Looking at lights in maya

After i had blocked out the interiors of the environment, i started looking at all the lights in maya. There are 6 lights in total and each light has a different effect and aspect to it. As i'm going through the lights for the first time in detail, i am going to just explain what each of the lights are and their function and purpose. Here are the lights stated below and what i thought of them and the potential results they can bring to my environment....

Ambient Light - The ambient light is a very strong light. Light is being projected in almost every direction. This light can be useful for very dark places in environments that need a lot of brightness but what i found out as i was experimenting with this light was that you can't really cast a shadow while using this light. Also the light appears to take away almost nearly all the shade and shadow of nearly every object in the scene because light is being projected in every direction. This light can have some purposes but in this case, because of its lack of shadow and shade that it cannot bring , i will not be using this light.

Directional Light - The directional light is a more specific light which is projecting its ray of light in one particular direction as i found out. Which ever direction you position the lights in, that is the area that its going to project its lights on. Also you can use forcast shadows on this light so its one that i may use as i go along. Could be useful if i am trying imitate a sun ray or something like that.

Point Light - The point light in appearence is very similar to the ambient light in which it is projecting its light in all direction. The difference between the ambient light and point light is that the point light can cast shadows and shade but the ambient light cannot. This light can be useful for something like a light bulb or a lamp.

Spot Light - The spot light is a very interesting light. In appearence the light appears to funnel its ray in a cone shape and projects its light in one direction with the light appearing in a circular shape due to its cone shape appearence. This light could be useful if i'm trying to play around with character and mood. I could use the light to literally focus on scene or a character and with added shadows that come with it, it could prove resourceful.

Area Light - The area light is a very straight light as i started using it. Just like the directional light, it projects its light in one particular direction. I found out that this light could specifically be used for something like a moniter screen which could prove useful since my team are creating an office environment.

Volume Light - The volume light is probably the biggest since it works and looks differently from the rest. I found that its appearence is like a grid sphere shape form and that within the grid sphere the light is projected inside. I found out that the more you expand the light, the brighter the scene gets. I could be potentially using this light for large environments.

The first light i tried experimenting with was the Area Light and its a pretty cool light. I found out that this light may have to be duplicated on many occasions as i found out that light isn't strong enough to light up a whole scene. Plus the positioning of the lights is also going to be very important and i will be looking into that. Here are some early rough and low key lighting in maya just to get warmed up.

Rough Block out in maya

Ok so while i am gathering more research and references on lighting in offices, i have decided to just quickly block out the interior environment and then just familiarise myself with all the lights in maya. Once again this is just a rough block out and not the actual final design.

Reference

Here are some references of typical cubicle offices.

What i noticed about offices in general is that the lighting is quite strong and hard. In some offices there are no natural light coming from the window either because the window is closed or blocked or maybe there are no windows at all. The source of the light seems to be coming from the lights on the ceiling as well as the computer moniters on the desk. What i want to do is just look at different offices of different types during different weather seasons and see if that has any effect. I will also be looking at other interior environments and not just offices and look at how light is reflected and lighted in there also. I will also be taking photos with my camera to get my own reference and analyse how mood and atmosphere can be really affected by looking at movies and games as reference. These will all go in my main blog as well as this blog.

Lighting the interior

Since i will be lighting the interiors of our environments, i have decided to start cracking on with some testing and practices. I have never really got into full lighting in maya but i did look at some excellant tutorials from a website called Digital Tutors over the summer. Based on those tutorials i did do a rough lighting test in the summer and that gave me confidence that i can do it. Obviously for this unit since we are using it as an experimental blog, i went through the lighting tutorials again just to re-jog my memory and i will create a rough block out of the environments and then experiment with some lighting.

For the environments in our animation, we are looking to create an office ennvironment. At this moment in time we are not yet final on whether we will go ahead with an office environment, as we have had some feedback from Mike who told us to look at other possible environment designs before going ahead with this one. Keeping that in mind, i will continue to practice lighting and for now will block out a cubicle office for our environments since that is what we are going for.

Experimenting

For this term we were told to create a blog where we should update it with experiments for the animation we are working on. The purpose of this unit is to practice and forsee possible complications that could arise when we do get down to producing our animation.

So i will be updating and uploading my experiments and test runs on this blog just to showcase what i have been doing and any difficulties that i may have came across. I will also be addressing on how i can overcome these difficulties.