Flashlights Set & ies profiles

Doc Acme

Flashlights Set

I picked this up a few days ago and amazed at the detailing.  The package includes some some actual .ies light profiles, which is great as when I bring assets into Lightwave & parent an actual light to the object.  But in DS they appear to actually be applied as a material rather than an actual light in the scene.  Is this the case?

Secondly, does DS have the ability to do volumetric lights?

 

NorthOf45

First, Iray does implement a subset of IES standard, but is apparently very fussy about what kind of surfaces it can use. Maybe @Totte can shed some light (sorry) on the details. As PA Code-66 he has a product, Emission Profile Master, that explains a bit how it is done. You can access the UserGuide from the readme page.

Second, do you mean something like said flashlight in a foggy setting? Yes, with a little finessing on basic volumes, or with pre-configured products like AtmoCam For Iray, or Terradome 3 (if you use the atmosphere prop).

Totte

NorthOf45 said:

First, Iray does implement a subset of IES standard, but is apparently very fussy about what kind of surfaces it can use. Maybe @Totte can shed some light (sorry) on the details. As PA Code-66 he has a product, Emission Profile Master, that explains a bit how it is done. You can access the UserGuide from the readme page.

hehe,

the reason I have two simple props with the required polygon normals and facing in the EPM product is just that, most models do not work with Iray and IES profiles, and I have problems myself making larger props that do as you always at some point do something that break it.
 

/Totte

NorthOf45 said:

Second, do you mean something like said flashlight in a foggy setting? Yes, with a little finessing on basic volumes, or with pre-configured products like AtmoCam For Iray, or Terradome 3 (if you use the atmosphere prop).

 

Doc Acme

OK, thanks.  I could probably set up a test scene to see what all it's doing.  Probably equivalent using a surface but not as flexible as having an actual light object.

Figured there had to be a way with the atmospheric, but sounds a bit too fiddly for me & short attention span.  I'm taking them into Lightwave anyway.

This example took longer to render than to export from Daz, do some minor geometry tweeks in Modeler, then put the scene together with the ies light & set up the volumetrics.  These are a bit exagerated for effect, but all easily accessible & controlable.

maclean

@Totte

I'm interested in your comment because I've found IES profiles to be very erratic in DS and I can't understand why.

I was told that for a profile to work, the normals have to face in the minus Z direction when imported. I did this quite successfully in one or two products, but in others, I couldn't get the profiles to work at all, no matter how many different ones I created. (I use Creator IES by Karba - free and very good).

If anyone has more information on how IES should work, I'd appreciate it.

 

Totte

maclean said:

@Totte

I'm interested in your comment because I've found IES profiles to be very erratic in DS and I can't understand why.

I was told that for a profile to work, the normals have to face in the minus Z direction when imported. I did this quite successfully in one or two products, but in others, I couldn't get the profiles to work at all, no matter how many different ones I created. (I use Creator IES by Karba - free and very good).

If anyone has more information on how IES should work, I'd appreciate it.

 

Hi Mac!

First off, Iray only support a small subset of IES (street lights type 1), and only a subset of the params (I spent a week on different Iray forums to gather all info about this to make EPM)
Second, the way I "found out" how they should work, good old try and error..

Made a Cube in Modo, split the polys and then named them like 1,2,3,4,5,6, then put IES on each, and saw which one (only one) that gave the correct result.

But I also found out that if when UV mapping the surface, it is easily "destroyed", that I haven't figured out, and never bother to figure out, but I guess a rotated UV map disturb Iray too in some way.

 

Fishtales

I use IES Profiles quite a bit and if you choose the right one it works. I have hundreds of IES Profiles downloaded from various light manufacturers website so am spoiled for choice. I use Light Manager PRO quite a bit too to quickly change settings.

There are two different profiles used in this image. One for the ceiling lights and another for the wall lights both are Emissive surfaces.

maclean

Hmm.. that's an interesting test with the cube! I must try that. I usually UV map the emissive material in the normal way - ie. giving it the maximum coverage. I'm not sure what would be the correct way.

Fishtales - I did download a few and try them, but never had much luck. I need to get some more and try again.

Meshitup

I wish to sell a product which includes an IES profile.

Where do I place thie file in the runtime folder sytem? Do I just add a folder in the runtome and call it "IES profile"?

Also the Validator has a problem with the IES file.

Sevrin

Meshitup said:

I wish to sell a product which includes an IES profile.

Where do I place thie file in the runtime folder sytem? Do I just add a folder in the runtome and call it "IES profile"?

Also the Validator has a problem with the IES file.

Maybe do it like Marshian did here?

File List [Documentation Center] (daz3d.com) 

SpottedKitty

Sevrin said:

Meshitup said:

I wish to sell a product which includes an IES profile.

Where do I place thie file in the runtime folder sytem? Do I just add a folder in the runtome and call it "IES profile"?

Also the Validator has a problem with the IES file.

Maybe do it like Marshian did here?

File List [Documentation Center] (daz3d.com) 

I've done the same thing with all the IES profiles I've downloaded from wherever; stuffed them all into various subfolders of a /Runtime/Textures/!ies/ folder.

All I need to do now is figure out how to use the ones I have. Still haven't quite managed to wrap my brain around it.