A Guide to Neon Lights with V-Ray

Topics Covered

1. Neon Light
2. V-Ray Light Material
3. Basic Interior Lighting

Download the scene here
Note: The scene will only work with Max 9.

Isometric View Of Entire Scene

As you can see, in this particular scene, I pay little attention to objects that are not in view of the camera.

Note: The object acting as the floor is just a copy of the back wall. Also I placed a plane above the floor acting as the face of a billiards table. The plane is not in view of the camera but it is necessary for light bounces and color bleeding.

V-Ray Global Switches

- Displacement is enabled
- Default lights are disabled

V-Ray Global Illumination Settings

Pretty basic settings here.
- GI is on
- Primary GI engine is set to Irradiance map
- Secondary GI engine is set to Quasi-Monte Carlo

V-Ray Irradiance Map Settings

Pretty basic settings here as well.
- Irradiance Map preset is set to medium
- Under options I enabled show calc phase
- Mode is set to Single Frame

V-Ray Environment Settings

- The environment light has been enabled and toned down to 0.2
- The reflection/refraction environment has been enabled and set to 1.0

Note: a HRDI map was used for the reflections

V-Ray Material Settings for the YELLOW neon light (OFF STATE)

Neon sign in off state

Note: Since this material is for the off state of the neon light, it is not a Light material and it does not generate illumination.

- The material has Fresnel reflections
- IOR set to 2.0
- Max depth set to 8

V-Ray Material Settings for the BLUE neon light (OFF STATE)

Neon sign in off state

Note: Since this material is for the off state of the neon light, it is not a Light material and it does not generate illumination.

- The material has Fresnel reflections
- IOR set to 2.0
- Max depth set to 8

V-Ray Material Settings for the YELLOW neon light (ON STATE)

Neon sign in on state

Note: Since this material is for the ON state of the neon light, it is a V-Ray Light material and it generates illumination.

- The material is a V-Ray light material
- The color has been set to yellow/orange
- The multiplier has been set to 2.0

V-Ray Material Settings for the BLUE neon light (ON STATE)

Neon sign in on state

Note: Since this material is for the ON state of the neon light, it is a V-Ray Light material and it generates illumination.

- The material is a V-Ray light material
- The color has been set to a navy blue shade
- The multiplier has been set to 2.0

V-Ray Material Settings for the YELLOW neon light (ON STATE)

Isometric View Of Entire Scene

Note: The light in this scene comes from three sources.

1. Environment light
2. The neon light
3. The V-Ray light (All of the above contribute to the global illumination)

As you can see from the screen grab above, the V-Ray light is positioned in the top right portion on the scene. It is facing towards the wall and is aimed slightly towards the main scene geometry. I wanted to make it appear as though there was a bar or some other light source just off camera.

- Multiplier was set to 60
- A redish color was applied to the V-Ray light
- Subdivs were left default at 8

V-Ray Camera

- Type was set to Still cam
- F-number was lowered to 2.0
- Exposure was left on
- Vignetting was disabled

V-Ray Material Settings for the Wall

Note: I wanted the wall to look old and worn down. I added some displacement to the wall as well as some graffiti to give it some character.

- The material has light Fresnel reflections with an IOR of 2.0 with a max depth of 8
- Reflection glossiness was set to 0.85 (this increases the material's glossiness) with a max depth of 8

V-Ray Displacement Settings for Wall (Left)

- 2D Mapping was used
- Plaster2D.jpg was used for the displacement map
- Amount was set to .03"

Displacement Map (Included in zip file)

Displacement Map (Included in zip file)

Texture Map For Wall (Included in zip file)

Texture Map For Wall (Included in zip file)

V-Ray Displacement Settings for the hand Chalk (Left)

- 2D Mapping was used
- chalkdisplace.jpg was used for the displacement map
- Amount was set to .001"

Note: The displacement map choice for the chalk was fairly arbitrary. Basically all I wanted was to have a rough surface on the chalk to simulate it has been used.

Hand Chalk (white object)

Hand Chalk (white object)

Texture Map For hand chalk (Included in zip file)

Texture Map For hand chalk (Included in zip file)

Final

Below you can see the neon lights with this scen and iif you click on the image, you can download a flash movie of them working.

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