I am a newbie and this is my first post. I have had Poser 6 for a couple months. I made my first movie recently. It was just a test before I tackle something with a plot. You can see it with the link below. I have a question, which for me is very important. How can I turn body shadows off? I mean you can turn off the shadow that a figure casts on the background but I want to know how to get rid of, or greatly reduce, the shadow cast by the chin on the neck and the shadows on any other part of the anatomy. I have tried using spot lights which works ok but not that great, and I feel like I am working hard to get rid of something that shouldn’t be there in the first place. I feel like a shadow is somthing you should add at your discretion and not have to figure out a way to get rid of. It would be great if there was a default “zero” light button which would produce a universal even light and no shadow. There are light sets with names like “360’ or “neutral’ but they all produce shadows. These shadows often look like a lot of dirt around the neck.
http://stevedraun.com/posing/posing_fs.htm
Steve
PS: the movie was intended for the uninitiated

 

the flash movie looks pretty good to me. a few glitches, but nothing you don't know about already. the shadows under the chin to which you refer are not shadows, but actually areas that aren't receiving any illumination. there are many ways to do what you want, and the lighting experts will be able to tell you more. one way is to use several lights from all angles, to make certain every body part is lit up. GI may also work, but if there's ambient occlusion, you'll get those dark areas.

Quote - the flash movie looks pretty good to me. a few glitches, but nothing you don't know about already. the shadows under the chin to which you refer are not shadows, but actually areas that aren't receiving any illumination. there are many ways to do what you want, and the lighting experts will be able to tell you more. one way is to use several lights from all angles, to make certain every body part is lit up. GI may also work, but if there's ambient occlusion, you'll get those dark areas.

 

Miss Nancy,
Thanks so much for your input. Are there any lighting sets I can purchase that will make these body shadows (what else do I call them?) disappear so the entire figure is evenly lit? Or is there some sort of formula, a diagram of were to position lights to get the desired effect? You mention positiong lights at different angles, what kind of lights? I was hoping I was asking a question with a simple solution which would not necessarily require an expert. I have seen so many renders with body shadows that were so subtle they may as well have been non existent.  Please remember I am new to this. What is GI? I have  zeroed out ambient occlusion with no effect. Any more help would be greatly apprecated. My only back ground in 3d figure animation is Iclone, which is much easier. Here is an Iclone movie I made.
http://stevedraun.org/sword/sword_fs.htm

 

Hi Steve,

I think it is phenomenal that you are a new person to Poser and can animate like that....  Have you any experience with other animation programs...  thats was excellent.

unfortunately, proper use of light and shadow in poser requires alotta experience and expertise, which needs several chapters of a manual to properly explain. see the poser gallery here for hundreds of thousands of examples of bad lighting and shadows. depending on poser version, read up on image-based lighting or global illumination (GI) in yer various manuals (I don't have iclone, but GI is covered in carrara). read all the recent threads here with keyword "lighting". we useta fake GI in older versions of poser by having a set of about 30 dim universal (infinite) lights, and there may be some of those sets in freestuff here. the disadvantage is that poser can become somewhat slow and unstable with that many lights.

Quote - Hi Steve,

I think it is phenomenal that you are a new person to Poser and can animate like that....  Have you any experience with other animation programs...  thats was excellent.

 

Thanks so much for your compliment! As I said in my last post my only experience in animating is with Iclone which I used since it came out a year ago this month. There is a link to a movie I made with it in that previous post. Iclone is easy to use and lots of fun. In a few months I taught myself to animate and then I took to poser right away. I never feel frustrated animating like I do with lighting. It’s easy to learn the few animation tools and then it’s patience and imagination. The trouble is I can’t imagine how to light my characters and I am running out of patience. The light sets that come with poser 6 are worthless if even lighting is your goal. I just bought the first computer related book I ever owned “Poser 6 Revealed” and as far as light is concerned I am no better off then before I owned it. I am not trying to do anything fancy, I just want even lighting and any help is appreciated. 
Steve

 

Quote - unfortunately, proper use of light and shadow in poser requires alotta experience and expertise, which needs several chapters of a manual to properly explain. see the poser gallery here for hundreds of thousands of examples of bad lighting and shadows. depending on poser version, read up on image-based lighting or global illumination (GI) in yer various manuals (I don't have iclone, but GI is covered in carrara). read all the recent threads here with keyword "lighting". we useta fake GI in older versions of poser by having a set of about 30 dim universal (infinite) lights, and there may be some of those sets in freestuff here. the disadvantage is that poser can become somewhat slow and unstable with that many lights.

 

Hi Miss Nancy,
Your words are not wasted on me. I have experimented by placing 4 white spot lights front, back, and left and right about mid body and then changed them to infinite lights. This lights up James (head and shoulders) pretty good. But when I switched to Jessie I got ugly shadows on the shoulders. So I install lights above the head point them down and on the ground and point them up and make them infinite and tweak and tweak but…
I am not interested in stills just movies interested in making movies. I am waiting for Poser 7 which may make animation movies a little more interesting and by using mostly 2D backgrounds and only one or two characters I should be able to keep rendering times down to 1 or 2 minutes a frame. Unless I use 30 lights! Is there some other way to achieve Global Illumination without 30 lights? You said you could fake it with 30 lights what’s the real way? How can I make a movie using 30 lights? If I give up perfection is there a more practical way. Perhaps a set of lights for sale that produces Global Illumination with only a few strategically place lights? 
Steve

Using a value in the ambient channel will reduce unwanted dark areas (without increasing render times, always important in animations). Remember to connect the ambient color and make sure the different light values add up to 1.

Make sure to check the properties of all your lights to be sure they have cast shadows disabled.

My problem has often been the opposite of yours - not getting the shadows I wanted and having to make sure I turned shadows on with the various lights.

I dunno how to fake GI in early poser versions, other than the fake GI infinite light sets like the "render upgrade" set shown in the attached image, or use a bright image with IBL and no AO, to avoid the dark areas that most folks actually wanna see in renders. for GI, I would just use carrara instead. it's very easy in that, and most other modeller apps. if HDRI works in P7, then try that, as that technique should be far more realistic than ordinary IBL.

Quote - I dunno how to fake GI in early poser versions, other than the fake GI infinite light sets like the "render upgrade" set shown in the attached image, or use a bright image with IBL and no AO, to avoid the dark areas that most folks actually wanna see in renders. for GI, I would just use carrara instead. it's very easy in that, and most other modeller apps. if HDRI works in P7, then try that, as that technique should be far more realistic than ordinary IBL.

 

Thanks Miss Nancy  I finally found what I was looking for! The suggestion to use IBL did the trick. The IBL lights give over all even lighting to the entire scene or figure. For example when using the IBL “sun right” light if the light is placed directly in the center and reduced to 20 % strength before rendering I get great results and it only requires one light!! Then I can add  spot lights and they will produce SOFT shadows for high lights and dramatic effects.
Now I am not trying fruitlessly to get rid of shadows which everyone that responded to this thread knows is very difficult, I am adding shadows if I want to, which is much easier.
Steve

o.k., good luck and happy holidays. let us know how the render turns out.