Week 5: Lighting - Faking G.I. challenge

It seems in that in this industry, it's common for studios to want to see if an artist can create sophisticated looks with just very basic tools (keep it simple stupid). It shows that one understands the concepts well and has a solid understanding. I heard a story from the instructor that a woman with a great portfolio and advanced lighting skills in various rendering software was told by Disney to go back and redo her whole portfolio using just the regular Maya software renderer and achieve the same look. She did. And they hired her. So, I guess it's good we learn the hard way too. : )

That seems to be why we were shown the image above that was created in 3d using G.I. and asked to recreate it using just simple 3d direct lights. G.I. (or Global Illumination) is a 3d lighting method that mimics the naturally occurring bounced light that happens when light enters a room and bounces from surface to surface, illuminating the whole room. You can create very realistic interior renderings very quickly with this method. We were asked to use direct lights in Maya, which are very primitive CG lights that do not bounce.

So to imitate a Global Illumination rendering, you need a lot of well-placed and proportioned lights. It was a challenge and not easy for sure to fake that look. My result below ...

BTW, the model is not spot on accurate to the original but since we were being evaluated for the lighting look, that was OK. Was just about look and feel kinda thing. OK, on to the next challenge!