Lighting levels in animations

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Permalink Reply by Rich Hart on December 6, 2011 at 2:50pm

If you render a scene, set the brightness in the rendering window, and then start an animation in the same model, that brightness setting will apply to the animation. Just click on "Import Selected Changes" when you're bringing up the Animation dialog.

If you're trying to have some scenes in the animation be not as bright as the others, then that won't work for you. If that's the case, we will have to give you a way to set the brightness individually for the different scenes.

Can you send me a model which illustrates what you're trying to do?

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Permalink Reply by Mike Halls on December 7, 2011 at 3:13am

Hi Rich

I only need to set the brightness level once for the whole animation, not individual scenes (although that could be an interesting effect, an animation gradually turning to night time !)

I'll have a go at your suggestion and report back. If I have any issues I will send over the SKP for you to look at.

Thanks

Regards

Mike

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Permalink Reply by Mike Halls on December 7, 2011 at 3:55am

Hi Rich

Did as you suggested - Did a render and set the brightness to my desired level.

Started an animation in the same model.

The animation was way too bright as previously.

I could not find a check box for 'Import selected Changes' in the animation dialogue ?

Attached is the SKP file I am working with

Regards

Mike

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Permalink Reply by Mike Halls on December 7, 2011 at 3:56am

Hi Rich

File got rejected as it is over 5mb.

I have sent it to you via e-mail

Regards

Mike

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Permalink Reply by Rich Hart on December 7, 2011 at 9:11am

Got it.

At first the animation was washed out as you were getting. Then I lowered the brightness and ran the animation again to get an animation that was not washed out, with the brightness lowered:

I was able to lower the brightness this way:

1. Render a scene.

2. In the render dialog, lower the brightness to get the effect I wanted.

3. Close the rendering dialog

4. In SketchUp, click on the Animation toolbar button. You should see this dialog first:

Note: If you don't see this dialog, then you probably checked "Ignore all changes" at some time. If that is the case you'll need to "Reset Factory Defaults" on the Options/More tab to start seeing this dialog again, and start the process over again. We'll fix this so that it's easier to restore this dialog, without resetting everything.

5. Click on Import Selected Changes to keep the new brightness settigns that you made in the render window.

6. Then run the animation and it should render at the same brightness settings as you used and "Imported" last.

Try that.

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Permalink Reply by Mike Halls on December 7, 2011 at 9:29am

Hi Rich

Followed your instructions but can't seem to get the dialogue box with import senlected changes to show up.

The attached PDF will explain my steps.

Regards

Mike

Attachments:

• render illumination.pdf, 301 KB

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Permalink Reply by Rich Hart on December 7, 2011 at 9:58am

Reload those defaults, from within SketchUp, before you do the first rendering.

Then you should see that dialog when you come back to SketchUp, after changing the brightness in the rendering window, whne you start another rendering or animation or when you load the Options dialog in SketchUp.

Try that.

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Permalink Reply by Mike Halls on December 7, 2011 at 10:48am

Hi Rich

Tried as you advised

Started a new sketchup session and opened my model.

Went straight to NXT setup options / more tab / load factory defaults.

Closed the setup dialogue

Went to the animation tab and got the same dialogue as last time

as an experiment

I started a render and interupted it by going to the setup tab in the render window

I loaded factory defaults from there then resumed rendering

When the animation finished I closed it and THEN when I went to the animation icon I got the 'missing dialogue

I clicked on select all / import selected changes the started an animation

The animation started but was using sunlight - no artificial.

I paused this using the setup tab again and clicked the int ./ no sun

the animation resumed using the spotlights but it is still too bright.

Any thoughts

Regards

Mike
Rich Hart said:

Reload those defaults, from within SketchUp, before you do the first rendering.

Then you should see that dialog when you come back to SketchUp, after changing the brightness in the rendering window, whne you start another rendering or animation or when you load the Options dialog in SketchUp.

Try that.

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Permalink Reply by Rich Hart on December 7, 2011 at 11:07am

Try this, in the model that you sent me:

1. Render a scene

2. Change the brightness in the rendering window. Load the dialog to do this, the button to the left of the Brightness slider bar.

3. Load the Statistics dialog (right click on the title bar, or else from the About Box dialog) and page down to the Tone Operator section and see what the brightness is set to.

Here I've got it set to -0.36, darker.  (0 is the default brightness.)

Then close the rendering window, and go back to SketchUp, and render it again, after clicking on Import Selected Changes on that dialog that appears.

Then check the Statistics in the new rendering, and see if the brightness setting stuck at the same value.

Is the brightness still set the same as it was when you rendered the first time?

Then close the Rendering window and go back to SketchUp, and start the animation.

And check the statistics (You don't have to wait till it finishes to check this. )

Is the brightness still set the same as it was when you rendered the first time?

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Permalink Reply by Mike Halls on December 7, 2011 at 12:17pm

Hi Rich.

When I hit the button next to the brightness slider the dialogue shown on the attached PDF comes up.

Can't see the dialogue box you have shown anywhere !

If I right click the title bar I just get

Restore

Move

Size

Minimise

Maximise

Close

The default brightness, contrast and burn  is 50 and for saturation it's 100 (brightness is not 0 as you mentioned)

When I reduce the brightness with the slider to 35 I get the effect I want.

Did the render, then imported the changes and rendered again , the brightness stayed on 35.

I then closed the render window and opened the animation. Imported the changes and sure enough the animation rendered with the same brightness level as the earlier render. Dont know how you check the brightness in the animation window but it looked exactly like the earlier render so I assume it was using the '35' value

Seems that the trick is to change the brightness level from within the dialogue that comes up with the button next to the brightness slider in the render window, then it remembers the settings ? for future renders and animations. Do you think that is the mystery solved ?

Regards

Mike

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Permalink Reply by Mike Halls on December 7, 2011 at 12:18pm

Oops forgot the PDF

Attachments:

• illumination.pdf, 224 KB

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Permalink Reply by Rich Hart on December 7, 2011 at 12:42pm

I tested just changing the brightness with the slider, and my brightness change got saved, so I don't think the mystery is solved yet.

Mike Halls said:

Seems that the trick is to change the brightness level from within the dialogue that comes up with the button next to the brightness slider in the render window, then it remembers the settings ? for future renders and animations. Do you think that is the mystery solved ?

Regards

Mike

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