1. Rendering, Cameras & Lighting
CGDD 4113
Jeff Chastine

2. Rendering The process of converting your scene into a 2D image
For gaming, we don’t care about it that much (but still important)
Click on a View (the header) and then use menus and shelf
For this class, use standard menu bar
Open rendering view
Render Single Frame*
IPR Rendering
Render Settings*
After rendering, you have the option to save the image (File->Save Image)

3. Common settings File Output Prefix Image format
Resolution (e.g. 640x480, 72 dpi)
Frame range (for animations)
Camera (front, side, persp)
Aspect ration (HD)

4. MAYA software settings

5. Camera settings In each view, there’s a camera icon
Can set options like:
Depth of field
Background color
Angle of view
Focal length
Near/Far clip plane

6. Camera Settings

7. Image Planes Using an image as the background color
Image always faces the camera (orthogonal)
Can animate it, but doesn’t move if camera turns
Instead use a Skybox (or Sky Dome)

8. Lighting * Attenuated (falls off with distance). Typically 1/d^2
Several kinds of lights – hardest part of realism!
Default* – if no other lights, this one’s there (to the upper-left of camera)
Ambient – only affects ambient component of material
Directional light - parallel rays come from infinitely far away
Point* - a lamp
Spotlight* - a spotlight (duh!)
Area* – a rectangular light is the source (not just a point). Soft edged shadows
Volume – advanced. We won’t be using it here.
Global Illumination (Radiosity) – algorithm, not light. Patch-based. Mental Ray only.
Shadows – must turn them on per light and in render settings!
* Attenuated (falls off with distance). Typically 1/d^2

9. Default Light (With raytracing and shadows turned on)

10. Ambient light (with intensity at 1
Ambient light (with intensity at to demonstrate it – Shadows Off)

11. Directional Light Has two parts (position and direction)
Separate with the ‘T’ key

12. Directional light (Raytracing, Shadows on)

13. Point light

14. Spot light (2 parts) (Penumbra =5.0, cone angle=50.0, no decay)

15. Area light (2 parts)

16. About shadows Two common kinds of shadows Raytrace Takes longer
Usually gives hard edges
Is exact
Shadow maps
Usually faster
Must specify resolution (default 512, which is bad)
Gives softer edges
Edges can be jagged

17. About shadows
512
8192