Lighting Up the Night: Special Lighting for Dark Scenes

Lighting Up the Night: Special Lighting for Dark Scenes

In this community workshop, we specifically looked at dark, grungy, nighttime, and low-level light scenes and how to improve lighting in these conditions.

It is challenging to render low-level light scenes with Iray in Daz Studio. Images tend to be grainy, and that is because the Iray render engine works much like a real camera, mimicking the real physics of light. For the same reason, it is difficult to shoot photos or a movie scene in very low light; the camera just isn't as sensitive as the human eye.

This community-based tutorial looked at a range of ideas, example artwork, best practices, and a few recommended products

    • Looking at low-level light scenes in terms of luminance watts
    • Use of ghost lights and creating your own ghost lights
    • Using differently shaped primitives for ghost lights
    • How to use HDRI backgrounds to light your night scenes
    • The quick and dirty method to adding an emissive light to a prop
    • How to use postwork to improve on low-level light renders
    • Looking at a dim underwater scene
    • Is filament good to use for dark scenes?
    • A monitor in a dark room: how to improve lighting in this situation
    • Horror scenes
    • Tomb Raider stylized scenes
    • Some recommended products for low-level light scenes

Try this searchable sample of the video:

About Digital Art Live:

We've been connecting, educating, and inspiring digital artists in our weekly live webinars since 2013. Look out for our live events in our DigitalArtLive.Studio forum.

What's Included and Features

  • Lighting Up the Night: Special Lighting for Dark Scenes
  • Video 1: 1 hour 32 minutes (.MP4)
    • 00:00 introduction
    • 00:01 Richard Schafermeyer - Low exposure levels in Iray considering luminance watts
    • 00:04 Flaming torch on the wall
    • 00:05 Gloomy low level lit hotel room
    • 00:06 Headlamp in a cave
    • 00:09 Mary Codd - The Tired Cobbler Scene - using Ghostlights
    • 00:11 Use of HDRI
    • 00:12 Headless Horseman night scene
    • 00:13 Hallowed Eve - using rim lights
    • 00:13 Using the Hog and Barrel Pub Exterior
    • 00:14 Using a night sky HDRI00:16 Tiffanie Gray - The Secret to Making a Ghostlight in Iray
    • 00:17 Fain - Ghost light demonstrated - using a sphere
    • 00:20 Adding an emissive to a prop - the "quick and dirty method" cyberpunk it!
    • 00:24 Fain’s night scenes
    • 00:27 Night club spotlights
    • 00:28 Night scene only lit with an HDRI background
    • 00:30 Karen Williams
    • 00:31 "Gnasher" in the dungeon - How to use postwork to improve a dim and dark scene (rather than wait for a render)
    • 00:32 Flashlight in a night scene using an IES profile
    • 00:32 IES profiles to produce god rays
    • 00:34 In DAZ Studio - a ruined building on an asteroid - lighting using an IES profile
    • 00:37 Trevor Hancock - Dim underwater scene
    • 00:38 Caustics
    • 00:43 Star backdrop example
    • 00:45 Ted Murphy: Using Carrara - Exorcist-styled scene, using two different types of lighting to tell two different stories
    • 00:48 The bat signal and light cones in Carrara
    • 00:49 The vampire hunter - the use of god rays
    • 00:50 Karen Williams - The IES library - why and how to use it
    • 00:57 Slater Lewis - experimenting with an HDRI collection
    • 00:59 Using blue-toned light to suggest an evening/nighttime scene
    • 01:02 Wireframes and renders showing HDRI lit scenes
    • 01:05 Photoshop bridge camera with DS
    • 01:10 Is filament better to light dark scenes?
    • 01:14 Current HDRI sales
    • 01:15 Pablo Setendijian: IES lighting - tomb scene lighting
    • 01:17 Horror lighting
    • 01:20 Bob Keck: Adjusting a set and replacing the lighting for a night scene
    • 01:22 A monitor in a dark room - how to handle lighting in this situation
    • 01:25 Karen Williams - the Emission Profile Master - recommended product
  • Documentation: (.PDF)
    • Light Up The Night - Searchable Video Access

Compatible Software:

Daz Studio 4.15

Install Types:

DazCentral, DIM, Manual Install

Daz3d