What are highlights?
When a bright light (sunlight, spotlight, and so on) reflects off a surface, a specular highlight results. In another words,
highlights are the hotspots where light is reflected off an object.
In the following image, the highlight value was increased for each object from left to right.
Highlight parameters
Tip
To view the parameters for a particular material, select an object with that material and press Ctrl+M.
- Show Highlights for this material
-
Check the box to turn on highlights.
- Use color
-
Adjusts the color of the highlights. For details on how to use these controls, see Change colors.
- Use image file
-
Applies a specular map to control how highlights appear on an object. For details on how to use these controls, see Use image maps.
- Highlight size
-
Controls the size of shiny highlights or hotspots on the surface. (This value is sometimes called eccentricity.) Enter any numeric value with unit intervals of 0.1.
Tip
For surfaces to be perceived as shiny, the highlight size should be small and the highlight transition value should be high.
Tip
For surfaces to be perceived as dull, the specular highlight size should be large and the highlight transition value should
be small.
- Highlight transition
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Modulates or scales the intensity of the specular highlight. (This value is also called specular rolloff.) Enter any numeric value with unit intervals of 0.1.
- Environment lighting override
-
Determines how specular highlights interact with the environment light and/or image-based lighting. For details on how to
use these controls, see Use environment lighting overrides.