You can use simple Area light, than use shift T to point it directly in your needs. If you want to use light from constrains - you can assign vertex of mesh to a group, then constrain area light to directly this vertex group
'constrain/track to' is so cool. Thank you for reminding us of this powerful little tool. So useful, especially in animations when the camera is moving through a scene.
A couple of alternatives you might want to check out: 1. Set Transform Orientation to 'View'. 2. Align your view to a mesh-selection with Shift-Numpad 7. 3.Align your light with Object > Transform > Align to Transform Orientation. Same as above, but with 'Create Orientation' create an new orientation from a mesh-selection to align you light to. With Ctrl-Numpad 0 on a selected light, you can look through it, as if it was a camera. 'Lock Camera to View' still works. If you align a viewport view the way you like, (possibly using Shift-Numpad 7 again) .. Ctrl-Alt-Numpad 0 on the light-as-camera will jump it to the Viewport's viewpoint, and orientation. ( Object Mode, Ctrl-0 on the camera, will set it back to being the camera again.)
Perhaps an idea is to make a modal operator which we can call and use the selected light we have than on each click it will adjust everything. It would act a bit like that awesome looking addon light wrangler. I have not tested this yet, its a theorie
I made the operator and though it's not a modal one it still works like a champ. I also added all light props and undo function. That way, I get the small operator menu in bottom left and I can keep editing the, the position and also all the light props. This is so handy now!. It now just 2 clean cos. I've added it in theobject menu, W, so click it and then it takes the position and default distance I add. Bam and done.
Just found an addon which actually uses raycast and works like light wrangler, but it's free. It has tons more other options. It's called leomoon-lightstudio
This is a fantastic little trick. Is there any reason you're using emission materials vs lights? I was under the impression that lights tend to render faster with less noise.
With the light tree my understanding is that it doesn't matter so much anymore. But luminous geometry allows you to set up a stencil to fade the edges a bit, although in this example you wouldn't really notice that because of the roughness of the surfaces used. Although in 4.0 you can now do that to area lights. But you could have used area lights exactly the same way. My goal was moreso to show how the 3D cursor could be aligned to geometry than it was to specifically do lighting.
Got it. Thanks. I'm sure that trick with the 3D cursor will come in handy. I've used an image texture to drive the fade-off of area lights by enabling shader nodes for a light in Cycles. Sounds similar to your approach with the emission materials. Thanks for the great information!@@christopher3d475
@@christopher3d475 with blender 4.0 we have light uv, so we basically should be bound by that anymore. Not sure if the mission mesh vs light actually matters
Hi Christopher, and thanks for the great tutorial. I’m having issues with the 3D cursor. Even though in options I have “surface project” and “orient to geometry”, the local axes of the 3D cursor don’t match those of the face. Please help!
This would have also worked with an area light. The reason I used geometry was kind of out of habit. I've tended to use those more than area lights because you can apply a stencil to fade the intensity of the light a bit which you couldn't do (to my knowledge) with area lights. But that's changing in 4.0.
Did you you can add a texture to a point light? So that the variation in the texture adds some directionality to the light? For example, this could be an IES texture, but it could be entirely something else.
Why would you want to create an oriented area light if you're gonna use "track to" later anyway? Track To overrides any rotation the source object initially had and an empty doesn't require any rotation for targeting.
is it possible to align existied object to 3d cursor? Or I need to create some temporary object which snaps automaticly to 3d cursor and then snap my target object to temporary one? Thank you for sharing this great trick
Quite interesting, now let's hope my brain will retain that info ;) There's just so much to do with the software, it's hard to come full circle or rather it's easy to get lost in all the details and tools available. I need a pocket dimension or time slipping ability :P
How does the orientation of the 3D cursor even matter, when in the end you constrain it to an empty and move the light. You can skip a step and get the same result.
Because I don't always assign constraint. Besides, this is just one example of demonstrating the alignment of the cursor to a surface for some other operation, not everyone knows the cursor can do this.
I have an impression that emission planes gives more rendering time and noise. Anyone knows if its the case with recent blender versions? With light nodes you can use textures to shape de light.
Because planes allow you to apply a stencil to the emitting material which you couldn't do with an area light to my knowledge. However, that's now changing in 4.0 since they've exposed the UV of the geometric shape used for area emitting. I show it in my video on new render features in 4.0. Also, the Light Tree functionality introduced in 3.5 samples emitting surfaces like it does area lights.
You can use simple Area light, than use shift T to point it directly in your needs. If you want to use light from constrains - you can assign vertex of mesh to a group, then constrain area light to directly this vertex group
This method is too clever. Thanks.
'constrain/track to' is so cool.
Thank you for reminding us of this powerful little tool. So useful, especially in animations when the camera is moving through a scene.
Wow! I didn't know this way of lighting objects before, thanks! This is really useful for poduct design.
Really useful stuff! This tip is going to make my lighting much faster
A couple of alternatives you might want to check out:
1. Set Transform Orientation to 'View'. 2. Align your view to a mesh-selection with Shift-Numpad 7. 3.Align your light with Object > Transform > Align to Transform Orientation.
Same as above, but with 'Create Orientation' create an new orientation from a mesh-selection to align you light to.
With Ctrl-Numpad 0 on a selected light, you can look through it, as if it was a camera. 'Lock Camera to View' still works.
If you align a viewport view the way you like, (possibly using Shift-Numpad 7 again) .. Ctrl-Alt-Numpad 0 on the light-as-camera will jump it to the Viewport's viewpoint, and orientation.
( Object Mode, Ctrl-0 on the camera, will set it back to being the camera again.)
WOW!!!!! Mind blown! Thank you
Incredibly useful tutorial. This was a real struggle for me, now it is super easy.
You may set it in Preference by assigning "orientation : geometry" to the "Shift Right Click" keymap and leave the tool menu option.
Yes, but you first have to know that the functionality is there to begin with, and that's what this video is about.
Amazing!!!
Great stuff!
I feel stupid for not knowing about Align -> 3D Cursor on primitive creation. Thanks for the pointing it out man.
3D is a constant learning game.
Perhaps an idea is to make a modal operator which we can call and use the selected light we have than on each click it will adjust everything. It would act a bit like that awesome looking addon light wrangler. I have not tested this yet, its a theorie
I made the operator and though it's not a modal one it still works like a champ. I also added all light props and undo function. That way, I get the small operator menu in bottom left and I can keep editing the, the position and also all the light props. This is so handy now!.
It now just 2 clean cos. I've added it in theobject menu, W, so click it and then it takes the position and default distance I add. Bam and done.
Just found an addon which actually uses raycast and works like light wrangler, but it's free. It has tons more other options. It's called leomoon-lightstudio
This helps a ton! Thank you so much!
really nice trick.
This is a fantastic little trick. Is there any reason you're using emission materials vs lights? I was under the impression that lights tend to render faster with less noise.
With the light tree my understanding is that it doesn't matter so much anymore. But luminous geometry allows you to set up a stencil to fade the edges a bit, although in this example you wouldn't really notice that because of the roughness of the surfaces used. Although in 4.0 you can now do that to area lights. But you could have used area lights exactly the same way. My goal was moreso to show how the 3D cursor could be aligned to geometry than it was to specifically do lighting.
Got it. Thanks. I'm sure that trick with the 3D cursor will come in handy.
I've used an image texture to drive the fade-off of area lights by enabling shader nodes for a light in Cycles. Sounds similar to your approach with the emission materials.
Thanks for the great information!@@christopher3d475
@@christopher3d475 with blender 4.0 we have light uv, so we basically should be bound by that anymore. Not sure if the mission mesh vs light actually matters
Hi Christopher, and thanks for the great tutorial.
I’m having issues with the 3D cursor. Even though in options I have “surface project” and “orient to geometry”, the local axes of the 3D cursor don’t match those of the face. Please help!
thats awesome. thank you! IS THERE a difference between using an area light vs a plane with emission?
This would have also worked with an area light. The reason I used geometry was kind of out of habit. I've tended to use those more than area lights because you can apply a stencil to fade the intensity of the light a bit which you couldn't do (to my knowledge) with area lights. But that's changing in 4.0.
Did you you can add a texture to a point light? So that the variation in the texture adds some directionality to the light? For example, this could be an IES texture, but it could be entirely something else.
Yes, I love IES lights.
@@christopher3d475 Trouble is, the IES texture node doesn’t work if you enable OSL. But it’s easy enough to convert an IES profile to an OSL shader.
Why would you want to create an oriented area light if you're gonna use "track to" later anyway?
Track To overrides any rotation the source object initially had and an empty doesn't require any rotation for targeting.
is it possible to align existied object to 3d cursor? Or I need to create some temporary object which snaps automaticly to 3d cursor and then snap my target object to temporary one? Thank you for sharing this great trick
Quite interesting, now let's hope my brain will retain that info ;)
There's just so much to do with the software, it's hard to come full circle or rather it's easy to get lost in all the details and tools available. I need a pocket dimension or time slipping ability :P
How does the orientation of the 3D cursor even matter, when in the end you constrain it to an empty and move the light. You can skip a step and get the same result.
Because I don't always assign constraint. Besides, this is just one example of demonstrating the alignment of the cursor to a surface for some other operation, not everyone knows the cursor can do this.
@@christopher3d475 Alright, fair.
On the SSD, there are vertical lines. Did you model them, or use a normal map?
It's geometry.
In 2023, why are people still using planes with emission instead of actual Area Lights. I've been asking this question since 2.79
That I'd like to know too
My question: does Lights in Blender work in UE4, Unity or Godot?
Does emission materials more compatible?
Much easier to control shape of an emission mesh
I have an impression that emission planes gives more rendering time and noise. Anyone knows if its the case with recent blender versions? With light nodes you can use textures to shape de light.
Because planes allow you to apply a stencil to the emitting material which you couldn't do with an area light to my knowledge. However, that's now changing in 4.0 since they've exposed the UV of the geometric shape used for area emitting. I show it in my video on new render features in 4.0. Also, the Light Tree functionality introduced in 3.5 samples emitting surfaces like it does area lights.