Objects and figures aren't casting shadows.
l_riefkohl_ferrer_1923365ed0
Posts: 166
Objects and figures aren't casting shadows. Only one object is casting a shadow. I would like my scenes to look realistic, please help!
Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
7533 S Center View Ct #4664
West Jordan, UT 84084
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2025 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
Iray uses photoreal light and shadow by default, so it should look realistic.
You need to either post some screenshots or explain more.
Are you using Filament by mistake*? Are you using an HDRI? Is the ground plane on? What kind of lighting do you have?
* Nobody uses Filament on purpose. *rimshot*
What are you using to render - Iray, 3Delight, Filament, or the OpenGL preview (e.g. Texture Shaded)?
I'm not using filament. I'm using a distant light, not an HDRI. Do you mean is the "Draw Ground" on? If yes it is on. Ask if you need more info.
I'm using Iray with a laptop, Ryzen 7 3700U CPU, 12 GB RAM, AMD Radeon RX Vega 10 Graphics.
Is the character in an environment? Is there anything around them to actually catch the shadow?
Is the character not casting a shadow at all, or is the shadow just very faint? If so, the distant light's settings may need to be tweaked. The light a light, the softer the shadow.
I'm using i13 Home Time Cuddle Poses and Props. There is stuff around the characters where they are supposed to cast shadows. The characters are not casting shadows at all. There are also some other objects not casting shadows.
What is your environment type set to, in the Render Settings tab? Is it "Dome and Scene", "Scene Only", "Dome Only", or "Sun-Sky"?
Dome and scene.
I changed it to "Sun-Sky" and now I have nice shadows.
I honestly can't help you without seeing more.
If you want to upload a screenshot, you can run the Iray Preview and then go to "File -> Save Last Draw" to save it.
Sun-Sky disables scene lighting, though. So no lights in your scene besides the skydome will cast any shadows whatsoever.
How can I post an image here?
There's an "Attach a File" link in the bottom of every post. Just make sure there's no nudity, or it'll get removed.
Here is the image.
Is this with Sun-Sky, or Scene and Dome?
The shadows look normal to me. They're not very sharp, since the light source is very large and thus the shadows are very soft, but they're definitely there.
This is with "Scene and Dome". Can you give me some tips to get sharper shadows?
I don't use distant lights--since HDRIs do the same job and better--so I'm not that familiar with them.
To get really sharp shadows, create a spot light and aim it at your characters. You can adjust its sharpness by changing the angle, the beam exponent, and the width (in order to change the width, you need to set the geometry to something other than "point"). The width is the size of the light source, the angle is the size of the cone it projects, and the exponent is how much the light is concentrated. Each light has a certain amount of "power"; the bigger a light is, the more that power is spread out and the gentler it becomes. An exponent of 1.0 will spread the light rays evenly across the light's surface, an exponent of 100.0 will pack them all into the center. You want a small width, a small angle, and a high exponent.
10cm, 10 degrees, and 50.0 exponent will do for a start.
Note that concentrating the light rays like that will increase noise. You will need to judiciously adjust the lumens and/or reduce the specularity of textures or your characters will explode into a swarm of fireflies.
You can also activate Spectral Rendering in the Render Settings, and set it to Natural, cie1964. That seems to do better when dealing with concentrated light. It also has a nasty habit of making seams appear on your figures, but if they have clothes on it should be fine. You will need to increase your lumens to something like 100,000,000 to compensate if you do spectral rendering.
Thanks for the tips but, I ended up using HDRIs as you said. I used "iRadiance - Studio HDRIs for Iray" which I forgot I have because I didn't work with Daz Studio for a long time. Here is an image which I think is greatly improved. This is the kind of shadow I'm looking for. Can you give me your opinion?
Opinion on what? How to achieve that look, or just how it looks?
Opinion in both now that you mentioned it.
The technique I mentioned, using hard spotlights to get defined shadows, would be great if this is a stage play. If it's not, then your first image is much better, since people indoors generally have very soft shadows due to all the diffuse light around them.
If I was lighting this as an ordinary indoor scene, I'd set the environment type to "Scene Only" to get rid of the HDRI, put a few point lights with spherical geometry (25cm - 50cm) around the room the brighten it up, then use a large spotlight with a wide angle and an exponent of 1.0 as a key light and shine it directly at the couple's faces.
I will try your technique. How do I choose spherical geometry for the point lights and how do I make them 25cm-50cm? I played with some settings and it made no difference. Later I will ask about the spotlight.
Change "Light Geometry" to "Sphere". All units in Daz are centimeters by default, so you just type "25.0" into the width. Width does nothing if the geometry is set to "Point", but it controls the diameter of the sphere when it's set to "Sphere".
There's also "Disk" and "Rectangle", but those should only be used for a spotlight. Same with "Height"--it doesn't do anything unless the geometry is set to "Rectangle".
The point lights are set as you said and the shadows are better than my image. Now I need to set the spotlight. I set the "Spread Angle" to 180.00 and the "Beam Exponent" to 1.00. It is pointing to the faces of the figures as you said. What did you mean by key light? Also how can I increase the size of the spot light?
180 is way too much for a spotlight; it's basically a semicircle at that point. An angle of 90 degrees is fine, provided you've moved the spotlight far enough away from them. 120 degrees can be set if you really need the coverage, but it's rarely necessary.
In three-point lighting, you have three main lights: the key, the fill, and the rim. The key is the main light, which you point at whatever you want to highlight. It should be the brightest light in your scene. The fill is used to "fill" in the shadowy areas the key light can't reach, so they're not totally dark. And the rim light is shone on the hair and shoulders, to help the figure stand out from the background.
If you're doing a sunny, everyday shot, you want the fill light to be just a little darker than the key, but not too much. That will make the lighting look flat and even across the face.
But you can change the set-up to achieve a specific effect.
In this case, Viggo Mortensen has a strong key light to the right, almost perpendicular to the camera, and a strong rim light on his hair that makes him look angelic. But the fill light is weak (or nonexistent) which throws half his face into shadow, because moody.
I set the spotlight up and this is the result. What do you think of it?
Depends what mood you're going for.
If I were doing it, I'd turn the lumens down on the spotlight and increase its size to get rid of those hard shadows. Probably lower the light so it's shining in their faces more.
But you said you wanted the hard shadows, so if that's the look you're going for then it's good.
Obviously you should tweak the lights, change the lumens and size around, try and improve it as much as you can.
But ultimately only you know what you want to achieve, so there's no magic bullet for that. Just practice until you get good.
I made the changes. This is the image. Is very helpful what you taught me. I think I can go from here on my own now. Thanks for your help.