Hello everyone,

Im workin on a render and its got a shadowed rear area that makes detailed carving on a door impossible to see. I used the daz dungeon lighting and brought in a torch, set it in a wall sconce right by that door, and rendered, and it cast no light, as the daz candleworks would have. Im wondering if im doing newbie-user-error and not using all the abilities of the dungeon lighting, or if it in fact doesnt create any light for the torches and braziers in its set?

Is anyone familiar with dungeon lighting and can tell me if these items can cast light? If not, what are good solutions? I thought of bringing in candles from candleworks, centering them all in the torchflame, then just deleting the candles, as I remem the candleworks readme warned that deleting the candles would leave the light source present. This sounds feasable but I dont know how well its gonna simulate torchlight, so second question is, does anyone know of light shedding medievalish items? Is there anything out there like "torchworks" or "brazierworks" that would do what I want in one step?

Thanks for reading :)

Logan

The torch you mentioned does not cast light but your idea of using the DAZ candle works is a good one and will work. In answer to your second question: There was a Brazier in the free stuff section. If you do a search I'm sure you'lkl find it. Bear in mind this Brazier doesn't cast light either.

render an image to post, I've done a lot of work with dungeons and cellers (being the dungeons and dragons freak that I am), there is a way that you can fake hdri and get truly realistic images depending on the contents, as well as getting the ambient light from torches in the sconces, fireplace, or any other fire light source.

Logan, Is this my 'medieval chamber' from DAZ you're talking about? If so, the lighting with it wasn't really meant to light anything other then the door and area around it. I could try to make a new light for you, if you tell me what you need. The main problem here is that poser doesn't have 'point lights', that is light which goes outwards from a source, like a torch or candle. But maybe it could be faked some way. mac

Hello Everyone :) Thank you for the replies! Neil, thanks for confirming the "candleworks gambit" Im glad to hear I was plotting something that is possible! Ill check out that brazier too. Bobcat, I had to google for "hdri" to better understand your reply (curse of the newbie) and WOW there seems to be some incredible work underway to simulate lights! Were you offering for me to post a render of my scene so you could show me an example of hdri postwork? That sounds awesome! Mac, Holy Crap yer the creator of the DAZ medieval Chamber?? I cant believe the elbows im rubbing here! How youse doin man? :) Ive seen your item at DAZ and it looks awesome, im drooling for it ;) In my current render, im using the DAZ Courtyard but not its lights. When I got this item, it pretty much emasculated me. I would bring the courtyard in, then try to import a character, and I could never find that character. My personal Poser Guru that turned me onto the program did some kind of incredible edit and sent me a courtyard "retread" that now allows me to bring in the courtyard, bring in a character, and pan around without losing the person. This is what ive used, along with Complex Global Lighting. The result is a dark shadowed area in the back of the render scene, and thats what im trying to illuminate with a torch so the carved door can be better seen. Thanks for reading :) Logan

one way to accomplish torchlighting, is to parent a whackload of spotloghts to the ball prop that comes with poser. then position each of the lights to where you wanted them placed around the ball, then make the ball invisible. There used to be a setup of that in the free stuff a while back, might still be there.

Hello Bobcat, Thats a great suggestion, thank you. Preparing to Google for "whackload" now (wonders if this could turn out to be a tragic decision...) I did a search in the free section for "torchlight" and "torch" and It seems that item isnt around any longer. If anyone following this thread has this torchlight simulator, id appreciate a chance to get it :) Thanks again! Logan

'whackload' slang term for many. anywhay, I searched the free stuff for you and found it here: http://www.renderosity.com/freestuff.ez?Topsectionid=0&Form.SortOrder=UserName&Start=37&Form.Search=True&Form.Criteria=BALL

or just search-globall-, it'll get you there to.

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=645709

I think the fire lights your referring to are RomanceWORKS "UltimateFIRE CandleFLAME" from the FreeStuff.

Right on, thank you for the link :) I actually had a pretty fair idea whatcha meant by whackload - evidently my net-comic skills havent matured to the point where I can quit my day job yet ;) Thanks for sticking with me, I cant wait to try the globall Logan

Hi Nruddock, Thanks for the link, Ive got it saved and will give it a shot, im going the newbie route first and seeing what I can do with existing light items. The render ive got already has a complex global light set and Ive played with both glowball and ultimateFIRE now in the existing render, it seems that both the glowball and the FIRE steal or null out some of the existing lights? Is there a way to use both light effects or have I reached some light object limit in Poser4 propack? Thanks again, Logan

If you've got ProPack or P5 you can use one of Ockham's scripts (search FreeStuff) to turn them all back on, otherwise save the scene and edit the pz3 in your text editor of choice, definitely not ideal, but this will keep everything parented properly.

If you do P5 there are some other interesting things you can do, see
http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=1768916#11

Message edited on: 05/27/2004 20:06

Right on again, thanks for the additional info :) OK ive found two items in freestuff that I think could be the script you are referring to: Python: Change lights, P5 and P4 by ockham Includes P5 light attributes like RayTrace in the changes. Select some or all lights, select any combination of attributes. (Read the readme for more info.) and, Python: Light changers by ockham Package of four simple scripts. Set all lights to spot, set all to infinite, set all to local, and delete all.(Local is halfway between spot/inf, not avail. from usual commands.) Is one of these what you referred to? I do have P5 installed but havent done any work on it yet. ALL my stuff is in my P4 runtime. Spose I could move it over to work in P5 but Id love to be able to pull this render off in P4 propack Logan

It's "Change lights, P5 and P4" that you want (file should be LightPanel2.zip).

ProPack should be fine, the only difference is you need a lot of lights to get the same effect.

OK cool, Ive extracted the zip and put the .py file in Runtime/Python/poserScripts Ive launched poser and theres no smoke pouring outta my comp chassis, ive turned on the local news and see that Montanna is still standing, So far so good. Poking around the poser GUI I note the File>Run Python Script... option. Prob gonna mix myself a stiff drink and then click that and see what happens. Ill let you know how I do. thanks again for all the great advice :) Logan

This is a little OT Logan, but you don't need to move your P4 runtime anywhere to use it in P5. P5 supports multiple runtimes. Fire up P5, open any library, go to the very top level and "add new runtime", navigate to your P4's runtime and add it. Everything (fingers crossed!) should work OK. Just a suggestion for after you've got your lighting working in P4:-) (BTW - if you do decide to try P5, please ensure you are up-to-date on the Service Releases). If you've not used P5 much you'll have a bit of a learning curve to go through, (and you'll probably need more RAM and a faster PC!), but IMHO P5 is well worth experimenting with. (Plus you can use the materials room to set ambient colours (> 1 if necessary) so that they seem to glow in the dark - might be an alternative to using additional lights...) Cheers, Diolma

Hello Diolma, Im tragically new to poser so this info is gold, thanks for sharing. Ive just used the SR 4.1 Application, and SR3 Figures Updater was already loaded. Im on a win 2000 professional service pack 4 system with a 1.13gig P3 cpu and 1.5gig RAM. Is this going to be sufficient and should I go for the Runtime import? Thanks again, Logan

Hello Again, Im having a problem with this instruction: Fire up P5, open any library, go to the very top level and "add new runtime", navigate to your P4's runtime and add it. When I open the library and go to figures, I right click on just about everything I can and see no "add new runtime" option. Can anyone clarify for me please? Thanks, Logan

You need to double click on the "Folder with arrow" icon.
You'll get the "Add runtime" option when you have gone far enough up that you don't see the "Folder with arrow", just folder icona for each of your Runtimes.

The "Add runtime" is the usual "+" button, but when you mouseover it you'll see "Add Runtime" rather than "Add to Library".

Message edited on: 05/29/2004 06:00

worked like a charm, thanks nruddock.