Hi all,

I'm new to rendering with HDRI's and I'm confused as to how they work when lighting scenes that are entirely interior. Let me try to clarify:

My understanding is that HDRI's become the background of your scene, and are able to apply light using the encoded info in the hdr file. This makes sense to me when I'm rendering a small object that ends up being surrounded by the hdr, or an exterior scene that uses the hdr as a sky, for example.

What I don't understand is how to utilize an hdr when I have an interior shot with no windows/skylights etc. My model ends up blocking the light from the background hdr file, and my rendering ends up being pitch black every time.

I feel like I’ve missed some fundamental aspect of this cool lighting technique. If anyone can clue me in, I would really appreciate it.

Thanks a lot for any help and for all of the help found throughout these forums! This is my first post but I have spent many sleepless nights using these forums as my guide.

Dan

Hi all,

I'm new to rendering with HDRI's and I'm confused as to how they work when lighting scenes that are entirely interior. Let me try to clarify:

My understanding is that HDRI's become the background of your scene, and are able to apply light using the encoded info in the hdr file. This makes sense to me when I'm rendering a small object that ends up being surrounded by the hdr, or an exterior scene that uses the hdr as a sky, for example.

What I don't understand is how to utilize an hdr when I have an interior shot with no windows/skylights etc. My model ends up blocking the light from the background hdr file, and my rendering ends up being pitch black every time.

I feel like I’ve missed some fundamental aspect of this cool lighting technique. If anyone can clue me in, I would really appreciate it.

Thanks a lot for any help and for all of the help found throughout these forums! This is my first post but I have spent many sleepless nights using these forums as my guide.

Dan


.........well, lighting any interior scene without windows or a skylight, and presumably no lights inside will always end up being pitch black. Just like in real life a room with no windows or skylights or openings will likely be pitch black. This is because, as you put it, your model blocks out all the light. I don't exactly get where the confusion is. If you want the lighting of the HDR background into your scene then you have to have windows or openings for the lighting to get through.

The only exception to this would be if you're only interested in the HDR lighting on the reflective surfaces of materials and objects in your scene. In which case, depending on your renderer, you place the HDR map in the reflection slot of your renderer's settings dialog. But even then you will still need some lighting in your scene to be able to see the reflections anyway.

P.S. when asking a software-related question it always helps to let people know what software or renderer your using when asking a question as some responses tend to be software-specific.

I think the confusion lies in how you have built your scene. The scenerio you mention above with no windows certainly won't work.

HDRI can be used for interiors if you have an HDRI interior shot and wish to place an object (mirror teapot anyone?) in the room. In this case you would really just be rendering the teapot and a table maybe, with the HDRI working as a background. It would give you great looking reflections and lighting as if the pot were in the HDRI room.

In your case, you have modeled an entire room, or building and want to do interiors. So what you actually want is an HDRI EXTERIOR with scenery, clouds, sky and such, so that when you see out of WINDOWS you will get a realistic background outside your room. But you are definately going to need some windows to see out of, and probably some interior lighting as well.