Animation with Radiosity

By default, a radiosity solution is calculated at the current frame. If you are animating objects and you want to perform a radiosity solution at every frame, turn on Compute Advanced Lighting When Required in the Render Setup dialog Common panel Common Parameters rollout Advanced Lighting group.

Once the renderer starts processing each frame of your animation, it computes the radiosity solution for each frame as required. This occurs, for example, when an object moves or a light intensity changes. If nothing changes in the scene from one frame to the next, the radiosity engine does not recalculate the solution.

NoteDue to the random statistical sampling used by the radiosity engine, there might be some flickering between frames. If this occurs, increase the value of Initial Quality or the number of Refine Iterations to solve the problem.

Tip Before launching a lengthy animation with radiosity, process a radiosity solution manually for a single frame to make sure the results are acceptable.

Tip If you animate only the camera as in an architectural walkthrough, you can save time by calculating a radiosity solution for only the first frame of the animation. You can then reuse it in all subsequently rendered frames by turning off Compute Advanced Lighting When Required on the Common Parameters rollout of the Render Setup dialog.

Avoid using the Automatic Exposure Control for animations. This exposure control can change from frame to frame, creating a flickering effect.

Object Animation

The radiosity solution is calculated for each frame if any object is animated in the scene (the default is to calculate the current frame only). You specify the parameters (goals/quality) you want to reach on the Advanced Lighting panel. Before rendering the entire animation, we recommend first running a solution to verify that it’s successful. These parameters are then reprocessed for each frame.

You go to the Render Setup dialog Common Parameters rollout and enable the option Compute Advanced Lighting When Required, and then render the scene. The radiosity is processed for the first frame and then rendered. 3ds Max then moves to the next frame, processes radiosity, renders, and so on.

Camera Animation

If objects remain static in the scene and only the camera moves, you can solve radiosity at frame 0, and when you render the animation, turn off Compute Advanced Lighting When Required.