Probably if you opened this video, you may
have wondered why your renders don't look as photorealistic as you expected. What many people
don't realize is that achieving photorealism isn't just about having a powerful PC; it's
about mastering the right techniques. In fact, it doesn't require as much effort as you might
think. I’ll show you the key points that allow you to achieve photorealism in Blender in this
simple example but it all applies to any project. I already made a video about realism in a blender
and then talked about one of the important things in realism - details. Realism requires small and
often overlooked elements. Imagine you’re creating a wooden table, like this one. It’s not sufficient
to simply apply a wood texture; you must also incorporate small scratches, subtle layers of
dust, and natural variations in the wood grain. The more details, the better results you will
get. That is why we can use megascans textures with normal maps and displacement. I apply
a normal map to give the surface depth. Bump maps simulate tiny bumps and grooves, making the
texture look and feel real. For added realism, displacement maps are also a great tool. They
create even finer details on the surface, enhancing the texture’s complexity. In Blender,
we may use displacement textures in different ways. If you need true displacement change
Displacement settings to Displacement only or Displacement and Bump. In this case, you
also need more dense mesh but you will get a really detailed surface or you may use
only a Bump. In this case, nothing happens with your surface but you still get realistic
details if you use light in the right position. It means to achieve photorealism we also
need Light. I talked a lot about light and have a separate playlist about light. You may find
it in the corner links. Lighting is crucial for photorealism. The right lighting has the power to
turn a simple scene into something extraordinary, emphasizing important details. It`s not enough
to just put the light into the blender scene, it is necessary to find a lighting
scheme to emphasize everything. You can use the classic Three-point
light system or find your own. Also, I often use HDRI light. HDRIs provide realistic
lighting by simulating how light interacts with the environment. You can find plenty of
free HDRIs online that suit different moods and settings. You have to play with light.
Trying to catch some glare on glossy surfaces, change the temperature of the light. The main
light may be a cold light but other warmer light and HDRI for ambient light. That brings
also a picturesque effect to your renders. Of course, to achieve photorealism we need
to set up our camera correctly. The key to achieving photorealism is understanding
how the real cameras work. In this case, I use a 50mm lens because it provides
a natural perspective, similar to what the human eye sees. And the magic lies
in this feature of the camera settings. Depth of field. Enabling depth of field in
the camera settings allows you to blur the background slightly. Even not only a background
it works for the foreground too. In a nutshell, it allows us to highlight focus point like
in the real camera. When you focus on target objects using a real camera everything in
front and behind the object is blurred. Adjusting the f-stop in the camera settings
controls how much of the scene is in focus. A lower f-stop value creates a deep effect
of depth of field, perfect for close-ups and emphasizing the main subject or character.
But try to avoid some unrealistic values. Would be better to work within real F-stop
values related to existing lens values. Post effects are what can turn everything
into a realistic picture. Using good textures, and light and adding some details we
can achieve realism but to get photorealism we need some post effect that will imitate
the photo, like it's not a 3d render or capture on a Mirrorless or DLSR Camera. In
a blender, we can use compositing to add all these effects and of course, here we can
do some post-production like color grading, to avoid spending a lot of time trying to set
up everything in 3d scenes we can do some small adjustments in order to bring the result
to perfect without using external programs. As I often said, Blender is enough for many tasks
to make the whole result inside Blender only. ---
In other words, photorealism is not in the ideal of everything, the less idyllic materials
the more natural they look to us. Also, in order to achieve photorealism, it is necessary to follow
the logic of working as a real camera, because the camera in the 3d program is deprived of all
those moments that are present in the real camera, like noise from lack of light. Do not confuse
it with the digital noise from lack of samples, It’s a different noise. Also, lens distortion,
the vignetting that appears with the optics. This is such a paradox, photographers constantly
try to get rid of all these artifacts, in order to get idyllic photos, but we as Digital Artists
have to recreate all these artifacts to get cinematic and photorealistic images. Because
the real camera follows the laws of physics, and the 3D camera is devoid of all laws
and works by algorithms. So it turns out that by default the pictures created
in a 3D environment do not look like a photo. That’s the reason why your renders
aren’t realistic because they are so perfect. In general, 3d artists have a good advantage
in front of photographers. We do not need to search for objects or create some situations,
or lights to create nice shots. Instead, we can do everything in 3d without a lot of
stuff. Believe me sometimes to find something with a camera in your hand is really hard. With
3d graphics, you don`t need even to go out to shoot something. But we have to remember that the
way to photorealism is in physical properties. In this way, it turns out
that to achieve photorealism, we need to get rid of the perfection of the
digital image. And that's a fact. Because it's the perfect 3D image that reveals the
fact that it's created on a computer. So, to achieve photorealism in 3D work, we need to
consider all these factors such as detailing, physical camera, lighting, and post-effects.
And the main answer to the question of whether we need a computer the size of a nuclear
reactor to achieve photorealism. No. It has more impact on the size of the scene you can
work with, but definitely not on photorealism.
