TM Lumen: Issues and Tips

[@jskup]

thank you. For rendering still images I have obtained good results by superimposing a path tracer rendering on a Lumen rendering in post-production. The Lumen rendering gives a well-marked contrast for the spotlights and path tracer for the soft, high-quality shadows and mirror reflections. For these lighting problems, you need to play with the intensity (or distance) of the shadows.

[@viarender]

That is brilliant! I may try that this weekend, and see how it looks.

[@max22able]

Thank you for putting the time and effort into this - I really appreciate your work at digging around under the hood of TM. Currently working on the HDRI/ sun balance and your insights have been useful.

[@viarender]

I’m delighted to hear that you found it useful. Thanks a lot for the support and taking the time to write a nice message!

[@AWViz]

I believe the sun size setting controls the shadow sharp/softness as well

[@max22able]

Yes - but only in PT, not Lumen.

[@viarender]

Thanks for commenting, I’ll have to look into that!

[@DartDesign-p9x]

Hi there. I must say the way you teach makes it easy for professionals like me learn new software with an ease. Now my question is, Is it sensible to import V-ray lights from 3ds max scene directly into twinmotion ? If yes, how will it impact overall quality and rendering speed? Or do you like to use default inbuilt lighting system of twinmotion?

[@viarender]

Many apologies for the delay in getting back to you on this (crazy end of school year)! So, I have never attempted to import lights from another application into TM. From their documentation though: "there are some conversion inconsistencies when importing lights between design applications and Twinmotion". I am also not familiar with VRay, so I do not know if lights used in VRay are a physical 3D mesh object that emits light, or a software specific light (a sort of 'magic' light, like the default 3ds Max lights). My inititial thoughts would be to build your lighting in the render software. So, make a clean slate scene, and build the lighting up from scratch each time you work on a scene. Each render is different, and each context is different, so I would rather have control over the light parameters. Also, VRay is more physically accurate, with more detailed camera options, and to me, TM (and Lumion) are still more 'artistic' rendering engines (very much personal opinion there!). So you can cheat the system a bit to get the result you want... I'll look into the documentation a bit more on this topic though! Thanks for watching and taking the time to comment!

[@IllGib]

Interesting. Every options i thinker with seems like a short blanket, it might fix a distant object shadow but then create artifacts near camera, or viceversa. I'm on the latest 2023.2.4 and i'm getting grainy and striped reflexes of lights and shadows trough glass objects. In my case i have those big windows in a night scene, and the ceiling lights have this dithered reflex on the glass, and some shadows are striped, if looked directly the shadows, even from far, are ok. I'm fiddling with all the possible options and either have the dither but nice overall shadows and reflex, or completely no light reflexes and some blotches around. I try to post the images for references.

[@IllGib]

Default settings: i.postimg.cc/W1p23NVs/Esterno-notte-1-Copia.jpg Max reflection quality: i.postimg.cc/020kP6Lt/Esterno-notte-1-000-Copia.jpg

[@IllGib]

Nope yt removed the link at the images.

[@viarender]

Any luck getting this to work? Is this for video, or still shots?

[@IllGib]

@@viarender pity no, i'll have to live with that. Sometimes render turn out all blotchy, moving a bit the camera or restart it fix it most of the time. Overall the new version it's miles away better the previous, and lumen it's a great addon. Pathtracing it's great, but i use twinmotion for fast iterations or else i'll keep using Corona that take less time overall 😁

[@MauroMan_]

In the 2nd issue, - Ambient light - how to solve that sunlight that filters in the upper corner, at the back of the room?.. Isn't there a solution to that?

[@viarender]

Hi there! I have not checked the latest version of TM to see if the issue is fixed, but I will later this week, and see if there is a workaround!