3dsmax VRay Rendering Tutorial - Rendering with Sunlight

Software Used: Autodesk 3dsmax & VRay Advanced 1,5

RC3 for 3dsmax 9
Original Ideas From: Osmosis Studio
Sydney nsw@osmosis.com.au
Modified and Presented: Dong
Contact: yangdongmy@gmail.com

Introduction

This tutorial explains how to set up sunlight an d VRay light to

light up a building's interior.

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Approach to Render a Scene with VRay

The approach I used to render this scene is: Firstly, use a

single SunLight to simulate the outdoor light. In this case, the
outdoor sun light is the main light source. Test render the
scene and add a VRay light to add additional light and shadow
to the scene. The VRay light is used to simulate the light from
outside to give small objects some shadow because the
Sunlight and Environment lighting will not give shadows to
small objects.

Steps to Set Up the VRay Render

Step 1: Go to Create tab -> System -> Sunlight, to create a

sunlight system. Then, place the Sunlight out side of the
building as the image shows:
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Step 2: Set up the Sunlight parameters: Set the shadow type

to "VRayShadow", set "Multiplier" to "3.0", "Color" to White .
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Step 3: Set up the VRay rendering parameters in Renderer tab
by pressing F10.

First, under "V-Ray: Image sampler(Antialiasing)", set "Image

Sampler" type to "Fixed", and turn "Antialiasing Filter" on, type
to "Catmull-Rom".

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Tips for selecting "Image Sampler" types:

1. Use "Fixed" when the rendered scene requires a lot of

blurring effects such as Depth-of-Field.

2. Use "Adaptive subdivision" when the rendered scene does

not require any blurring effects such as Global Illumination,
Reflection and Refraction, Area Light/Shadow, Transparency).

Step 4: Under "V-Ray: Indirect Illumination(GI)", tick the box

before "On". It will enable VRay GI. Set "Primary bounces" ->
Multiplier to "1.0" and "Secondary bounces" -> Multiplier to
"0.5". Set the "Secondary bounces" to "0.5" will prevent the
scene being too bright because we will set up the Environment
as well for Skylight. If the render result is too dark, you can
always increase the "Secondary bounces".
Under "V-Ray: Irradiance Map", "Built-in presets" -> set
"Current preset" to "Low". It will reduce the test rendering time
dramaticly. Under "Options", tick the box after "Show calc.
phase". This option will show you differenct phases while you
are rendering, so you can quickly spot problem areas before
the render finishs.

Under "Mode", set "Mode" to "Single frame".

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Step 5: Under "V-Ray: Environment", turn on "GI Environment

(skylight) override", set the color to blue (R=173, G=208,
B=255), set "Multiplier" to "4.0". This setting will override
MAX's default environment settings. If this option is not turned
on, MAX will use the default settings for skylight .

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Below shows the differenct phases of the render :

Phase 1:
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Phase 2:

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Phase 3:

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Step 6: As you can see, the render is too dark. And there is
some antialiasing problem as well in the edge of the sun light
area. We will change some settings to eliminate the problem .

First, go to "V-Ray: Color mapping", set "Dark multiplier" to

"2.0", it will give the dark area more light .

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Second, go to "V-Ray: Image sampler(Antialiasing)", change

"Image sampler" type to "Adaptive subdivision". And go to "V -
Ray: Adaptive subdivision image sampler", set "Min. rat" to " -1"
and "Max. rat" to "2".

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Third, got to "Create" tab and create a "VRay Light". This light
will be used to simulate light coming from outside and gives
small objects some nice shadows. Check out VRay Light
settings with the image below.

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Fourth, select Sun Light system and go to "VRayShadows

params", tick the box before "Smooth Surface Shadows" .
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Fifth, change VRay render settings according to the image

below. Note, set the "Secondary bounces" Multiplier to "1.0"
will increase the brightness of the bounced light.

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Final Render Result:

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[Download Scene File:]

The scene file includes: .MAX file for 3dsmax 9 .

Download Scene File [226KB].