Lighting and Rendering - Ambient Occlusion

Lighting and Rendering - Mesh Lights

In this tutorial, I learned how to create mesh lights. I experimented with using a different colour on some of the ramps on the different orbs. I learned more about ramps and projections and I'm feeling more confident in understanding sampling, although I'm only noticing just now that the top of the image still looks very pixelated, however, the quality is fine on my computer, it only becomes pixilated when I upload it onto here and I'm not sure why.

Finished Render

Colour Experiment

Lighting and Rendering - Part 14: Physical Sky Light

In this Maya tutorial, I used a Physical Sky Light alongside a SkyDome Light. I learned that this is a great light to use to add realistic sunlight to a scene and that you can also change the attributes to make the scene a little more unrealistic by changing the tint of the sky and sun. I also looked at changing the sampling depending on how much light is in the scene and learned that by increasing the exposure of the scene, you can get rid of some noise, although your scene might not look so realistic anymore. I experimented with the Elevation, Azimuth, and the sun and sky tints in a couple of my renders. 

Midday - Sun Overhead

Mid Morning - Sun Rise 

Evening - Sun Beginning to Set

Sun and Sky Tint Experiment

Changing the Elevation, Azimuth, and Sky and Tint Attributes