Basic Exterior Scene Settings

Written by Corey Rubadue

Thursday, 08 February 2007
Objective
This tutorial helps to set up a basic exterior architectural scene using Physical Sun and
Physical Camera.
Basic Settings
Global Switches>Gamma 2.2 (all other values default)Camera>Physical Camera
enabled>Still Camera>Shutter speed 125>Film Width 36>Zoom 1>F-number 12>Film
Speed(ISO) 200>Exposure enabled>Vignetting enabledEnvironment/Sky>GI enabled
1.4>Texture Editor (double click on m)
other

values

Antialiasing

default)Image

enabled>Area

Common>Type Sky>Multiplier 1.5 (all

Sampler>Adaptive

1.5Color

QMC>Min

Mapping>HSV

Max

16>

Exponential>Dark

Bright

1Indirect Illumination>GI enabled>Primary engine Irradiance MapSecondary engine

Quasi Monte-CarloIrradiance Map>Min-3 Max 2>HSph. Subdivs 50>Samples 20 (all
other values default)Quasi Monte-Carlo>Subdivs 8>Secondary Bounces 3
Global Switches

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Camera

Environment/Sky

Image Sampler

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Color Mapping

Indirect Illumination

Irradiance Map
(For faster test renders you can reduce the HSph. Subdivs to 30)(To increase the
quality you can change the Min Rate to 2 and Max Rate to 0, however this will
increase render time)

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Quasi-Monte Carlo GI

Scene Setup
Image 1 shows an architectural exterior scene. The goal is to render the exterior using
a physical sky and physical camera available using vray. Its important to note that
vray takes the sun location and time of day from the SketchUp shadow settings as
shown on Image 2. In this SketchUp scene, the only Vray specific material applied is to
the glass. The rest of the materials are SketchUp applied materials. This is important to
note since a lot of users will have existing SketchUp models that they want to render
without spending too much time re-applying materials and this example is meant to
illustrate exterior render settings only. Nonetheless, it still demonstrates the speed and
quality that can be achieved with a simple and fast setup.
Image 1: Exterior Scene in SketchUp

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Image 2: SketchUp shadow settings

NOTE: If you enable Show Calculation Phase under the Irradiance Map Rollout>Basic
Options,You will get a preview of the IM calculation and lighting distribution as shown
on Image 3
Image 3: IM Calculation Phase

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Image 4: Final Rendering using VfSU setting listed above.

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Render time approx. 12 min 800X500 The VfSU render options can be saved to be
used on other scenes. Open the Render Options toolbar, select File>Save, Load or
Restore Defaults. VfSU comes with preset settings for low, medium and high quality
renderings. The above method is just one way of many, I encourage everyone to
experiment with their own settings based on their own scenes. I hope this serves as a
good starting point.

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Basic Interior Scene Settings

Written by Corey Rubadue
Thursday, 08 February 2007
Objective This tutorial helps to set up a basic interior architectural scene using V-Ray
Rectangular Light and Physical Camera in Vray for SketchUp
Basic Render Option Settings
Global Switches>Gamma 2.2 (all other values default)Camera>Physical Camera
enabled>Still Camera>Shutter speed 125>Film Width 36>Zoom 1>F-number 10>Film
Speed(ISO) 800>Exposure enabled>Vignetting enabledEnvironment/Sky>GI enabled
1.4>Texture Editor (double click on m)
other

values

Antialiasing

default)Image

enabled>Area

Common>Type Sky>Multiplier 1.5 (all

Sampler>Adaptive

1.5Color

QMC>Min

Mapping>HSV

Max

16>

Exponential>Dark

Bright

1Indirect Illumination>GI enabled>Primary engine Irradiance MapSecondary engine

Light CacheIrradiance Map>Min-3 Max 0>HSph. Subdivs 50>Samples 20 (all other
values default)Light Cache>Subdivs 750>Sample Size 0.01>Scale Screen>Num.
Phases 2 (Eq. # Processors)

Global Switches

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Camera

Environment/Sky

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Image Sampler

Color Mapping

Indirect Illumination

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Irradiance Map

(For faster test renders you can reduce the HSph. Subdivs to 30 as well as reduce the
Max Rate to 2)
Light Cache

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(For faster test renders reduce the Subdivs to 500 and increase the Sample Size to
0.02. The Num. Phases should be equal to the number of processors on your
machine)

Scene Setup
Image 1 shows an architectural interior scene. The goal is to render the interior using
a Vray rectangular light and physical camera using vray. Its important to note that
vray takes the sun location and time of day from the SketchUp shadow settings.

Image 1: Interior Scene in SketchUp

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For this interior scene, a Vray rectangular light was placed directly outside the window
as shown on Image 2. The color of the rectangular light is light blue to simulate the
color of the sky. Multiplier 30, Invisible enabled (to the camera), No Decay enabled,
Ignore Light Normals enabled.

Image 2: Vray Rectangular Light

NOTE: If you enable Show Calculation Phase under the Irradiance Map Rollout and
Light Cache Rollout, you will get a preview of the calculation phases and lighting
distribution as shown on Images 2 & 3

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Image 3: Light Cache Calculation Phase

Image 4: Irradiance Map Calculation Phase

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Image 5: Final Rendering using VfSU settings listed above.

Render time approx. 20 min 800X500 The VfSU render options can be saved to be
used on other scenes. Open the Render Options toolbar, select File>Save, Load or
Restore Defaults. VfSU comes with preset settings for low, medium and high quality
renderings. The above method is just one way of many; I encourage everyone to
experiment with their own settings based on their own scenes. I hope this serves as a
good starting point.

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Church of Light Tutorial

Written by Damien Alomar
Wednesday, 16 May 2007
This tutorial explains the settings and steps used to set up the scene "Church of Light
by Tadao Ando" using Vray for SketchUp

Basic Render Settings

Global

Switches>Gamma>Output

2.2

(all

other

values

default)

Camera>Physical Camera enabled>Still Camera>Shutter speed 125>Film Width

36>Zoom 1> F-number 10>Film Speed(ISO) 800>Exposure enabled>Vignetting
enabled
Environment/Sky>GI enabled 2.4>Texture Editor (double click on "m") Common>Type
Sky>Multiplier

(all

other

values

default)

Image Sampler>Adaptive QMC>Min 1 Max 16> Antialiasing enabled>Area 1.5

QMC

Sampler>Adaptive

Color
Indirect

Amount

Mapping>HSV
Illumination>GI

Secondary

0.9>Noise

Threshold

Exponential>Dark
enabled>Primary
engine

0.01>
1

engine

Min

Samples

Bright

Irradiance

Map

Light

Cache

Irradiance Map>Min-5 Max-4>HSph. Subdivs 50>Samples 20 (all other values default)

Detail

enhancement

Enabled

Light Cache>Subdivs 500>Sample Size 0.02>Num. Phases 2

Global Switches

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Physical Camera

Environment/Sky

Image Sampler

Indirect Illumination

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Irradiance Map
(For faster test renders you can reduce the HSph. Subdivs to 30)

Light Cache
Sample Size 0.02 was used to reduce noise in the scene. Since this
scene does not contain a high level of detail this number was

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acceptable. Num. Phases was also set to 2 to ensure a low amount of

noise in the scene.

Lighting Set-up
Images 1 & 2 show the basic scene exterior and interior. The goal is to
render the interior using the physical sky/sun and physical camera
available with Vray for SketchUp. It's important to note that Vray takes
the sun location and time of day from the SketchUp shadow settings as
shown on Image 3.
Image 1: Exterior View of Model in SketchUp

Image 2: Interior Camera View in SketchUp

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Image 3: SketchUp shadow settings

Image 4: Sun Location in the model is set to be perpendicular to the

exterior wall with cross opening for this specific scene where we want
the light to come in directly behind the wall. Note the shadow direction
which

is

perpendicular

to

the

wall

with

the

opening.

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Image 5: One Vray rectangle light was located directly outside the
cross opening of the model to supplement the sun light entering the
space and ensure the light rays would enter the space perpendicular to
the room. This is typical for a lot of interior scenes. In some cases,
where light is entering through glass, you may position a rectangle light
next to the glass on the interior.

Image 6: Vray Rectangle Light Settings

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Materials Setup
In this scene, SketchUp materials with no textures were replaced with
new Vray materials. Textured elements in the SketchUp model were
brought into the material editor as Linked Vray materials. This is
important to note since a lot of users will have existing SketchUp models
that they want to render without spending too much time re-applying
materials and also, it's very easy to apply and adjust the textures on
objects using SketchUp controls
Image 7: Material Editor shows the Vray materials as well as the Linked
Vray materials. Most elements have a certain amount of reflection. This
adds to the level of realism in a scene since most materials have
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reflectivity in real life, even if it's barely noticeable sometimes. This

image also shows the specific settings for the Linked Walls material, it's
important to note the level of reflection noted by the level of grey (22)
as well as the Glossiness factors (0.6). The glossiness was turned down
to create the blurring effect of the light and the reflection on the
material.

Here is the final scene rendered by Vray for SketchUp using the
rendering and material settings described above.

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The VfSU render options can be saved to be used on other scenes. Open
the Render Options toolbar, select File>Save, Load or Restore Defaults.
VfSU comes with preset settings for low, medium and high quality
renderings. The above method is just one way of many, I encourage
everyone to experiment with their own settings based on their own
scenes. I hope this serves as a good starting point.

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Basic

Architectural

Glass

Material

Settings
Written by Corey Rubadue
Thursday, 08 February 2007
Objective
These settings create a glass material suitable for architectural exteriors
and interiors. It is a clear glass which lets light through as well as
reflects the surrounding environment.
Basic Settings

Sample Rendering

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Lighting in V-Ray for SketchUp

Written by Damien Alomar
Thursday, 08 March 2007
This tutorial goes over the different types of lighting within V-Ray for
SketchUp. These include Global Illumination, HDR (High Dynamic Range)
images, point lights, rectangular lights, and emissive geometry.
There are several different options for adding light in VfSU. The simplest
is GI or Global Illumination. Then we have the built in lights within V-ray,
and lastly we have light emitting geometry. So lets get on with it.
For these tests I am using a model of the new Camaro which I
downloaded from here http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/details?
mid=a3da1cce792763fd33898df841c4de85
Global Illumination
Global Illumination (GI) is by far the easiest way to add light to a scene
in vfsu. Basically GI simulates a dome around the scene that emits an
even light from all directions. The result is a very soft light that does a
great job at providing a good lighting basis for a scene. In order to be
able to use GI you must enable Indirect Illumination. If you dont the
side of the car facing the camera will be completely black because it
isnt visible to the Sketch Up Sun. After enabling Indirect bounces in
Global Switches disable Default Lights. Now go to the Environment
Rollout and enable GI, this is what allows us to set the illumination for
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our scene. For right now you can keep the GI values where they are.

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And here is the result.

Youll notice the nice soft shadows at the base of the car, and the nice
light coverage on the front grill. This is because the light is coming from
all around the model. GI is very useful for providing quick tests and
visualizations because its easy to set up and can give good feedback on
how the geometry will react to light. In this case this is an exterior scene
and the model isnt blocked from its environment, so this is giving us a
very even light.
Using HDRIs
With VRay we also have the option of using an image to light our scene.
Although we could use any image, the types of images that are best
suited for lighting are HDR images, or High Dynamic Range Images.
Basically what this means is that the image actually contains information
that is brighter than white, and we can use this information to add
lighting to our scene.

I have downloaded this image from here

(http://gl.ict.usc.edu/Data/HighResProbes/) (this image is not the actual

HDR, but a jpeg)

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So lets put this HDR to use. In the Environment rollout click on the little
m next to the GI multiplier. This will bring up the Texture Editor. On
the left next to type there is a drop down list. From the list select bitmap
option and all of the image parameters appear on the right. Now you
can add the map by clicking on the m towards the bottom of the
window and find the image. In order for any image to be used correctly
for either GI or environment backgrounds the must be mapped using the
Environment option at the top of the texture editor. Now we need to
specify the mapping, and In this case we know that our image is a
spherical image, so we will make sure that the spherical option is
selected from the list to the right.

Go ahead and repeat the same

process for mapping the background and then go ahead and render.

Go ahead and repeat the same process for mapping the background and
then go ahead and render.
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You might notice your image is a bit noisier now, which is due to the
sampling on the hdri (the example above was done with higher quality
settings which are in the frame stamp). You can also see how the
shadows themselves look a bit sharper, as well as looking as if the
lighting is a bit more directional. This is because the illumination from
the image is mostly directly above our scene.

You can tell by the

sharper shadows along the side of the car, the elongated shadows in the
front of the car, and the shadows underneath the side view mirror.
Below is the same rendering with a jpeg version of the same file, and as
you can see the image is darker and the shadows arent really as distinct
as they were in the rendering with the HDR image.

Adding Lights
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V-Ray supports both rectangular lights and omni lights (or point lights).
We are going to go over some of the features the omni light first. In the
V-Ray toolbar the yellow ball icon will add an omni light.

After clicking the icon simply pick a point in your scene then position the
light in your scene. Omni lights will emit light in every direction, so
remember that when your placing in you scene. Also depending on the
size of your scene the omni light may be small or large. The actual size
of the light doesnt affect anything, but its a good idea to have it be a
size that doesnt effect moving, viewing, or creating anything in your
scene. After adding the light you need to edit the light properties. You
can do this by either right-clicking on the light and at the bottom of the
menu will be an option for VRay for SketchUp. From that option select
edit light. You can also do this in the main menu bar by going to Edit >
VRay for SketchUp >Edit Light.

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This will bring up the Light properties box, and there are several key
parameters that we must go over.

In the intensity section there are parameters for both color and the
multiplier. Color is fairly self explanatory (the color of the light) and the
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multiplier will control how brightness the light. Under the Options
section is a little option that says Decay with a drop down box to the
right. This option will control how the intensity of the light changes
based on how far away the light is from an object.

The default setting is Linear which basically means that the intensity of
the light will not change at all. This is not a very realistic setting
because in the real world lights decay. The second option is Inverse,
which decays the light based on the inverse of the distance value. The
third option is Inverse Square, which decays the light based on the
inverse of the distance squared. Inverse Square is how light decays in
the real word, so it is recommended that you use this setting. You dont
really need to know the math of it, but just be aware that each option,
from linear to inverse square, will need a progressively higher multiplier
to achieve the same amount of brightness.

Here are some sample

images to show different decay. The only thing changed in each image
is the type of decay.

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The Sampling section allows you to control how V-Ray samples the light.
Unless you are creating caustics or using other features these settings
are best left alone, so we will leave them for another tutorial.

The

Shadow section has some other helpful features. First is the option to
enable or disable shadow. The Radius feature will allow you to control
the sharpness of the shadow, or in other words blur the shadow edges.
Omni lights by their nature create very sharp shadows, so if you would
like to minimize this effect then you would use this feature.

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Be careful as this can increase render times and if you set too large of a
value your shadows may disappear. Subdivisions are a way to control
the quality of the shadows. A lower value will allow the render to be
quicker, but may have lower quality. A higher value will have better
quality, but will take longer. Only adjust this value if you are not getting
the quality that you would like for your blurry shadows.
Rectangular Lights

Rectangular Lights are the other lights supported by V-Ray and have
their own distinctive characteristics.

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The intensity of a rectangular light is related to their size. For example, a

very small light with an intensity of 10 may have just the right effect, but
if the size were tripled or quadrupled then the intensity would be greatly
increased even though the multiplier is the same. Here are two images
with the light at two different sizes.

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The size of a rectangular light also has an affect on the shadow quality.
A small light will usually have a sharp shadow (not as sharp as the omni
light though) compared to a light which is bigger. Because the blurriness
of the shadows are controlled by the size of the light itself we really only
have the ability to turn shadows on and off. Rectangular lights do have
many of the same features as the omni lights with several differences.
The Intensity controls are the same, but under Options we find many
more choices. First well skip down to the No Decay option. This is
similar to the decay options of the omni lights. However, we only have
the option for Linear or Inverse Square decay. Having No Decay check
will make the decay linear, while having it unchecked (the default and
recommended value) means that the decay will be Inverse Square.
Double-Sided will allow the light to emit light from both sides, not just
the front face. Invisible will make the light invisible to both the camera
and any reflections in the scene. Enabling Ignore Light Normals allows
for an even distribution from the front face. Disabling this feature will
force the light to be emitted predominantly in the direction normal to the
front face. The Skylight Portal function causes the light intensity and
color to be taken from the environment behind it. This is mostly used in
windows for interior scenes, but its use is not entirely effective or
accurate. Store with Irradiance Map allows for the direct light to be
calculated with the Irradiance Map which will speed up calculations. In
this mode quality is controlled by the IR settings. Within the Sampling
section we do find one value that was not in the omni light settings. The
subdivisions value will control the number of samples that are taken for
the rendering. The default value of 8 is usually sufficient, but with
interior scenes more subdivisions may be required.
Light Emitting Geometry
In V-Ray it is also possible to have objects emit light, which provides a lot
of flexibility in how we can add light to our scene. Effects like neon
signs, glowing objects, and other things are now possibilities by using
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light in this way. We will actually create these effects via the material
editor, so click on the M in the V-Ray toolbar. This brings up the material
editor, and if we look on the left we have a list of all the materials in the
scene. Right click on Scene Materials then Add Material > Add VRay
Material.
This will add a standard V-Ray material which is named Default Material.
Right click on this material to rename it if you like. Now click on the little
plus sign next to the name of the material. This will open the material
layer structure. As you can see there currently there is only a diffuse
layer in our material right now. To add a light emitting layer, right click
on Emissive Layer and click Add New Layer.

Now you will see the

Emissive rollout over in the material options.

There are 3 simple options within the emissive layer; color, intensity, and
transparency. Color and Intensity work in the same way as regular light
do.

The transparency will be useful to allow other layers that are

underneath the Emissive Layer (like the Diffuse Layer) to be visible in

the material. Keep in mind that making the material more transparent
will decrease the intensity of the light.
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