If you are new to CG, stuff like reflectance / albedo / sRGB (Gamma 2.2) / RGB (Gamma 1.0 / Linear) can be confusing.
In this post we will try to demystify these therms and show you how make a calibrated material scene.
There are two approaches to get the same end result.
# Use a fixed light intensity and adjust the camera exposure.
# Use 0 EV camera settings and adjust the light intensity.
We will use the second approach, because it's more practical. We can swap HDRI maps and nothing will break.
--= Sphere =--We need a sphere to calibrate our scene.
Make a 100x100x100cm box, scans are usually 1m.
Apply a TurboSmooth modifier and use a high Iteration amount, I used 6 here.
Apply a Spherify modifier
The sphere has shrunk to 83.966cm, if you used the same settings as me.
To correct this, open the scale tool and input 119.096 into the "Offset:World %" box.
The sphere is now back to 100cm
The sphere is now hovering about 9cm above the pivot point.
This step is not essential, but stuff like this is really irritating!
Select our sphere, right click somewhere in the scene and click "Convert to:" > "Convert to Editable Poly"
Click on this wrench icon "Utility"
Click on "MAXScript"
Paste this code into the editor
for i in $ do(
i.pivot = [i.center.x,i.center.y,i.min.z]
)
Now CTRL + A the code, and drag it onto your Toolbar to make a Macro Button.
Select your sphere and click the macro button.
The pivot point should now be in the center of the sphere at the bottom.
Open the Move Transform tool and reset everything to 0,0,0.
--= 18% Gray Material =--Gray cards are usually 18% reflectance. ColorChecker Passport "Neutral 5" is around 19.7%.
You might think, 18% what ? RGB ? sRGB ?
We are talking about 18% linear/RGB.
Create a "Corona Color" map
Click on the color preview to open "Corona Color Picker"
Uncheck "sRGB" and go into the "0-100%" tab.
Input 18, 18, 18 here and click "OK".
Do not input 18 into "Value", for whatever reason "Value" is always sRGB.
If people are talking about 90% white, they are talking about 90% linear/RGB.
Here is an overview of the average ColorChecker Passport swatches.
When you are capturing textures in real life, try to get "Neutral 5" as close to 122 sRGB as possible in camera (tethering is a huge help here). And then adjust your photo to match 100% in post.
I've noticed that on lower/medium end DSLRs you will get a better result by shooting for "Neutral 8", that is 201 sRGB.
Create a "CoronaMtl" and hook our 18% gray map into "diffuse color".
Leave Reflection at 0 while we calibrate.
Apply the material to our sphere
--= Render Settings =--I usually use "Image Aspect" of 1.0, but do whatever you want.
Go into Performance
Set "Secondary solver:" to "Path Tracing"
I usually enable these render elements, but do whatever you want.
--= Calibrating Our HDRi =--I will use "Apartment Livingroom 2015 – Interior" from mastering cgi in this example, because everyone and their mom has this HDRi.
Hit 8 on your keyboard and drag the HDRi into "Environment Map", this will auto change the mapping of the HDRi to "Spherical Environment".
3dsMax projects HDRi maps from the outside, this will flip our map. We have to counter this with -1 U Tiling. I wish Corona could auto apply this like "Spherical Environment".
Set Blur to 0.01
Hit "U" to go into "Orthographic" view.
Select your sphere in the view port and hit Z, this will lock your camera to the center of the sphere.
You can now hold ALT and middle mouse button to rotate around the sphere.
Fire up Interactive Render
Inside the VFB set "Saturation" to -1. We want even RGB values.
Our goal is to align the camera to the brightest spot in our HDRi. In my case that is the window above the sofa.
Rotate around and right click in the center of the sphere until you find the highest "Tonemapped sRGB" value in the center of the sphere.
18% gray is 0.459 sRGB float / 117 sRGB. We need to calibrate our HDRi until the brightest spot on our sphere is 0.459 sRGB float / 117 sRGB.
Go back into the HDRi map and adjust the "RGB Level" until the brightest value is 0.459 sRGB float / 117 sRGB.
I usually make a desaturated version of the HDRi to remove all color cast, then I plug the colored HDRi into "Environment overrides".
Calibrated HDRi
It's time to hit P to go back into Perspective mode.
Set "Saturation" back to 0 in the VFB.
Hide the sphere and import a real model. A little tip, always create materials on the actual object it's meant for, and not on a fancy shader ball!
--= Notes =--Materials with proper ColorChecker values will look very flat and boring. This is how it should look.
Linear raw photos are just as boring.
You can toggle one of my photographic LUTs to see how the material will look in a final render.
3% black sphere with photographic LUT enabled
These are the official ColorCehcker Passport sRGB values.
If you capture your textures with a properly lit Checker and use this scene. Your materials will stay consistent and correct.
