Shadows from GOBO type masks

[IanH]

Im actually involved in garden design so i'm not a lighting person. As I have VW Designer I have the Spotlight features, but don't know what I need.

The effect that I would like to achieve is that of dappled shade coming through some trees. For now I just set the sun and put a couple of 3D trees in front which then create the dappled shade. but its all very time consuming plus I have some unwanted trees that I have to deal with.

I was wondering if there was something in spotlight that could achieve similar. I understand the basics of GOBO type lighting and wonder if there is some technique based on this that I could use. It would be brilliant if I could draw a mask that represented the density of the planting that I wanted to create the shade from.

Im a workspace based on the designer workspace so will also need assistance locating the spotlight tools.

Thanks in advance

[Tamsin Slatter]

Ian, if you create a black and white masked image for the effect you want (in Photoshop or equivalent), you can then bring that in as a new Renderworks Texture.

Then, you'll need to use a Lighting Instrument (from the Entertainment libraries) and insert the texture as a Gobo. The light source inside a Lighting Instrument is a Spotlight so not the same a directional as you might use for the sun. But if you set the angle wide, you may be able to achieve the same effect.

The Spotlight tools are in the Spotlight toolset, but if you just add the Lighting Symbols to the Resource Browser and then double-click a light, it will activate the Instrument Insertion tool. Then you can use the Object Info palette to edit the light.

Alternatively, why not create the texture as discussed, and apply it to a large 3D plane (extruded Line) in front of the light source. It could be a lot easier than messing around with Spotlight stuff and would not give you extra trees to worry about.

[IanH]

Thanks Tamsin. Will give both a go.

The trees work brilliant at moment as they have given me the control that I needed to match shadows with an original photo. And having them there is not an issue as they are in part of the photo that I am going to mask out anyway.

But it was such a nice effect, I was thinking of finding a more flexible solution for the future.

[Tamsin Slatter]

Have you also tried the VB Visual trees?