Stadium Lighting Question

# 1 06-10-2014 , 09:52 PM

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Join Date: Oct 2008

Posts: 10

Hey guys,

I have to light a stadium in Maya and I am using mental ray and am going back and forth on what is the most efficient and effective way to this. I'm keeping render times in mind as I don't want 45 min render time for each frame. I am considering putting in spot lights for each light but with the amount of lights this will kill my render times. I also considered using one spot light but the look inst that real because of the slot light emitting from a center. My last option was using a area light which looks good but I don't get proper reflections in close by windows it looks like a big white square in the renders. How would you guys tackle this, opinions what not? Ive attached some screen caps give you an idea of what I am trying to accomplish.

Thanks

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# 2 06-10-2014 , 11:19 PM

The thin red line
Join Date: Aug 2009

Location: England

Posts: 4,472

Just to get you started you could bake the lighting on to the textures.............dave

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# 3 06-10-2014 , 11:29 PM

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Join Date: Dec 2006

Location: South FL

Posts: 3,522

I don't know how realistic this needs to be or your hardware limitations so I can't say if under 45 mins is reasonable. You could have illuminated shaders for the surfaces and have area lights behind them. Area lights should be set to not be visible and you may need to unlink the fixture models from it.

If there are any volumetric effects in the scene then you may need a texture in the intensity that simulate the individual bulbs(an orthographic front render of the light panel would make a decent starting point for assembling such a texture). At any rate, you can have a pass for light surfaces that you can later use to apply glows and flares and whatnot.

Having said all this, multiple spotlights might still be less expensive.

- Genny
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