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Cycles: Add option to sky texture to specify the sun direction by another object Authored by Lukas Stockner (lukasstockner97) on May 8 2016, 7:56 PM.
Details This patch adds an option to the Cycles Sky Texture node that allows the user to The only remaining problem is that rotating the lamp while being in viewport
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Event TimelineComment Actions You can use has_object_dependency() on that node to make sure viewport update is correct. However, in this case i'm not sure having it a node option is the way to go, more flexible would be to have it as a socket. And then most of the time you wouldn't even need to worry about having an extra object (for which you'll need to keep track about visibility, or if it's an Empty then i'm not sure Cycles will really update it's matrix) you can use Normal node to define direction straight from the shader. Or you'll be able to do some nifty tricks like distorting the direction for some artistic choise. Comment Actions Forgot to mention.. We can also consider adding Other Object Info node, to query direction/transform of another object. Not sure it's really that needed tho. Comment Actions I think having another object around is not a problem, because the Cycles sky texture does not include a sun component. So if you want the sun you need to add a sun lamp anyway, and then you might as well use that sun lamp to control the sky texture. Maybe there's a better way to solve it, this sun/sky is a feature that doesn't really fit cleanly in the world or sun lamp settings. But unless we come up with a better solution I think this patch is a step in the right direction. Controlling the direction in the viewport seems easier than doing it from a shader. Comment Actions Added the dependency, the viewport updates correctly now. The Sun-Sky thing is tricky indeed - I've been playing around with adding the Sun component of the Hosek-Wilkie model a while ago, and while it works quite well, I don't know how to integrate it properly - since the sun is so tiny, having it as part of the Sky node makes it necessary to use World MIS with a huge resolution for something that could easily be sampled analytically, but having it as a Node that would connect to a Sunlamp shader is not really better... Comment Actions People are used to Sun Position or Geographical Sun addons for architectural renders to see shadows and enlightened areas. It is cool to have Sun represented inside sky texture. But it should have a size. BI sky model have a size for Sun. Currently, Eevee adds a bloom effect directly on sunlight reflection. Yes, people will still use Sun lamp Size to have wanted shadows instead of a huge World MIS resolution. But I see no reason to create a node for Sun Lamp shader. Comment Actions Thanks for your efforts. From several years I use this script named Link_Sky_to_Sun_Lamp.py by Oscurart and Greg Zaal: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wap2jimkud5dntv/link_sky_with_sun.py It works very well and could be of inspiration to you. This is the discussion where I got it: https://blenderartists.org/forum/archive/index.php/t-297721.html |