I'm all exited about HDRI ! I have every related app and plugin I could find but... how do I get those Terragen generated hdr files into Poser ?! xDave

more info please. what, exactly, are you trying to bring in? a background still image? If so, it's great that you created a beautiful image (how about posting it so we can see HDRI from Terragen) but a digital background image is only that to Poser -- a digital image. You can connect it to a rectangle in the materials room and it will look fine, perhaps with tinkering. You can also composite it behind a poser-rendered image in 2D software (in other words, don't bring it into poser at all. If NOT a still image, please inform us. ::::: Opera :::::

Attached Link: http://www.keindesign.de/stefan/poser/

If you have Pro Pack or P5 try the attached link - under Python scripts. Adrian

Message edited on: 01/10/2005 04:16

For Opera, I'm creating a set of hdr files using the sopack plugin to emulate the lighting conditions I created. I always use backgrounds when rendering an outdoor scene in poser. To Adrian. Yeah I got that script. I used the LightGen plugin in HDR shop and it worked, once. The script worked too but the lights were too intense (forgot to check scale all). For some reason the plugin refuses to work again. I get an error "plugin does not exit when queried for parameters." I got this the first time but the file was there anyway. anybody get this error? xDave

you guys are over my head, but I am going to tag along and hopefully ask my questions intelligently. -- search for "sopack" on Renderosity, nothing found. What is the 'sopack plugin?" -- at stephan's site, he has a python script "that allows you to import light set text files created with LightGen and HDRShop. It is designed to be used with light sets that are scaled to a total density of 1." So I went to HDRShop and it seems to be a program into which you feed TIFF or other format stills and get HDRIzed file back. Cool. But I did'nt see where you can make lights. Also, is the program $600 (not necessarily unreasonable.) So, I ask, is there a way to get HDRI lighting for Poser using a phython script? ::::: Opera :::::

I get the error, XDave - I usually exit HDRI-shop and then see if any HDRI or lightgen plugins are running in task man, close them, and start again. I tend to get the issue when I am using pure HDR files and not say generic .tif or .jpg files, so maybe you want to check your output? The sets in my freebie stuff are all TG with HDRI-lights, but I did add and remove some in order to fake radiosity. Looking at them now, I see I still have a ways to go ;-) 3D world gave away stitcher a few issues back - it's worth a peek if you want to try out other options than HDRI shop. ~S

oh, and for the ignorati - sopack is a TG plugin, not Poser. ~S

For xDave - I get that error too.
For OperaGuy - you can download HDRShop V1 for free, non-commercial use only.
From the LightGen plugin page - "There is a bug in HDRShop where if the plugin takes a while to execute, HDRShop will think it has died and will report a failure. However, even if HDRShop reports a failure, the plugin is running just fine so you can ignore this warning."
Adrian

Message edited on: 01/10/2005 07:40

Not always - LightGen sometimes doesnt create the file, and HDRI may leave processes running (this is more a FYI, btw :-)) When it comes to hellaciously bright lights - scale them in LightGen and also remember to sometimes minimise the amount of lights. ~S

Spinner, I have just been trying it out on my P4 3Ghz @ work & I've found that the processes are actually running & not stalled. It took 6 minutes @ 100 iterations & 1 minute @ 5 iterations to generate the text files from the hdr file of the attached jpg. The speed of creation of the text file is linked to the number of iterations. Adrian

Cool. I left my similar work box on at night, overnight, and nada when I came in at 11 the following day. Different people, different machines, different experiences. The gist of this is: It works, don't give up at once, and yes, you can import HDRI files into Poser Pro Pack, thanks to Stefan's scripts. (Or the DAZ scripts, if you want to check out P.C Bos' stuff) And thats a mighty purty picture :-) ~S

Attached Link: http://www.debevec.org/Research/HDR/

Here's the link to the hdr for the pic. Spinner it sounds like you're a part timer to me, I get in @ 7 :) Adrian

It's usually the peons who need to get in that early in my world. I pull 14 + hr days, if I come in late, it's because I stayed late. Now, back on topic - xDave, if you're really into HDRI you may also want to take a peek at Vue5. I havent tried the demo, but from what I see in the galleries it's much more powerful than a HDRI script in Poser. ~S

Shade is also an alternative for affordable HDRI/IBL rendering of Poser scenes. The recent 7.2 update included support for .hdr files (previous versions supported only .float HDRI files - same data, different format).

Well, i have been called ignorant on this thread (and answered respectfully as well), yet I want the knowlege and will continue to ask questions at my own level, as well as attempting to parse what is going on. I'd love to get HDRI capability in Poser. Question: does HDRShop and any other program that process stills into HDRI stills produce results so accurate and reliable mathematically from one image to the next that you can feed it a folder of animation output images and it will produce a smooth animation? ::::: Opera :::::

Operaguy The output (often called probes) from HDRshop and other such progs. are not really for use as stills. They attempt to contain the extra intensity information that real world lighting has. This can not be re-produced on a monitor or photo. Once you have got hold of your probes (stop sniggering) It still takes a 3D program to interpret them. At its simplest a program could just interpret the 20 brightest points of the probe and create a light set mapped on a sphere. With more sophistication you can use the information in the probe to control the percentage intensity of individual lights in your light set. So having set up your HDRI environment you animate in the normal way. Apologies if this was too simplistic, someone may find it useful!

well, we peons and ignorati need simple! thanks prikshatk. and guess what, it is STILL to dense for me! Let me parse it down, and since you were considerate enough to respond, perhaps you will do so again. You feed HDRShip something. Big TIFF file? Series of TIFF files? And you get back....output 'that attempts to contain the extra....' and you say that actual output cannot be viewed on print or a monitor, fair enough, I noticed the HDRI Viewer and downloaded it along with some .hdr files. Okay. Then you say "can use the information in the probe to control the percentage intensity of individual lights in your light set" so that must mean that with stewer's Python script, you can induce the .hdr probe to drive the settings on the normal lights in Poser. Do I have that right? What's that saying..."technology sufficiently advanced appears like majic to the ingorati" or some such as that. If posers mundane lights can be driven to HDRI in this way, it would look like magic to me. So now this question... does the python script drive the NUMBER of lights? Most fake GI and Radiosity schemes I have seen in Poser depend on ten, twenty, thirty lights at low intensity. Anyway, before I ask more, lets see if I am even at all clued in yet. Thanks again pridshatk, yes, someone might find it useful, myself and plenty of others. ::::: Opera :::::

I use POVray (via PoseRay) for HDRI and radiosity with poser3, poser4 and DazStudio scenes. Even better value than shade, its FREE ;-)

...so anyway, I notice in the task manager that LightGen was still running, its ram usage was even fluctuating. I thought it looked like it was running, I'll try to let it run and see what happens. I've got a 2.4GHz with 1GB of PC3200 ram so it should be fairly quick, in relative terms. To Operea guy, although yourself and many others would find parts of this thread useful, most of it would be just confusing. If a thread started by someone else has question about several things that you arent familiar with then you should start a new thread with a question like "what is HDRI". This way people that are new to it will find that basic information without having to sort throught the advanced stuff.

Attached Link: http://www.geocities.com/ffrog.geo

YEAH!!! Just let it run! Watched it with CachemanXP and it didnt take more that 15 minutes. I made a set of hdr's in Terragen with the soPack plugin. I converted them with "cube2cross" (see url). Then I used the LightGen plugin. One note: according to a lot of the articles I read, the size of those original files is much less important than I would have thought. Smaller=faster in almost all cpu functions.

Attached Link: http://www.on.cs.keio.ac.jp/~maru/fv/

xDave Have you seen this utility?

It uses OpenGL to display HDR probes. 30MB files open almost instantly!!!!!

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?ForumID=10139&Form.ShowMessage=2073297

Operaguy I started a new thread in Poser technical...

Attached Link: http://www.debevec.org/

I think some people have a misconception as to what HDRI really is, and what it's actually used for in 3D. The lightgen utility just extracts certain info from a light probe in HDRShop and translates that information to generate a standard lighting rig to basically "fake" HDRI, using standard lights, in apps that don't support HDRI probes natively. However, in some 3D apps, the light probes can be used directly, and no standard lights need to be added to the scene in order to use them. Light is calculated by advanced rendering engines using the information in the probe directly to illuminate a scene with a global high dynamic range of colors, which provides a much more realistic lighting model than using standard 3D light rigs. Check the link for more information on what HDRI actually is. It's the webpage of Paul Debevec, the founding father of HDRI.

Thanks for the help guys! I've seen a lot of examples lately. The current practicle use I've seen is mostly in advertising. It's being used to make digital images of products appear more realistic. All of the images I saw were done in apps that support it natively. I'd love to buy Vue or shade but I'm unemployed right now so that luxury shall have to wait. xDave

I'd second Prikshatk's suggestion regarding PoseRay/POVRav as a free easy way to get into playing with HDRI.

Ignorati is bastard latin, derived from ign. (ignotus) - unknown. It is used as a phrase to describe "Those who do not know". Hence, the phrase denoted "for those who do not know" and not "for those who are ignorant morons", which it looks like the phrase was interpreted as. Here's a short overview over getting fake HDRI into Poser Pro 4 thanks to Stefan's scripts: * Grab the old lightcrosses I have lying around here, bottom of page, they're in HDR format: http://spinner.northern-studios.com/freebies.htm * load HRDI shop * load any of the crosses * Go to Image > Panorama > * Set the left hand side to Verical Cross * Set the right hand side to mirrored ball * Uncheck bilinear interpolation * set the file size to be 128 x 128 (i've not ever had a prob at this res) * save the file as a non radiance file (jpg/bmp/whatever) inm order to avoid xDave's lightgen issue * open the saved file, leave default settings * run lightgen * play with parameters and click execute * Do as you please with file with funny dots, but make sure you have the saved .txt file * open poser * run Stefan's script - which will call the liightgen-generated .txt file * tweak Traveller has a big tut on this at RDNA. Shrek 2 had all HDR lights, as did a lot of The Incredibles and some of the recent car ads. Other cool places to take a look at are splutterfish and maybe the v-ray crowd. ~S