Forest v4

Thanks Rashad. The main function of my brain appears to be to forget. I've really got to duplicate your tests, the insight gained might stick a bit longer.

Skydome Horo, if you remember a short time back an image submission I made called "Lighting Options." http://www.bryce5.com/details.php?image_id=2350&mode=search In this submission I show an example of each of the major bryce lighting tools and their benefits/drawbacks. Notice the example on the top right hand corner. It shows the bryce sun and the bryce sky dome in combination. I provided the different shaped objects so that the behavior of the light can be observed easily. Notice how the sky dome fails to illuminate the sides of the cubes. Sky dome light comes from a perfect 90degree angle above the world, and it cannot be changed. Since bryce is thought to be a landscaper, the skydome light functions somewhat well for terrains as terrain ridges can take advantage of this light from directly above. But other shapes like cubes gain very little benefit from the skydome. Also, something not made clear in the example, the sky dome does not cast shadows, it penetrates everything. This is a super big problem. Test it out yourself and you will see. In the scene I submitted long long ago called Miami Vice, there is a shiny red car in the scene but underneath the car the cement is bright blue from the sky dome. The cement beneath the car should be in shadow but the sky dome violates that by not casting any. I assume this feature was programmed this way originally to avoid having too many sets of shadows competing with the sun shadows. I could be wrong though. If you ever take the time to download Blue sky with Sun 34.hdri in Unrelated programs ( it's a jpeg but is meant to be used as an hdri), you will notice that all it really is is a true skydome. A blue gradient as the sky and a pink tinted white ball as the sun. I have many renders coming up that use it and the results are spectacular in my opinion, but we shall soon see. I used it for the final Cement Jungle submissions also, and resulting light is very believable. A true skydome in bryce would relieve the need for such hdris, but for now, I'm sticking with Blue Sky with Sun 34.

. Dave you been using it all this time with the Sky Light :P

Hmn... I think it has all been said. But anyway, yes the sky and the haze/fog are very good. The trees are a bit too dark - reminds me of places where there has been a fire. I too would like to see a true skydome simulation.

It is interesting what you say here (and I wonder how Rashad knows how the Bryce skydome works). Anyway, the interesting thing gat tells about the carrara skydome is how you could use this in Bryce: create a skydome with HDRShop, using Banterle's plugin. Then use this as IBL skydome and supply the Bryce sun plus a radial to bring the sun up to power.

Thanks gat for that explaination on skydome, I figured as much. Bryce does have a "skydome", but it is really nothing more than a single skylight, and it sucks for so many reasons mostly because it comes only from one direction and does not cast shadows. I always wondered why they call it a skydome yet it really isn't a dome at all. I've also wondered why daz won't update the sky dome into a true "dome" since bryce has IBl now, it would take alot of pressure off of ibl. I have had to create ibl's simply for the purpose of simulating a true skydome in bryce. Skydome should be a very powerful tool, but in bryce it is so a joke.

. thanks guys yes lighting needs improvement. rashadcarter Bryce doesn't have a sky dome or anything close to it. Carrara simulates an actual Sky Dome, it (I think) actually takes the sky and projects the light from it onto the ground as if it was IBL in Bryce. Also, if you do want to use the sun as well you will need to add a sun light, which I did not know before I rendered the pic before this one. What it will do is it will not place a light in the scene, but instead will use the sun in the sky lab.

Horo has said what I would have said. Boy that sky is good! Can you explain how the skydome effect works in Carrara? Is it 1 dimensional like in bryce? In bryce the skydome is a single light that shoots down from directly 90degrees above the world plane no matter where the sun has been placed. I hate it becaise it does not provide any light from the sides nor does it cast any shadows so it lightens images far far too much. Is it the same way in Carrara?

The sky looks excellent, very nice haze between the clouds and the landscape. I can see such here around often: looks natural to me. The foreground is way too dark for my taste. This scene may profit from IBL lighting for ambient. But don't change the sky!