I'm a Poser (6) newbie, but do have some serious 3D (LIghtwave, etc..) experience. 
I can't fathom the apparent oversight of not having -in Poser 6-  a global ambient light setting...perhaps there is a python script or something I'm not finding? 

What am I trying to do? Well, for example, increasing the global ambient light will lighten every thing uniformly,  and decrease shadows uniformly.  I estimate having this feature would cut my time on lighting by ...a whole bunch. That's a technical term that I rarely use :)

Use a diffuse IBL and set it to a plain color (no image).

Yep - it's a glaring (no pun intended) omission.

IBL substitutes nicely.

Thanks for the tip you two, eye will look into that IBL monkey business :)

Glaring omission = spec-tac-ular humor :)

Quote - Thanks for the tip you two, eye will look into that IBL monkey business :)

Glaring omission = spec-tac-ular humor :)

ouch :)

you shouldn't make light of Poser failings you know

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:biggrin:

lingo-laden: man, you guys are the best, that IBL dope is da BOMB!

or, in tad nerdi-er, nasalier voice: that ibl "appears to be" a more than adequate solution.

or , just being me: It has kicked my renders up a very nice notch

Thanks!

most of my renders are done with a very dim IBL with no map and an infinite - it's a pretty good all round light setup I think

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Some of this might help. On an IBL light, if you set it to Zero, your scene will be fully lit with no lighting, even if all lights are set to zero strength black. Adding a value to IBL contrast will only darken the scene. Anyway see below.
**------------------------------

Image Based Lighting and Ambient Occlusion Light Values and Research**

THIS Zip file of rendered examples illustrates the effect of light values at various settings. Images are named using their settings. No light sets included.

LIGHT AND SHADOW OVERVIEW

Firstly, it is important to note that light and shadow, though often controlled on the same panel, are very different. Light illuminates the surface of a mesh; shadow darkens the mesh where the path of light is blocked. Though simplistic and obvious, this fact must always be remembered when looking at the various dials and input boxes. Shadow inputs will not light your mesh, and light inputs will not create shadows, though shadows can be faked with light gels (images plugged into spots and infinite lights.

The type of shadows, whether raytraced or depth map, will yield very different results. Where the depth map shadow is much faster, raytraced is more detailed. Ambient Occlusion is a shadow subset of the Raytraced option, and completely optional.

Although most of these values can apply to any type of light, some are unique to IBL (image based lighting), such as IBL contrast. Also some dials, though still visible and able to accept input, are ignored depending on your choice of light and shadow type.

SHADOW COLOR

Yellow is the first color to fade from our visible spectrum. Blue is the last. Forests of yellow green fade to purple and finally blue mountains.

Distance diminishes color in this order: Yellow>(orange)>Red>(purple)>Blue.
Remember:Yellow is close. Orange red not so much. But purple and all of blue are always out of touch.

Low light shadows are often greenish in yellow sun or indoor light, struggling to stay true. However, winter shadows on snow are teal to blue.
Example Pic

Night shadows start more purple before finally becoming blue.

The shadows under the yellow moon are aqua and teal.

THE DIGITAL CONTRADICTION

Being, it is a developing medium, we often encounter flawed design approaches to rendering. One that suffers often is light and shadow and it's effect on colors. Unlike our eyes, render engines don't automatically remove colors based on what would disappear in the real world. SO WE have to play mother nature a bit.

In the real world, light makes colors truer and brighter allowing us to bring the contours into better focus. Shadows, subject to lower light levels, tend to defocus vision and desaturate colors. In bright sunlight, tulips and roses are bright red. A fire truck screams with color in full sun.

In 3D, the same truck or tulip becomes pink and paler in flawed lighting. Notice how yellow vanishes from the tulips in shade, making them less orange, less saturated, less crisp.

Poser's default light settings add many interfering elements like atmosphere and black overlays, all contradicting the nature of light and shadow. When striving for realistic lighting just remember....
Bright is brilliant. Dark should be dull. Clear is crisp. Shadowed is soft.

LIGHT PARAMETER TAB:

Map (shadow) Size (for Depth map shadows only):

Effect: Greater value=sharper shadows. (only works with depth map shadows, not raytraced)
Description: Greater values increase accuracy/crispness of shadow diplay accross mesh contour.

Preview_Light... Dial (under ShaderNode header):

Effect: Adjusts the visibility of the lit mesh in the preview window
Description: IBL lights usually preview dark but render bright. Often it is very hard to see what exactly the IBL light is illuminating. This dial, which has a maximum value of 10, will enhance the preview display visibility of the light hitting the mesh.

LIGHT PROPERTIES TAB:

Shadow Blur Radius Dial:

Effect: Greater value=Gaussian blur radius
Description: Greater values gaussian blurs the entire shadow on the mesh by amount entered. Values too hgh will allow hot contours to show through.

MinShadowBias Dial:

Effect: Lower values=accuracy of mesh able to catch shadow.
Description: Greater values Decreases amount of fine able to catch shadows. Can actually be a good thing to prevent over-shadowed/muddy contours in the eyes/lips.

Ambent Occlusion Strength Dial(for Raytraced shadows only):

Effect: When checked with Raytraced shadows and rendering enabled, this dial controls fine mesh self shadowing intensity.
Description: This dial weaken, strengthens the Ambient Occlusion (mesh self shadowing) in areas like eyes and teeth etc. Raytraced needs to be checked in shadow type and in the render settings.

Atmosphere Strength Dial:

Effect: This dial adds haze to the image which will desaturate and wash out the image like a screen layer in Photoshop.
Description: Higher values will wash the images desaturating and removing fine detail similar to fog.

Color Value Box:

Effect: It determines the color that the light is filtered through.
Description: The is the same value linked to the "Color" box on the IBL light node has a weaker tint effect on whatever image is plugged into it. Similar to "color" layer style in photoshop. This is the same color also determined by the Color value box on the light material node.

In this gif, Atmosphere was set to zero. Ambient Occlusion was used to self-shadow the mesh as seen around the eyes/lips/nose/ears. The gif shows how light shadows dial where adjusted to fade and blur the harshness of the shadows. IBL contrast was then increased to darken the image.

_________________________________________________________________________

IBL (image based light) MATERIAL NODE OPTIONS:

Color Value Box:

Effect: It determines the color that the light is filtered through.
Description: The first "Color" box on the IBL light node has a weaker tint effect on whatever image is plugged into it. Similar to "color" layer style in photoshop. This is the same color also determined by the color picker on the light properties palette.

Diffuse Value Box:

Effect: Similar to "multiply" layer style in photoshop.
Description: Yields a more aggressive multiplying/color replacement effect than the same color applied in "Color".

Specular Value Box:

Effect: Not used with IBL lighting.

IBL Contrast:

Effect: Adds darkness determining contrast ratio between lit and shadowed mesh.
Description: Greater value blackens the image. Zero is fully lit. Black overlay that darkens the entire rendered lit mesh except the shadows. Noise works well in this node socket.

*This gif illustrated how the IBL contrast value box adds darkness to the image.

Cheers.
Anton Kisiel*

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

Over 100,000 Downloads....

might help? Anton, trust me, it definitely helps a lot of us around here. Thanks a lot!

Sweet, thanks for the info Anton. Never new that about IBL's (mind you I never really understood them to start with even though I use them all the time) so hopefully I can now take this newfound knowledge and use it to some advantage. I've played with the lighting a fair bit but this whole IBL and AO thing is new to me as I only upgraded to P6 recently to get the P7 upgrade free. (rant) Which BTW I was a bit p-eed off about since when I bought P5, P6 came out about three months later with no upgrade specials, and then they go and offer P5 for free and then give you the bonus deal of upgrading to P6 and then give you a free upgrade to P7 for nix... Oh well, at least I went from P5 to P7 for the price of one upgrade after paying full price for P5... could be worse... but then again why the heck is anyone still using P4 or PP when P5 was offered free and for the price of one upgrade they could be using the latest version... not trying to open a can of worms here because maybe I misunderstood how that worked, but if I understand correctly, either I'm mental or people that are using way out of date versions of poser are... again, sorry I'm, a little bit drunk at the mo' but I've never really understood the whole "I'm proud of using an out of date program that can't really compete with the latest version but looks better than half the crap people are putting out with the latest version so I must be a better artist" thing. If what you're doing on an out of date program is so wonderful, imagine the wonderful things you could create with the latest tools. (/rant) I just know I'm gonna regret that in the morning.... Happy ANZAC Day to all the Aussies and Kiwis out there! EDIT: bugger, my rant tags didn't work....

You know what's even better? Although haven't officially timed it, eye  swear my  -much better- renders are actually**  faster**  with ibl.

I'm still unclear as to whats happening in the material room of the IBL light versus the property panels, but give me some time  to absorb excellent tutorial above, and play :)

Apollo comes with some reallly nice IBL lights, bith raytraced and depth map versions. I like them a lot but hey I made them so I am bias. They are in the lights folder and apart of the first download.

-Anton, creator of Apollo Maximus
"Conviction without truth is denial; Denial in the face of truth is concealment."

Over 100,000 Downloads....

I find IBL lights handy for all sorts of stuff.  They do seem to render faster so long as I don't use an image map and Antons lights are really rather good too.  I've used 'em before now on test renders

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