Chapter 5: Lighting

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Maya 8 at a Glance

• Chapter 5 Lighting

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Ambient Light

• Simplest type of lighting
• Illuminate the entire scene fairly equally
• Do not cast shadows

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Spot Light

• Originate from a single point
• Spreads in a conical shape
• Can cast shadows and can decay over distances

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Directional Light

• Have a specific direction
• Does not emanate from a single point
• Cannot decay or use fog/glow effects

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Point Light

• Sends out rays in every direction
• Emanates from a single point
• Can cast shadows

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Area Light

• Cast light from an area, rather than a point
• When scaled, their intensity increases
• Expensive to render, but can be very realistic

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Volume Light

• Illuminate within a specific volume
• Limits light to a specific area in the scene
• Have gradients to control the character of the
  light within the volume

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Shadows

• Depth Map Shadows
• Render quickly
• Not as precise as raytraced shadows
• Raytraced Shadows
• Work by tracing beams of light through the scene
• Very expensive, but very accurate

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Lighting Effects

• Decay
• Intensity Curves
• Decay Regions
• Projectors
• Fog
• Optical FX

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Linking

• Light linking and Shadow linking allow you to
  specify which objects in the scene get
  lit/shadowed by specific lights
• Can help speed up render times as well

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