in the environment. I guess there should be a way to block that influence but I have not figured that part out yet. I have not had much success when I have tried to have an external wall on the camera side and then going inside. If someone can give me some tips, I would appreciate it. So here is the current results.

Twilight & Animator Animation Settings v2.PNG (324.72 KiB) Viewed 11591 times

BTW: Just received some good news. My sponsor just sent me an email that he had purchased the Pro license and that I should receive it shortly. I am excited . I assume in your post on SketchUcation that x64 is the 64 bit version. I will probably use the above settings for my first attempt but I expect it to take several hours of rendering. Again, excited about the potential here.

[Chris]

Hi Dave, please check your private messages!

[Fletch]

I still have what appears to be an external influence even though I have the sun turned off and Physical Sky in the environment. I guess there should be a way to block that influence but I have not figured that part out yet.

Set Sky Type to "Background Color" and set it to white or black. Any Sky Type with the word "Background" in it will not influence/contribute lighting in the scene.

[ntxdave]

Thanks, that was a big help. I thought I had tried tha but must not have done it correctly.

I am in the process of generating my first Animator render. I have a big concern about how long it is going to take. I have 401 frames. This is very small compared to what I am ultimately going to want to do. If you have any tips/suggestions about how to speed up the render I would like to hear them.

[ntxdave]

Well, here is my first render. I used the Prelim setting so the quality is pretty low and even thought I used the Pro version, the materials and everything else are from my original model with 2.5 Hobby materials.


It is a start but I would like to see a higher quality render. I originally had the quality at Low+ but it was going to take a LOT longer so I dialed it back to see how it would work.

At least you can get the idea that using the Animator beta plugin for SketchUp and Twilight Render 2.5.5 Pro does work.

[Pilou]

Can you describe the process of on a simple cube animating moving? (just before lauch the render)
(with captures screen - Gif Cam is a good free one)
Because I don't see anything about Twilight rendering inside Animator, or anything about animator inside Twilight!

[ntxdave]

Can you describe the process of on a simple cube animating moving? (just before lauch the render)
(with captures screen - Gif Cam is a good free one)
Because I don't see anything about Twilight rendering inside Animator, or anything about animator inside Twilight!

First of all, you just have Twilight Render Pro installed. You then need to start it in SketchUp and get all of your render setting setup. Then when you go into Animator in SketchUp and click on the icon to generate a video. When the dialog box comes up, you will see an icon to use Twilight Rnder. I think there is an example of that screen over in SketchUcation.