This page provides details on the Lens Effects tools available in V-Ray for Unreal.
Overview
The VRayLensEffects is a render effect plugin used to simulate bloom and glare lens effects by filtering the rendered image with a filter kernel. It uses a fast multi-threaded technique to compute the result. The options can be accessed through the V-Ray frame buffer with the Open lens effects settings button.
The Lens Effects window can be docked or undocked from the VFB by right-clicking the Open lens effects settings button.
Result Channel
When lens effects are applied, a new channel called effectsResult will be created in the VFB. The RGB Channel button allows users to easily toggle between the effectsResult and original RGB channel.
Bloom Effect
The controls in this group allow the user to control how the bloom effect is combined with their image render.
On – Turns on the bloom lens effect.
Fill edges – When enabled, adds pixel data outside the edges of the original image. This will remove the darkening around the edges.
Mode – Determines if the bloom will be applied to the RGB image, stored in a separate render element, or both.
Weight – Specifies the strength of the interpolation between the filtered image and the original image.
Size – Specifies the size of the filter as percentage of the image's width.
Shape – Specifies the fall off of the filter.
Bloom Mask
The controls in this group allow the user to control where the bloom effect will be applied to the image.
Intensity – When enabled, the bloom effect will be applied only around pixels that have a value larger than the number specified in the field to the right.
Object ID – When enabled, the bloom effect will be applied only to objects with the specified ID.
Material ID – When enabled, the bloom effect will be applied only to materials with the specified ID.
Object ID, as well as Material ID settings, are not supported yet by V-Ray for Unreal.
Glare Effect
The controls in this group allow the user to control how the glare effect is combined with their image render.
On – Turns on the glare lens effect.
Fill edges – When enabled, adds pixel data outside the edges of the original image. This will remove the darkening around the edges.
Type – Specifies how the glare is computed. The possible values are:
From image – Takes the image specified in Glare Image as filter kernel.
From render camera – Takes the necessary parameters from the camera used to perform the rendering and automatically generates the filter kernel.
Glare type from camera params – Takes the camera parameters specified in the VRayLensEffects render effect itself and automatically generates the filter kernel.
Mode – Determines if the glare effect will be applied to the final image, stored into a separate render element, or both.
Weight – Specifies the strength of the interpolation between the filtered image and the original image.
Size – Specifies the size of the filter as percentage of the image's width.
Glare Image – The path to the filter kernel. Available if From Image option is selected.
Turn on diffraction – Enables diffraction, producing colored patterns in the glare.
Use obstacle image – Enables the use of the obstacle image the path to which is specified in the connected textbox. The obstacle image allows you to draw the aperture shape as well as any dirt or scratches on the lens which will affect the glare.
Camera Parameters
These parameters are used if the Glare Effect type is set to Glare type from camera params. The options allow you to use physical camera settings that are different from the ones used to render the image and thus control the glare separately.
f-number – The f-number used to calculate the glare. Larger values produce smaller camera aperture and stronger glare effects.
Blades – Controls whether the camera aperture has any blades and, if so, how many. This effect directly controls the number of "rays" of the glare.
Blades rotation – Controls the rotation of the of the camera aperture blades.
Glare Mask
The controls in this group allow the user to control where the glare effect will be applied to the image.
Intensity – When enabled, the glare effect will be applied only around pixels that have a value larger than the number specified in the field to the right.
Object ID – When enabled, the glare effect will be applied only to objects with the specified ID.
Material ID – When enabled, the glare effect will be applied only to materials with the specified ID.
ObjectID, as well as Material ID settings, are not supported yet by V-Ray for Unreal.
Update Control
The options in this group allow you to control how changes to the bloom and glare effects are updated.
Hardware Accelerated – Enable to calculate lens effects on the GPU. When multiple devices are present, V-Ray will prioritize the best one available.
Interactive – When enabled, the bloom and glare effects will be automatically recalculated and applied to the image each time a parameter is changed.
Update effects – Allows you to manually force the recalculation of the glare and bloom effects when Interactive update mode is disabled.