Lighting is one of the most important aspects of 3D rendering, as it can dramatically change the look and feel of a scene. In Blender, both the Cycles and Eevee render engines offer a variety of light types and settings that allow for realistic or stylized illumination. This tutorial will guide you through using lights effectively in Blender 3D with the Eevee render engine.
1. The Types of Lights in Blender
Blender offers several light types that serve different purposes:
- Point Light: Emits light in all directions from a single point. Great for simulating small light sources like light bulbs.
- Sun Light: A directional light that emits parallel rays, often used for simulating sunlight. The angle of the sun can be adjusted, but it always lights up the scene uniformly in one direction.
- Spotlight: Emits light in a cone shape, useful for simulating focused lighting like stage lights or flashlights. You can control the size and softness of the light cone.
- Area Light: A light source that emits from a rectangular or square shape. Ideal for simulating larger light sources such as windows or light panels.
Each of these light types can be used in both Cycles and Eevee, but their appearance and performance will vary depending on the render engine.
2. Point Light
Let’s start off by looking at a very basic light called the Point Light
To add a Light, press Shift + A to bring up the “Add” menu
Navigate to Light and choose the type of light you want
The Point Light is an omni-directional light
It is like a bare lightbulb in a room in that it generates energy in all directions
Surfaces that are further away will be rendered darker
In Render Mode, if we move the Point Light up and down along the Z-Axis we can see how the light falloff affects the lighting on the Cube
If we move the Point Light to the top-center of the Cube we now see that there is very little falloff onto the sides and bottom of the Cube
If we move the Point Light off to the one side of the Cube we notice a very different falloff of light
Let’s look at the options available to us
We have a Preview window that will show us what the light will look like in the scene
We can change the color of the light using the color picker
If we change the color to a bright yellow, we can now see that the Cube has a yellow color highlight added to it from the Point Light
We can add a second color by simply adding a second Point Light and changing the color
We can change how weak or strong the Point Light is by changing the Power option
The Power option is the power of the light in watts – the higher the value, the more intense the light
The Exposure option scales the power of the Point light exponentially and the Normalize option changes this power to Watts (specifically radiant power) per square meter
The Radius when larger than zero, will be emitted from a spherical surface – larger sizes have softer shadows and specular highlights
The Soft Falloff will avoid sharp edges where the light intersects with other scene objects
The Shadow option gives you the ability to use virtual shadow mapping which results in more traditional shadow mapping and offers better performance than ray tracing
Jitter increases shadow precision
Filter blurs the shadow
The Resolution Limit is the minimum size of a shadow map pixel
The options under the Influence parameters modulate the intensity of the light
Custom Distance allows you to set a custom attenuation distance that will be used instead of global lighting
3. Sun Light
A sun light provides light of constant intensity emitted in a single direction from infinitely far away
A sun light can be very handy for a uniform clear daylight open-space illumination
The direction can be changed by rotating the Sun light, like any other object, but because the light is emitted from a location considered infinitely far away, the location of a Sun light does not affect the rendered result
In Render Mode, if we move the Sun Light up and down along the Z-Axis we can see how the light falloff does not change the lighting on the scene
If we move the Sun Light to the top-center of the Cube we now see that there is no falloff on the top of the Cube and very little on the sides of the Cube and slightly less falloff on the bottom of the Cube
Let’s look at the options available to us
We have a Preview window that will show us what the light will look like in the scene
We can change the color of the light using the color picker
If we change the color to a bright yellow, we can now see that the scene has a yellow color highlight added to it from the Sun Light
We can change how weak or strong the Sun Light is by changing the Strength option
The Strength option is the power of the light in watts – the higher the value, the more intense the light
The Exposure option scales the power of the Sun light exponentially and the Normalize option changes this power to Watts (specifically radiant power) per square meter
The Angle is the size of the Sun Light according to its angular diameter (as opposed to its actual size) as seen from earth
The Shadow option gives you the ability to use virtual shadow mapping which results in more traditional shadow mapping and offers better performance than ray tracing
Jitter increases shadow precision
Filter blurs the shadow
The Resolution Limit is the minimum size of a shadow map pixel
The options under the Influence parameters modulate the intensity of the light
4. Spot Light
A Spot Light emits a cone-shaped beam of light from the tip of the cone in a given direction
The Spot Light allows us to confine light to a very specific beam of light within the scene which is similar to a spotlight in a theater or a flashlight
Notice that there is a cone of light that we can work with when we are using this type of Light
The direction can be changed by rotating the Spot Light, like any other object
In Render Mode, if we move the Spot Light up and down along the Z-Axis we can see how the light falloff changes the lighting on the scene
We have a Preview window that will show us what the light will look like in the scene
We can change the color of the light using the color picker
If we change the color to a bright yellow, we can now see that the scene has a yellow color highlight added to it from the Spot Light
We can change how weak or strong the Spot Light is by changing the Power option
The Power option is the power of the light in watts – the higher the value, the more intense the light
The Exposure option scales the power of the Spot light exponentially and the Normalize option changes this power to Watts (specifically radiant power) per square meter
The Radius when larger than zero, will be emitted from a spherical surface – larger sizes have softer shadows and specular highlights
The Soft Falloff will avoid sharp edges where the light intersects with other scene objects
The Angle determines the size of the outer cone of the Spot light which determines how wide the light spreads across the scene
The Blend option controls the inner cone which represents the amount of space the inner cone should occupy relative to the inside of the outer cone size
The Show Cone option displays a transparent cone to assist you in visualizing which scene objects will be contained within the Spot light
The Shadow option gives you the ability to use virtual shadow mapping which results in more traditional shadow mapping and offers better performance than ray tracing
Jitter increases shadow precision
Filter blurs the shadow
The Resolution Limit is the minimum size of a shadow map pixel
The options under the Influence parameters modulate the intensity of the light
5. Area Light
The Area Light simulates light originating from a surface emitter – such as a TV screen
This type of light produces shadows with soft borders
If you scroll in close to the light, notice that there is a square emitter that we can work with when we are using this type of Light
The direction can be changed by rotating the Area Light, like any other object
In Render Mode, if we move the Area Light up and down along the Z-Axis we can see how the light falloff changes the lighting on the Cube
We have a Preview window that will show us what the light will look like in the scene
We can change the color of the light using the color picker
If we change the color to a bright yellow, we can now see that the Cube has a yellow color highlight added to it from the Area Light
We can change how weak or strong the Area Light is by changing the Power option
The Power option is the power of the light in watts – the higher the value, the more intense the light
The Exposure option scales the power of the Spot light exponentially and the Normalize option changes this power to Watts (specifically radiant power) per square meter
We also have Shape options for the light emitter
We can use a square. rectangle, disk, or ellipse
The size for each Shape is controlled by the Size options
For example, if we choose the Disk option and change the size to 1.8, we can see the size of the emitter change
The Shadow option gives you the ability to use virtual shadow mapping which results in more traditional shadow mapping and offers better performance than ray tracing
Jitter increases shadow precision
Filter blurs the shadow
The Resolution Limit is the minimum size of a shadow map pixel
The options under the Influence parameters modulate the intensity of the light
Conclusion
Lighting plays a critical role in setting the mood and realism of a 3D scene. By understanding the different light types and settings in Blender’s Eevee render engine, you can significantly enhance the quality of your renders. Eevee excels in real-time rendering, offering faster results for animation and game design.