3ds max nterior rendering critique

[lamont_edwards]

Attached to this post is a interior rendering of a lobby I created.If there is anyone outthere that would like to give me constructive criticism on the rendering it would be greatly appreciated.

For lighting I used the following

Daylight system
MR skylight portal
and 1 omni light behind the camera

The rendering took 1hr to render.

Also if there is a faster way to render a more realistic scene it would be greatly appreciated if you could explain it to me thanks

[aaronrumple]

If the desk is going to reflect - then the plant should refleft too. How was it created? Doesn't look like an RPC.

The people are not very realistic. The closer they are to the camera, the more photographic they need to be. You might be better off with just some standing walking figures father away.

How was the volume light done around the elevator lights? Those are overdone - too much blur.

[lamont_edwards]

The people are 3d not render in the scene, the sconces in the elevator corridor are illuminated in photoshop. I tried using an architectural light emitting material, I was unable to achieve the white glow I wanted the material to have. Thanks for the advice

[arshiel88]

I assume you used mental ray renderer. If you are using Max 2009, I suggest you use the promaterials. The stone preset will have a nice blurred/glossy reflections for the floor.

If your computer can, its better those down lights to be photometric lights. It will give a nice effect on walls.

I don't put the light at the back of the camera. Its like using flash in real life. And you only use flash when the scene is inadequately lighted.
About the 3D people, if its 3D, its better to render it with the scene. If its not, make sure you also put its reflections & shadows and most importantly, in correct scale and places.

Try to accessorize the scene with something reflective. say, a porcelain statue, or a vase on the table, put magazines, wall lights etc, but don't overdo it.

Lastly, the camera shot plays a big role in any scene. If in exteriors, its nice to take it on an eye level position (i.e 1.50m-1.80m), in interiors, its best to take the shot on a sitted eye-level position, that is 1.0m-1.20m from the ground, and try not to go over 60deg. camera FOV.

[dellis]

I agree with whats been said already. The thing that i would add is that you should look into the glare shader for the nice glows around bright objects...works pretty good...but staying with Photoshop makes the most sense. The chair models need a little bit of work too. Keep asking questions and you'll get it where you want it.

[loydg]

Ditto with all the previous comments. I've ranted about staging people in other threads so I'll keep this short and sweet. If the people are distracting just don't put them in. If you spend some time viewing renders at VisMasters or CG Arcitect, you'll notice that most of the better ones don't use people or will place them in the distance.

Also, are there lights in the elevator lobby area other than om the wall? Feels a little dark back there...

Love to see the latest!

[lamont_edwards]

On average how many photometric light would you guys use when rendering an interior scene? The reason I am asking is because whenever I do a lighting calc in a space depending on the space I would need to use a min of 10 photmeteric lights according to my lighting calcs, I then import for instance the Focal point recessed down light into the model and copy it ten times as an instance so that the changes made to one will be uodated on the remaing 9 lights. This in turns creates a very long rendering time for the scene although I will get the cool wall washes as mentioned earlier. I was told by my professor that an interior scene should have a max of 3 lights and the light bounce should be set at a max of 2. Any andvice from you all would be greatly appreciated.

[loydg]

Photometric lights can slow down renders if there are tons of them, but I doubt ten would create significant slow downs, especially if instanced (smart move there!). Nor can I imagine a scene with only 3 lights. I typically only use one light and an HDR image, but i'm typically working on exterior scenes. I have had up to 25,000 instanced VRay lights in one scene. The renders weren't horrible, but certainly noticeable.

Are you running 64x? That could account for the increased render time. Raytrace is also a culprit.

The MI Glow Lume material can create a nice diffuse glow around the sconces. It may take a a little dialing to get the desired effect.

[dellis]

Another thing you may want to try is to fake the distribution pattern of the IES files by using a map in the projector map group of a standard light. You could try rendering the pattern on a flat surface first, to generate the map or paint a custom map in Photoshop. Its been my experience though, that VRay handles lots of lights way way way better then MR.

[lamont_edwards]

Thanks for the advice I will play with these settings

[Steve_Bennett]

On average how many photometric light would you guys use when rendering an interior scene? The reason I am asking is because whenever I do a lighting calc in a space depending on the space I would need to use a min of 10 photmeteric lights according to my lighting calcs, I then import for instance the Focal point recessed down light into the model and copy it ten times as an instance so that the changes made to one will be uodated on the remaing 9 lights. This in turns creates a very long rendering time for the scene although I will get the cool wall washes as mentioned earlier. I was told by my professor that an interior scene should have a max of 3 lights and the light bounce should be set at a max of 2. Any andvice from you all would be greatly appreciated.Only 3 lights? Are you sure he wasn't referring to using omni lights for non-physical renderings? That has been a workflow recommended by Ted Boardman when using only omni lights to light a scene for scanline renderings - which is not completely applicable to MR. The whole point of photmetric lights is to add lights to the scene just as they would appear in real life and give them values appropriate to the physical conterparts. Ideally you would want IES files for each light in the scene. If there are no windows in the room or it is night time, simply delete the daylight system from the scene. If there are windows and its day time, add a sky protal for the main openings in the room.