backlighting in renderworks 12

[scottwojda]

I'm trying to backlight a milk plex graphic panel so it looks like it's glowing. Unforturnately once i turn the panel into a light, it loses its texture. So i made an area light the exact same size as the panel, and moved it behind the panel a couple mm, and made the graphic panel translucent.

I'm not getting the results i expect. The graphic looks like there is no light behind it at all. Does anyone know a better way? I've tried the building a light box behind the panel trick, but the reason i got VW12 was so that i wouldn't have to do that anymore.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

-scott

[islandmon]

Glow = scatter, the better the glow effect the high the frequency of scatter must be ... there've been a few recent posting on how to get a television/ display/monitor to 'glow' properly.

I think the easiest way to create glow would be with a fog texture, but I've not tried that yet. Photoshop uses gradient fills to give the illusion of glow. Therefore, a fog texture created from gradients may be the answer to the 'glow' problem.

[Dave Donley]

Hello scottwojda:

This is a perfectly fine way to create this kind of sign.

Area lights have a direction - if you choose the area light's Show Direction option is the red arrow pointing the right way?

The quality setting of the light and the distance between the panel and the light affect how a translucent panel will look in front of the light. I would recommend using medium quality or maybe high if necessary, and at least 1" or separation if possible. Lower quality settings will show a distinct circular pattern of light samples. Larger separation values will allow you to use a lower quality for the light. High will take much longer to render than a medium or low setting.

I would also set the translucent texture to not cast shadows. Also, area lights only work in RW modes and will not light up in other render modes.

Area lights with their Render Geometry option on use a Constant reflectivity which is OK, but it is better sometimes to put an area light behind a tranlucent panel instead. One reason is that it works better with the auto exposure feature. The other is that the translucent panel will automatically show the correct color of the light behind it.