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NanoGator · 16-01-2005, 07:50 AM

@Mark & Zeeman: Thanks guys.

@hopesfall: I lightly touched on this topic in my post, but I'd be happy to go into more detail. (Don't worry, I'm not the type to say RTFA!! hehe)

I examined the footage and developed a sense of what the light sources were on-set. The first big thing that caught my attention was that there were no harsh shadows. Everything was VERY soft. The second was that there appeared to be two really strong light sources. The first was the light that was behind the camera. (Either they had a stage light or they had the door open and it was a nice sunny day. I've actually been in a hangar before so that helped considerably.) The second light source was simply a strong ambient reflecting from all the walls and the floor. So I built a cube around the robot using a tiled image I made in Photoshop of the walls and the floor. I made it self luminous and turned radiosity on. In the case of the first light, I created a HUGE area light at approximately the right position that the light source in the footage was.

I also made a dummy model roughly shaped like Allistair and place it in front of the robot. I did this for two reasons: 1.) So I could cast a shadow of the main character onto the robot during the animation. 2.) So I could more accurately place the light source. The great thing about putting the actor in the green suit was that I could see shadows very clearly despite the light sources being so soft. That made a big difference.

There is one other thing I did with that robot involving lighting that I hadn't mentioned in my original article. He's using a reflection map I made as well. It's subtle, but it's there. That's actually where Calvin's specular highlights are coming from. (well some of them are coming from the main light source, but most of it is from the reflection map I made.) I've done a lot of work with spherical photography, so I put it to use here. I used a similar technique on this image here.

Any more questions? Fire them off!

16-01-2005, 07:50 AM	#5
NanoGator Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: West Coast, USA Posts: 27	@Mark & Zeeman: Thanks guys. @hopesfall: I lightly touched on this topic in my post, but I'd be happy to go into more detail. (Don't worry, I'm not the type to say RTFA!! hehe) I examined the footage and developed a sense of what the light sources were on-set. The first big thing that caught my attention was that there were no harsh shadows. Everything was VERY soft. The second was that there appeared to be two really strong light sources. The first was the light that was behind the camera. (Either they had a stage light or they had the door open and it was a nice sunny day. I've actually been in a hangar before so that helped considerably.) The second light source was simply a strong ambient reflecting from all the walls and the floor. So I built a cube around the robot using a tiled image I made in Photoshop of the walls and the floor. I made it self luminous and turned radiosity on. In the case of the first light, I created a HUGE area light at approximately the right position that the light source in the footage was. I also made a dummy model roughly shaped like Allistair and place it in front of the robot. I did this for two reasons: 1.) So I could cast a shadow of the main character onto the robot during the animation. 2.) So I could more accurately place the light source. The great thing about putting the actor in the green suit was that I could see shadows very clearly despite the light sources being so soft. That made a big difference. There is one other thing I did with that robot involving lighting that I hadn't mentioned in my original article. He's using a reflection map I made as well. It's subtle, but it's there. That's actually where Calvin's specular highlights are coming from. (well some of them are coming from the main light source, but most of it is from the reflection map I made.) I've done a lot of work with spherical photography, so I put it to use here. I used a similar technique on this image here. Any more questions? Fire them off! __________________ Maestro -- Character Rigging and Animation plugin for Lightwave. (MAESTRO DEMO available for download.)