Creating a Rim Light
Rim lights are used to create a silhouetting effect. They are created by positioning a light aimed at the current camera and positioning the main character of the scene between the light and the camera. The result is to highlight the outer rim of the character.

Using Underlighting
If you position the key light underneath the main figure and point it upward, you’ll get an unnatural effect that casts shadows upward much like holding a flashlight under a person’s chin. This lighting technique is often used in horror films to create a sinister, evil-looking character, as shown in Figure 7-2.

Using Light Color
Light color can dramatically change the mood of a scene. Warm colors such as yellow, orange, and red can create a feeling of warmth and excitement, but cool colors like green, blue, and purple denote a calmness and subdued mood.

Light color can also be used to establish where the scene takes place. Bright yellow lights are useful for daytime outdoor scenes, softer blue lights are good for creating moonlight, red and orange lights can create the glow of firelight, and white lights with a touch of blue are useful for simulating indoor fluorescent lights.

 

Establish 3-Point Lighting
1.         Open Poser with the default mannequin visible.

 

2.         Select the default light in front of the character and increase its intensity slightly.

3.         Select the back light and drag it so it points downward on the figure from above. In the Properties palette, disable Shadows for this light.

4.         Select the fill light to the side of the Light Controls and decrease its Intensity. Then disable its Shadows in the Properties palette.

The 3-point lighting design gives a good sense of depth and volume to the figure, as shown in Figure 7-3.

5.         Select File, Save As and save the file as 3-point lighting.pz3.

 Work With Lights 
If a scene contained no lights, none of the scene items would be visible when rendered, but Poser has three lights that are enabled by default. You can easily add more light sources to the scene. Poser works with four light sources[md]infinite lights, spotlights, point lights, and diffuse image-based lights (IBLs).

Learning the Light Types
Infinite lights shine from a distance so all its rays are parallel when they strike the scene objects. This causes all scene elements to receive an equal amount of light regardless of their distance from the light source. All objects that are lit by an infinite light will have parallel shadows.

Spotlights are focused, casting light only to those scene objects that are within the cone of influence; objects farther away receive less light than closer objects. Point lights cast light in all directions from a single point such as a light bulb or a candle in a room. Diffuse image-based lights (IBL) define the scene lighting by building an image of the scene that holds all the lighting information.

 When using point lights and diffuse IBL lights, realistic shadows can be computed only using raytracing.