Transcription: Experimenting Gobo Lighting W/ Maya

Today,I took some time to explore the lighting in my animation, being one of the things that will give extra information and create the atmosphere of the scenes. I want to have a clear idea how to achieve the wished look.
Last week, Phil mentioned gobo lighting and how I could use lighting and shapes to create a good range of distorted shapes in the scene, called gobo lighting.

So after reading some tutorials, I found that it is a really easy process to do in the maya world, however a lot of tweaking is needed at later stages.

Firstly I started to create an image with some random shapes in photoshop. After I set up my scene in maya, with some dummy objects a plane an a spotlight and then on the colour node of the spotlight added the image, with this technique the light projected by the spotlight is based on the painting I did.

1st result: 

Gobo Lighting Technique 1- Add image onto Spotlight

Although I liked the first result, something that was visible was the lack of blurring on the edges of the shadow, so I thought of another technique.

The 2nd technique I have used was instead of adding an image onto the spotlight colour node, i have actually created a plane with the image and transparency so the light would go through just like in real life.

 Despite looking really similar I really like the effect So I tried even further by adding colour to the light. 

Here is the coloured version.

Although it looked slightly better the edges were still too crisp, i know I could play with the filters, to create a more blurred light. However after presenting this problem to Alan. 

He simply gave me the advice of using the same technique but them blur the image in photoshop. 

So without further ado, I experimented it and it works just fine. 

1- Point Light Rig                              2-Point Light Rig

What is good about this technique is that I can simply create a gradient colour for the light and have different tones. 

I can't wait to try with it, for now here is the coloured version with this technique.

Finally,  just a note for the comments by Phil. I have been reading the comments. and indeed I will put the next animatic as polished as possible as I have now a clearer idea what I have to have and what not. Hopefully, the next one will receive a green light. 

That is my mission for tomorrow! For now I carry on modelling the character!

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