Lighting Plugin for Sketchup

AdamB · 22 Apr 2008, 13:13

A couple of video tutorials to get people started using LightUp.

The first shows how to set up a Point Light source and is available
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Qtyj40CS6tg

The second shows how to set up Area Light sources and is here http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=EhpRDCqbGA4

tbd · 22 Apr 2008, 13:31

Adam: thanks for the video tuts.
you can even do psychedelic renders

later edit: get some crashes (when freeing memory after writing .luca files)

here is the file

Edson · 22 Apr 2008, 14:08

thanks, adam. very informative indeed. it cleared up some doubts i had after reading the users guide, being the rendering dummy that i am.

please keep the videos coming!

kwistenbiebel · 22 Apr 2008, 14:33

Yes, the videos clarify a lot.
Thank you.

juju · 22 Apr 2008, 14:45

Thanks for the tuts Adam, as a matter of note, the RSS feed I have bookmarked for your site fails to load, has been for a couple of days.

Adam, any chance your LightUp application/plugin will be compatible with Podium (application/plugin by TBD)?

I think it will be quite useful if I can set up the scenes in SU, check them out and have pre-vis and later, once modeling is all done, render it in Podium without having to redo the lighting.

JClements · 22 Apr 2008, 17:07

Neophyte question.

I seems that Area lights and Spot lights are similar. What is the difference between the two?

Edson · 22 Apr 2008, 18:23

neophyte reply: i think when you use an area light you see the source of the light but when using a spotlight you do not. of course, i may be wrong.

AdamB · 22 Apr 2008, 18:36

@unknownuser said:

Adam: thanks for the video tuts.
you can even do psychedelic renders

later edit: get some crashes (when freeing memory after writing .luca files)

Hmm.. You get that when the LightUp has stale data wrt SketchUp. It shouldn't happen of course and I'm working on a fix. One way of forcing a resync of LightUp is to add a single line to the model somewhere. It won't show in LightUp but does trigger a rebuild because the model is considered "changed". I know, its ugly!

[Useless info #1. They're called luca files because I was writing the code with Luca (my son on my knee) and he wanted something named after him - and "LightUp Cache files" kinda fitted!]

AdamB · 22 Apr 2008, 18:40

@unknownuser said:

Thanks for the tuts Adam, as a matter of note, the RSS feed I have bookmarked for your site fails to load, has been for a couple of days.

I'll look into it.

@unknownuser said:

Adam, any chance your LightUp application/plugin will be compatible with Podium (application/plugin by TBD)?

I think it will be quite useful if I can set up the scenes in SU, check them out and have pre-vis and later, once modeling is all done, render it in Podium without having to redo the lighting.

Well I did add some Podium support after speaking with TBD. It used to pick up Light Power from the face attributes (BTW it picks up some Kerky attributes too). But then just before I posted the demo I saw that Podium 2.0 is dropping per face attributes so I pulled it to stop a mass of confusion.

Adam

AdamB · 22 Apr 2008, 18:44

@jclements said:

Neophyte question.

I seems that Area lights and Spot lights are similar. What is the difference between the two?

LightUp doesn't have spotlights per se. It has Point Lights that radiant evenly in every direction, and Area Lights which radiant in a "spread angle" around the face direction (eg 90 degrees means radiant in a hemisphere). So you can create "spot faces" (aka spotlights) simply by giving an area light a small spread angle and big power. I tend to wrap light sources into components just for ease of use.

Adam

Max_B · 22 Apr 2008, 19:41

After I made a "clean unused components" in one file, I no longer see point light component in the material palette (nor the cache). Even after SU restart and LU reinstall.
They both are there, i can click on white place holders and add them. Just they don't show up.
How can I get the icons back?

Edson · 22 Apr 2008, 19:48

@max_b said:

After I made a "clean unused components" in one file, I no longer see point light component in the material palette (nor the cache). Even after SU restart and LU reinstall.
They both are there, i can click on white place holders and add them. Just they don't show up.
How can I get the icons back?

i had the same problem. my solution was to dump the plugin and reinstall it. the icons came back for a while but then disappeared again.?????

Edson · 22 Apr 2008, 19:58

adam,

two questions:

@unknownuser said:

Also by default any material whose name begins with “$” will be skipped
when calculating lighting so they will be displayed at full brightness all the
time. This is useful to create fake emitters.
(from getting started with lightup)

this must sound like a dumb request, but would you care to elaborate on the above? i do not understand what you mean by it. and what would be a fake emitter in LUp's sense?

and secondly, what is this component for?

AdamB · 22 Apr 2008, 21:10

@unknownuser said:

Thanks for the tuts Adam, as a matter of note, the RSS feed I have bookmarked for your site fails to load, has been for a couple of days.

Fixed. Thanks for pointing it out!

AdamB · 22 Apr 2008, 21:12

@edson said:

@max_b said:

After I made a "clean unused components" in one file, I no longer see point light component in the material palette (nor the cache). Even after SU restart and LU reinstall.
They both are there, i can click on white place holders and add them. Just they don't show up.
How can I get the icons back?

i had the same problem. my solution was to dump the plugin and reinstall it. the icons came back for a while but then disappeared again.?????

LightUp adds its built-in Components each time a document is opened or created. There are times when the icon disappears but (as you say) the component is still there and useable. I don't know why this happens.

Adam

AdamB · 22 Apr 2008, 21:20

@edson said:

adam,

two questions:

@unknownuser said:

Also by default any material whose name begins with “$” will be skipped
when calculating lighting so they will be displayed at full brightness all the
time. This is useful to create fake emitters.
(from getting started with lightup)

this must sound like a dumb request, but would you care to elaborate on the above? i do not understand what you mean by it. and what would be a fake emitter in LUp's sense?

and secondly, what is this component for?
[attachment=0:2yb9c0ua]LU_compo.png[/attachment:2yb9c0ua]

Fair point, "fake emitter" is a bit confusing. What I mean is that a face with a material beginning with '$' will be always full brightness as if it is self illuminating like a real area emitter. This is useful sometimes when you want something to look like a bright light but not actually emit light. I posted studio2.skp a day or so ago; the windows at the back of the room are bright white "fake emitters"; they come out bright white but add no lighting to the room.

Secondly, that is a LightUp component called an Irradiance Cache. It is discussed in the getting started document. Basically, you place these in your model to hint to LightUp where reflective surfaces can get there reflection information. It is a method getting fast reflections during the Tour tool mode.

Adam

Efrado · 22 Apr 2008, 21:49

PLEASE HELP!
I just registered trying to downloud this MARVELOUS plugin from AdamB,but unfortunately the compressed file does not appear.what do I must do?

Edson · 22 Apr 2008, 21:53

adam,

thank you for your patience. fake emitters understood. i went back to the skippy and played some with it.

as for the Irradiance Cache, understood in theory . i have yet to see it in action to fully grasp the idea.

regards.

AdamB · 23 Apr 2008, 05:39

@efrado said:

PLEASE HELP!
I just registered trying to downloud this MARVELOUS plugin from AdamB,but unfortunately the compressed file does not appear.what do I must do?

After you've registered an email is sent to you.
You need to click on the link in the email LightUp sent to activate your registration.
You then login and go to the download page to download the demo.

Adam

AdamB · 23 Apr 2008, 05:40

@edson said:

adam,

thank you for your patience. fake emitters understood. i went back to the skippy and played some with it.

as for the Irradiance Cache, understood in theory . i have yet to see it in action to fully grasp the idea.

regards.

I'm planning a video tutorial very soon.

Adam