Update Neutral Lighting environment (aesthetics)

[thomastgt]

Reference Issue

The update on the neutral lighting is to keep the lighting value on color chart closely consistent with the current neutral lighting, but reduce the big splash of specular highlights. See the comparison of the current neutral lighting versus new new adjustment.

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

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[elalish]

Can you give a little more detail on why this change is important? It feels a little arbitrary. Also, why have you changed from one light on the left to two?

[thomastgt]

Can you give a little more detail on why this change is important? It feels a little arbitrary. Also, why have you changed from one light on the left to two?

If you look at the chair example that's the most obvious, but partially observable on the mixer as well. The current neutral lighting (left) produces a broad wash of hot highlights, which I identified was caused by the backside of the area light (big piece). It's not visually pleasing or behavior of how material reacts to lights, per our production team experts. My solution is to break the light into two, reduce the size, move them bit further apart, which results in breaking up the big area of hot specular into smaller highlights, so the highlights are softer now (picture right). I then adjust all the light values to make sure the coloration and RGB values remain consistent to the current neutral lighting setup. Let me know if that makes sense to you.

[elalish]

Interesting, thanks. A couple things:

1. You changed the back and left from one light to two; why not the front and right sides? You'll have the same problem when you orbit the camera to the back.

2. Can we see some comparisons with a broader range of models? The two you show are both highly specular. On more matte objects I think the stronger directionality helps them look less flat. I'm a bit concerned about changing this as it's a breaking change (though I'm willing to be convinced). But I'd like to ensure this is making most objects look better, since lighting is often a tradeoff between different object types. After all, a photographer will tend to set up lights differently for different kinds of products.

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[thomastgt]

Hi,

Per request, the follow shows the comparison with more products.
Also, to the question "You changed the back and left from one light to two; why not the front and right sides? You'll have the same problem when you orbit the camera to the back." The default front camera view gives the first impression of the product as it's visualized, then the rest activity will be rotating the view around which is more dynamic. Therefore it's fine to have different lighting with one lights or two lights, as long as the color value is consistent. Also, the one area light versus two area lights provides interesting dynamic look: two sides with two lights setup, and the other two sides with one light setup...it's still methodical and purposeful.

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

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[elalish]

Thank you for the explanation and comparisons! I think I'm convinced now. I'm not sure why it's not picking up the CLA you signed last time; can you try to sign it again?

[felipe-chamas]

Hi,

Per request, the follow shows the comparison with more products.
Also, to the question "You changed the back and left from one light to two; why not the front and right sides? You'll have the same problem when you orbit the camera to the back." The default front camera view gives the first impression of the product as it's visualized, then the rest activity will be rotating the view around which is more dynamic. Therefore it's fine to have different lighting with one lights or two lights, as long as the color value is consistent. Also, the one area light versus two area lights provides interesting dynamic look: two sides with two lights setup, and the other two sides with one light setup...it's still methodical and purposeful.

I'm just wondering, any of the pictures you show are from the back face of the model?
I started using the neutral lighting for some models since it does not create a shadow on the back (which makes the same colors on different angles look different) and it does not look washed out as a not lit setup. My only problem with the current neutral lighting is the strength coming from above, which gets too bright on the top of reflective models. So I'm also worried splitting the light sources might bring the shadow I'm trying to avoid.
I wonder if this doesn't call for a more dynamic way of setting the lights instead of creating new setups or changing existing ones. E.g. the possibility to load an existing threejs scene to work as lighting background.

Edit:
Just to be clear about the dynamic lighting, I'm aware about HDR background setup, and my team is developing an HDR which looks the same as neutral lighting but less intense on the top, so there would be no problem in my project with your changes. It's just a suggestion if this is a recurrent issue on lighting as some people might want different setups.

[thomastgt]

I'm just wondering, any of the pictures you show are from the back face of the model?

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

I started using the neutral lighting for some models since it does not create a shadow on the back (which makes the same colors on different angles look different) and it does not look washed out as a not lit setup. My only problem with the current neutral lighting is the strength coming from above, which gets too bright on the top of reflective models. So I'm also worried splitting the light sources might bring the shadow I'm trying to avoid.

The strength from above for the reflective specularity is exactly what this fix is about. It's not coming from top per se, but from the back of the area light as I found out...so that's fixed in this PR. In addition, I double-checked the top light value to make sure the RBG value on color chart is consistent as the sides.

The front view: with the back wall's area light splits into two lights, you can see the top refection/ specularity is softened.

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

The back view: with the back wall's area light remains as a single area light, you can see the top refection/ specularity are the same (i.e. not softend)

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

the top view, the RGB values are same/ similar to the side faces.

current neutral lighting	new neutral lighting

[felipe-chamas]

@thomastgt, thanks a lot for the clarification and for the time spent on it!! With the pictures you've shown me, the use cases where my team would need a different HDR can be solved with this new setting

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[thomastgt]

@googlebot I signed it! From: googlebot ***@***.***> Sent: Monday, April 19, 2021 1:12 PM To: google/model-viewer ***@***.***> Cc: Thomas.Huang ***@***.***>; Mention ***@***.***> Subject: [EXTERNAL] Re: [google/model-viewer] Update Neutral Lighting environment (aesthetics) (#2249) Thanks for your pull request. It looks like this may be your first contribution to a Google open source project (if not, look below for help). Before we can look at your pull request, you'll need to sign a Contributor License Agreement (CLA). 📝 Please visit https://cla.developers.google.com/ to sign. Once you've signed (or fixed any issues), please reply here with @googlebot I signed it! and we'll verify it.

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[elalish]

At long last! Sorry for the delay; it was a bug in the CLA-bot.

[maciekglowka]

Great that it has been merged - been waiting for this! Thanks.
Will it be available on the next release? As a neutral-lighting-b or smth?

[elalish]

Yes, and it's a modification to the neutral lighting. While technically breaking, since the visual change is fairly small and it's a fairly new feature, we decided to allow it.

[maciekglowka]

Thank's for claryfing :)