Introduction

Introducing Light Studio plugin for Blender. Based on a prototype by Maciek Ptaszynski and inspired by HDR Light Studio 5 lighting system.

Blender 2.80: We are currently rewriting everything from scratch for Blender 2.80. An early beta with lots of new features, will be announced soon.

Features

• Add/Remove lights around objects (0,0,0)
• Add unlimited number of lights
• Each light has options like intensity, color, scale, distance, etc.
• Easy 2D manipulation of light which translates to 3D positioning of light
• Realistic HDR light textures included
• Each light can have different light texture
• Toggle lights
• Isolate light
• Lights are selectable to use render layers
• 3D Edit operator - interactive light placement and adjustment:
  • [N] Normal of clicked object
  • [S] Scale light mesh
  • [G] Grab (meant to be used in rendered preview)
  • [R] Rotate
• Import/Export of light profiles

Authors

• Amin Babaeipanah
• Marcin Zielinski

Prototype and Initial Scene by

• Maciek Ptaszynski

Changelog

• 2.3.11:
  • Bugfix for profiles
• 2.3.10:
  • Bugfix for screen.redo_last
• 2.3.9:
  • Bugfix
• 2.3.8:
  • State of Selection Override is now stored between sessions
• 2.3.6:
  • Added empty for each profile for easy movement
  • Added copy profile to scene
  • Added auto refresh light textures
  • Light distance is animatable now
  • Fixed left click (partially)
  • Fixed blend autopacking
• 2.3.5:
  • Bugfix
• 2.3.4:
  • Bugfix for left-click selection
• 2.3.3:
  • Bugfix (light scale and rotation not exporting, profiles not copying correctly)
  • Button to easily fix broken texture paths

How to install

1. Open Blender and go to File -> User Preferences... -> Addons
2. Click on “Install from File...” and select “blender-light-studio.zip”
3. After installation, the new plugin should show up and you can enable it
   • If it doesn’t, search for “studio” and enable the plugin
4. Close “User Preferences...”
5. Go to the new tab called “Light Studio”
6. Click on “Create Light Studio”
7. Click on “Prepare Layout”
8. Start adding lights by clicking “Add Light” and moving them around using the new split viewport
9. Use the options for the selected light and light your scene
10. Happy Blending!

Known Issues

• In case of problems with left click selection, manipulators or overlapping selection please disable Override Selection checkbox under Misc. panel

Future ideas

• Add ability to export (render) the light setup as environment texture (Equirectangular Panoramic EXR)

Compatibility

Tested with Blender 2.79b stable build

Donors

Benjamin Gratia Chris Phyffer x2 Damir Simovski Dario Jaeger Jacinto Carbajosa Fermoso x2 John Podlesnik Krzysztof Czerwiński x5 Marc-André Gasser Matthew Moore MoonGorilla Karol Rządczyk Nathaniel Westveer Pan Jiaqing Paul Kotelevets Reinhard Kepplinger Roger Chamberlain Tiago Santos Victor Lin