I remember in the early 2000s taking photos of a scene and then stitching and warping them to fit into an equirectangular panorama to be used as an hdri skybox. Times have changed for the better.
I think a lot of people who use hdris always go for the overlit look. I like mine to be 75% dark with 2 or 3 light sources so I can get some dramatic lighting contrast in my Redshift scenes. Im going to try this tool to make some new onrs. Looks cool
This was so informative with great practical examples, As a 3DS Max and Blender Veteran newly started to learn Unreal Engine it is so great to see what is the possibilities in UE5. Thanks for content!
Very cool. It's been decades since I was in school, so would have liked having this for work even 6 months ago! Making or finding good HDRIs even remotely close to what we need was always such a pain. We used to make 3d scenes and create skybox/hdri that way. Generate reflection maps and put them as maps models to run realtime etc. Im really looking forward to finally being able to quickly "art direct" my environment/lighting this way. One thing I'll be testing on my end is how far you can push the effects for a VR game running on the quest2 from Unreal.
Thanks! Very much agreed on the HDRI pain as I'm sure came through in the video 😅 Good question on the VR side, drop a comment if you end up giving it a shot on your side I'd be curious to test that as well
Thank you for the information! It helps a lot. I'm new to Unreal and I was wondering if it is possible to use these tools for indoor scenes? Not only outside scenes
No problem I'm glad you found it helpful! First off, welcome to learning Unreal :D To answer your question, yes you can use this method to light both exteriors and interiors. Though like I mentioned in the video it's by no means a replacement for actual scene lighting, moreso just to get a quick look early on as you're "blocking out" your scene to get a feel for the mood. I don't currently have in depth lighting tutorials on the channel but I'd highly recommend www.youtube.com/@WilliamFaucher if you're looking to learn lighting in Unreal specifically!
at 23:49 the solar panel on the rover is filled with noise. I'm experiencing that too, with scenes with reflective surfaces AND that noise is appearing in renders. Is this a bug? Do you know how to curb this?
From what I've gathered from different forums this is kind of just a Lumen thing in its current state when there isn't much direct lighting on the surface. Generally Lumen GI has a really tough time with glossy reflections (between .2-.4) and the denoiser has trouble with them which gives you all the flickering. The most recent workaround I've found are in this link here with some console commands. Settings to reduce Noise with in Lumen Reflections: r.Lumen.Reflections.MaxRayIntensity=3 r.Lumen.Reflections.BilateralFilter.SpatialKernelRadius=0.01 The defaults for these values are: r.Lumen.Reflections.MaxRayIntensity=100 r.Lumen.Reflections.BilateralFilter.SpatialKernelRadius=0.001 Source: forums.unrealengine.com/t/lumen-having-a-lot-of-noise-in-reflections-in-dark-areas/749276/4
Is it possible to make an anime style lighting? The ones with more sharp shadows and more warm\cold light? I've seen tutorials about such kind of lighting the scene without changing the realistic textures of the environment objects. And the scene becomes more anime like just with lighting.
You can definitely generate color palettes that would feel anime inspired, they even have dedicated styles for both anime and manage. As far as shadows go I don't think you'd be able to pull off that look with skybox lighting alone since by its nature its generally an incredibly large source of light meaning shadows it casts are quite soft (but I haven't tried replicating the style myself)
Unfortunately they aren't true 32bit HDRI's, the way they word it on the welcome screen is "Skybox AI creates equirectangular images that can be wrapped as a skybox HDRI in any 3D scene. However, while we don’t currently export true HDRIs with 32 bit depth high dynamic range, they can still be converted to 32 bit and used to light scenes like HDRIs." so generally the way I use them just to get quick looks in Unreal they have held more than enough information but for anyone really looking to push the dynamic range further these wouldn't quite cut it for that (at least for now)
@@marcus_ohreallyusyoure missing the point of why hdri's need to be 32 bit. Using a jpg to light your scene literally means the brightest part of the image has an emissive value of 1 which is extremely low thus itll look dull, diffused and lifeless. If you add a traditional lights to your scene, it is equivalent to clamping all those lights to a much lower value and then altering the exposure of the overall image to compensate.
Yeah Unreal is definitely getting pretty wild, will be putting in a lot more time to learn it more in depth the coming year so I can fully move away from rendering inside Blender/Marmoset
Awesome feature! Love seeing our HDRIs at work and presented so well. Added to our community tutorials playlist. 👌✨
I remember in the early 2000s taking photos of a scene and then stitching and warping them to fit into an equirectangular panorama to be used as an hdri skybox. Times have changed for the better.
you still need to take 360 panoromas mixing vfx with real footage. First spherical panoramas where taken in the mid 1800 and with no stitching.
As quick and convenient as this new stuff is, I can’t imagine how much you must’ve learned from the “old” way of doing things
A fresh start of AI informative newsletter, keep up with that Bro. I've already signed up and downloaded the assets. Thanks!
Thanks Nick appreciate it will do!
Love the style of your vid - nice simple production / art direction / great work
Very much appreciate the support!
Excellent explanation man, wish you success in your RUclips Journey! Dont Quit!
Appreciate the support, comments like this mean a lot!
this is an amazing resource. thank you for sharing your findings with us!!
I think a lot of people who use hdris always go for the overlit look. I like mine to be 75% dark with 2 or 3 light sources so I can get some dramatic lighting contrast in my Redshift scenes. Im going to try this tool to make some new onrs. Looks cool
yoo great video man! I was really hoping someone did a video on "that" AI plugin. I got you subbed dude!
Ay thanks I appreciate it!
This was so informative with great practical examples, As a 3DS Max and Blender Veteran newly started to learn Unreal Engine it is so great to see what is the possibilities in UE5. Thanks for content!
Awesome I appreciate the comment, glad you found it helpful!
Fantastic work. Very informative. I learned something new 😊
awesome glad to hear it, thanks! 😀
This is a video I didn't know I needed to watch, thank you
i tried this but for a different reason, might give this a shot on another project just for light/reflections
So cool. Thanks for sharing this fantastic video. Definitely gonna try this workflow. :)
Glad you found it helpful!!
👏Excellent content! You have a gift to inspire and teach. Excited to share your work with our students. 🖖👊
Thank you, I very much appreciate that!
Very nice! Always interested in learning something new. Thank you!
Thanks glad it was helfpul!
Great work, compliments. Thx 4 all!
Very cool. It's been decades since I was in school, so would have liked having this for work even 6 months ago! Making or finding good HDRIs even remotely close to what we need was always such a pain. We used to make 3d scenes and create skybox/hdri that way. Generate reflection maps and put them as maps models to run realtime etc.
Im really looking forward to finally being able to quickly "art direct" my environment/lighting this way. One thing I'll be testing on my end is how far you can push the effects for a VR game running on the quest2 from Unreal.
Thanks! Very much agreed on the HDRI pain as I'm sure came through in the video 😅 Good question on the VR side, drop a comment if you end up giving it a shot on your side I'd be curious to test that as well
Thank you very much for mentioning Reverie, I just sent you an email about it.
Yo. I subbed to your newsletter. How do I download the sky boxes? PS: Great Video!
EDIT: I got em! Thank you a ton!
Hey yeah unfortunately it takes a few minutes to get there, glad it arrived though, enjoy!
i belive Nvida canvas you can paint with a brush AI hdri in a 360 panorama , but this is more advanced due to the options of training models
Just wow :)
Thank You ❤
My pleasure!
So helpful. Thank you so much for this awesome tutorial.
No worries Nicole I'm glad it was helpful!
❤
This is brilliant. Thank you so much!
No worries glad it was helpful!
Great video! Very informative!
thanks I'm glad you found it helpful!
well i tried it but the styles are behind paywall, so... back to ansel and watchdogs legion for those nice urban sphericals.. :)
interesting. i prefer a real sky for games but for renders this could be good.
can the AI HDRI Generator generate an HDRI out of an existing image?
Thank you for the information! It helps a lot. I'm new to Unreal and I was wondering if it is possible to use these tools for indoor scenes? Not only outside scenes
No problem I'm glad you found it helpful! First off, welcome to learning Unreal :D To answer your question, yes you can use this method to light both exteriors and interiors. Though like I mentioned in the video it's by no means a replacement for actual scene lighting, moreso just to get a quick look early on as you're "blocking out" your scene to get a feel for the mood. I don't currently have in depth lighting tutorials on the channel but I'd highly recommend www.youtube.com/@WilliamFaucher if you're looking to learn lighting in Unreal specifically!
Hi I've subscribed your channel from India...
thanks glad to have you!
Great stuff, very helpful many thanks.
Thanks! Sorry for the question but at 19:43, which add-on of blender did you use to extrude so fast…. 😮
Hey! Its Boxcutter by TeamC blendermarket.com/products/boxcutter
Awesome!!!
thank you!
at 23:49 the solar panel on the rover is filled with noise. I'm experiencing that too, with scenes with reflective surfaces AND that noise is appearing in renders. Is this a bug? Do you know how to curb this?
From what I've gathered from different forums this is kind of just a Lumen thing in its current state when there isn't much direct lighting on the surface. Generally Lumen GI has a really tough time with glossy reflections (between .2-.4) and the denoiser has trouble with them which gives you all the flickering. The most recent workaround I've found are in this link here with some console commands.
Settings to reduce Noise with in Lumen Reflections:
r.Lumen.Reflections.MaxRayIntensity=3
r.Lumen.Reflections.BilateralFilter.SpatialKernelRadius=0.01
The defaults for these values are:
r.Lumen.Reflections.MaxRayIntensity=100
r.Lumen.Reflections.BilateralFilter.SpatialKernelRadius=0.001
Source: forums.unrealengine.com/t/lumen-having-a-lot-of-noise-in-reflections-in-dark-areas/749276/4
Is it possible to make an anime style lighting? The ones with more sharp shadows and more warm\cold light? I've seen tutorials about such kind of lighting the scene without changing the realistic textures of the environment objects. And the scene becomes more anime like just with lighting.
You can definitely generate color palettes that would feel anime inspired, they even have dedicated styles for both anime and manage. As far as shadows go I don't think you'd be able to pull off that look with skybox lighting alone since by its nature its generally an incredibly large source of light meaning shadows it casts are quite soft (but I haven't tried replicating the style myself)
@@futurefamiliar Thanks! I'll give it a try to make street location more anime like with it.
Hi, yes, stylized content will be next. I'm focusing on realistic first.
@@alxleiva Gr8 news! Looking forward to it!
Is it possible to use animated HDRI in UE?
Not that I'm aware of at the moment
Are these actually true 32bit files with full dynamic range?
Unfortunately they aren't true 32bit HDRI's, the way they word it on the welcome screen is "Skybox AI creates equirectangular images that can be wrapped as a skybox HDRI in any 3D scene. However, while we don’t currently export true HDRIs with 32 bit depth high dynamic range, they can still be converted to 32 bit and used to light scenes like HDRIs." so generally the way I use them just to get quick looks in Unreal they have held more than enough information but for anyone really looking to push the dynamic range further these wouldn't quite cut it for that (at least for now)
@@futurefamiliar cheers man, appreciate the reply!
I don't think my hdris are 32 bit, and no client has ever complained that the range wasn't dynamic enough in the finished video
@@marcus_ohreallyusyoure missing the point of why hdri's need to be 32 bit. Using a jpg to light your scene literally means the brightest part of the image has an emissive value of 1 which is extremely low thus itll look dull, diffused and lifeless. If you add a traditional lights to your scene, it is equivalent to clamping all those lights to a much lower value and then altering the exposure of the overall image to compensate.
It's very nice but you gotta pay for it really. There's gotta be a way to turn any ai generated image into an HDRI image
What browser is that?
It's Opera GX
I still find it mad this this is real time. I mean, bye C4D.
Yeah Unreal is definitely getting pretty wild, will be putting in a lot more time to learn it more in depth the coming year so I can fully move away from rendering inside Blender/Marmoset
looks like reverie is nothing no development, like its just a scam to get the epic megagrant
I follow you on Istangram man. Love you're work as a huge Sci-Fi fan!
Really appreciate that glad to have you here as well!