[DAZ] Understanding lighting used in a scene

[Whocares65]

I'm trying to understand how the lighting is done in this scene (and more generally in the game Being a DIK). The bright and even lighting is a style I like (and I'm not the only one), but I can't quite figure out how it's done.

In the image below I can see:

• Sharp shadow directly beneath the bed, suggesting there's a light source above
• Sharp shadow behind Maya, suggesting there's a light source pointing at her
  • Yet her front is not lit brighter than the rest of the scene

I've read that

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are a way to get the nice, even lighting I'm looking for. Below is an attempt to start replicating the above scene. I put a ghost light just below ceiling level covering the room:



This does provide an even lighting, but I see a few issues:

• The light below the bed is soft, not sharp
• There's no shadow under the desk

What am I missing? And what is giving Maya in the original image that sharp shadow?

 

[SliveEmerald]

So if I was to work through this deductively, I could say firstly that the light source is likely inside the room rather than coming from the environment through a window due to the even lighting as you said. Also, there are distinct angles between the illuminated bits and the bits in shadow. This tells me that there is likely only one light source, or multiple light sources far enough away that it gives a similar effect. The biggest example of this is her face, where part of it is bright and part of it dark, I think that's the best indicator for the angle of the light source.

Because we see the book in her hand cast a shadow on her upper body (down and to the right in the image), we can deduce that the light source is above her and angled down, toward her (you can also see this in the shadow of the box on her desk). I think the effect you saw in your first two points comes from a single angled light source, both above her and pointed toward her. As for what lighting technique is used, it's hard to say. It could just as easily be an emissive surface, like a primitive plane, or a spotlight far enough away.

One more thing I noticed. I think the original render is not an enclosed room and instead more like a movie set, whereas yours looks enclosed because I can see a distinct shadow of a ceiling in the corner. This may or may not impede your light source depending on how far away you have it. It's also easier to provide even lighting using an emissive surface when the room is not enclosed because it has to be large enough and far away enough to give the whole room the evenly lit look.

 

[Deleted member 1121028]

Emissive are generally not the best for sharp shadows. A single spotlight set to rectangle with a large angle pointing at her. You can see its reflection and position here (you can also notice ceiling and wall in the scene are still there) :



Not sure about the weird dark area under bed (is that even a shadow?). The lighter area between the bed and the chair make no sense too. Not sure what's going on there lol.



My 2cents.

 

[CaramelCowboy]

Haha i'm the guy that posted that. I even posted on reddit and daz forums because like you, I can't seem to figure out how games get that kind of lighting. Another great example I came across a few days ago was A.O.A academy. The scenes look so evenly lit yet still have some nice shadows and the characters have a nice spread of light all over them. I haven't touched daz since my post because i'm waiting for a better laptop.

If you do figure this out however, please drop some knowledge in here as that's the only thing that I still can't seem to get right.

 

[Whocares65]

OK, thanks to no__name's insight I placed a 100x100 spotlight w/ spread angle 180, 3 million lumens, temperature 5000 pointing at Maya's bed. This is only like 200 iterations so don't pay too much attention to the details.



A few things look good to me:

• Lighting is more or less even
• Shadow behind Maya
• Shadow of wastebasket & bed post look about right

But it still doesn't look quite right. Maybe it's a matter of light color, temperature, etc.?

If anyone has ideas on how to make it even more like the original, I'd be happy to hear them.

 

[CaramelCowboy]

OK, thanks to no__name's insight I placed a 100x100 spotlight w/ spread angle 180, 3 million lumens, temperature 5000 pointing at Maya's bed. This is only like 200 iterations so don't pay too much attention to the details.

View attachment 830137

A few things look good to me:

• Lighting is more or less even
• Shadow behind Maya
• Shadow of wastebasket & bed post look about right

But it still doesn't look quite right. Maybe it's a matter of light color, temperature, etc.?

If anyone has ideas on how to make it even more like the original, I'd be happy to hear them.

This definitely looks better than your previous render.
Seems like the right direction but I too am eager to find out how to get them to look as close to the original as possible.

 

[recreation]

First of all there are more then one light sources, there are at least 3, maybe more, you can see it partiall at the chair.
Then looking at the shadows, especially the one under the bed, the wird spot no_name mentioned, and the rectangular light spot next to the bed... I think there's been some post work done, some shadows just don't make sense.

 

[Deleted member 1121028]

there are more then one light sources, there are at least 3, maybe more

I saw that but they look quite meangless. Wonder if it's not few probes/spots in the wild to denoise here and there for other shoots.

OK, thanks to no__name's insight I placed a 100x100 spotlight w/ spread angle 180, 3 million lumens, temperature 5000 pointing at Maya's bed. This is only like 200 iterations so don't pay too much attention to the details.

View attachment 830137

A few things look good to me:

• Lighting is more or less even
• Shadow behind Maya
• Shadow of wastebasket & bed post look about right

But it still doesn't look quite right. Maybe it's a matter of light color, temperature, etc.?

If anyone has ideas on how to make it even more like the original, I'd be happy to hear them.

180° is a bit high, like it's a flat line, ~120° or less should be more natural imo.
At 3m lumens, you may want to tweak your ISO/Exposure instead.

Temperature, light color, size of the mesh light... and anything tone mapping : white point, burn highlights/crush blacks, saturation, gamma, luminance... Or tweaking surfaces, post work and so on... There is a lot of possibilities.

 

[Whocares65]

I've managed to create the shadows under the bed by putting a spotlight high above. This required setting ceiling visibility off.

I also put a spotlight near desk level pointing towards under the desk to minimize shadows there. However, I believe this light isn't in the original, or at least not in the same position, as it causes a reflection on the microwave (see bottom right corner) that shouldn't be there.

This is still far from perfect, as the colors are not quite right and the brightness not exactly even. Is it a matter of postwork? Maybe, but I'm skeptical that DPC would resort to postwork for each image b/c there are just so many in the game. I'm no IRay expert, but if it's something systematic that can be scripted, I'd expect it to be possible to be done by tweaking render settings.



As a Patreon patron I've actually went ahead & messaged DPC to ask he does lighting in general. Maybe he'll reply, maybe he won't, but I think he must have a way to quickly & effectively get the nice even lighting found in the game without manually positioning spotlights and tediously adjusting luminence, area, temperature etc. until it looks "just right".

After going through all this, I have so much more respect for the craft of making a good VN. All these lifeless models, carefully positioned and tenderly lit for thousands of scenes, are somehow able to evoke powerful emotions in us all. I tip my hat to the artistes out there like DPC.

 

[Whocares65]

OK, so at least for this scene the ceiling has been removed and ambient light is most likely being provided by an HDRI. You can see it in the reflection of the book cart.



I haven't done too much with HDRIs, only spotlights and such. I'll have to give them more of a try.

 

[Rich]

The overall issue of color could potentially be handled three ways inside iRay. The first is that you could change the color temperature of the lights. My first reaction is that that's probably NOT what was done here. Another option is that you can adjust the white balance in the render settings. (Under "Tone Mapping") This is a common technique for making a scene look like it's at night - you shift the white balance a bit toward yellow, and it makes the scene look blue. Finally, it's also possible to diddle with the Saturation under Tone Mapping. If I had to guess, without any experimentation whatsoever, that would be my first guess as to why the walls in his are less "red" than yours.

Also, when you experimented with a ghost light over the whole ceiling, it's no surprise that you didn't end up with that sharp shadow under the bed. If the ghost light had been smaller - say, the size of the bed and directly over the bed, you would have gotten more of that shadow. (Basically, think about how light works.) But it still wouldn't have been completely sharp.

However, one final thing that nobody's mentioned (if I missed someone saying that, apologies) - it's entirely possible that the image you're seeing wasn't done in a single render. It could be that much of the room was done in one render, and then the bed and girl, lit differently, was composited in. This could easily explain the inconsistent shadows. (The shadow on the wall cast by the girl and the shadow under the bed could have been done in the secondary "overlay" render by using "shadow catchers," and the overlay render done as a PNG with transparency, then superimposed on the rest of the room.