Hi guys. I trying to find a realistic way to light a red glass bulb from the inside to where it looks half way decent and to have it really glow believably. I've tried Anything Glows and a combination of other lighting but it looks terribly bad. I would like to see the transparency of the glass and the light within. Any advice? Thanks much;-)

Namaste;-)

Shakti

The best way I've found to make something like a bulb glow is to make the shader for the glass itself glow.  Multiply the glow color with a 1 - 100% modifier and use that to adjust to the glow you want.  Put a bulb inside it for the glow on other objects.  You will want to use ray trace shadows on the bulb and enable soft shadows using a diameter approximating the bulb's size.  If the bulb creates wierd shadows, make the bulb light illuminate everything except the bulb itself.

I have never had good luck with anything glows.

If the bulb is part of a larger object, take that object into the model room, select just the polys that make up the bulb surface and assign them to a new shader zone so you can apply a glass shader with glow to just that zone.

Good luck!

Klebnor

Mark

He He, I see that Mark and I are working at the same time cross posting.

I don't know the specifics of what he's done but I'll stab that it's similar to what I've done.

This is a simple sphere with a little bit of red in the color, a little bit of red in the transparency (mostly transparent though), and a little bit of red in the glow.

I put the filament in the middle so you could see that there's something inside and that it's quite transparent.

There's also a red bulb light in the middle with the falloff set to 100% and a distance which I liked. Soft shadows are jacked up.  Still not sure if this is what you're after but it sounds like it.

Oh yeah and there's a little reflection in the sphere too.

I do a lot of sstuff with glows like that.  My usual method is to put in the filament object with a bright but short distance3 aura and make it a very bright shade of what I want the color to be.  Bright yellow normally.  Next I either use a sphere or a custom spline object for the bulb itself.  The bulb has an aura as well.  A bit less intense than the filament.  Next I set up the shader for the object with a 97% transparency and color it to the desired color.  I add about 5 for the reflection value and I also add a small amount of refraction.  Usually using an index for common glass.  Lastly I add the main lightinng source itself.  I place a bulb light source in the exact place I have the filament in, inside the bulb object object.  I find it works very well for me.  I sometimes add a tiny amount of glow and a very small but intense light sphere to the bulb light, to make it look like the filament has that intense glow at it's center.  And make sure to turn on soft shadows for the light.  I find that this method makes it easier to set up proper shadows if the bulb is going to be inside some king of fixture.

Thanks very much everyone for all the great help. So appreciated!!

Namaste;-)

Shakti

Yes, Mark this is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks.

Shakti

Quote - Is this the type of effect you are looking for? 

Mark

Download the attached file and change the .txt to .car and take a look around.  There are several things going on in the file that both Sparrownightmare and Kixum have spoken of: Glow, Aura and a Light Sphere. 

Mark

Thanks a lot, Mark. Will do. This is exactly what I needed.

CHEERS;-)

Shakti

Quote - Shakti, 

Download the attached file and change the .txt to .car and take a look around.  There are several things going on in the file that both Sparrownightmare and Kixum have spoken of: Glow, Aura and a Light Sphere. 

Mark