Review: Lumenrt3 - Reference Manual

3
|review
for sketchup
LumenRT3 Reference Manual
LumenRT 3 Reference Manual
e-on software, inc.
e-on software europe
6107 SW Murray Blvd, Suite 264
68 avenue Parmentier
Beaverton, Oregon 97008-4467 - USA
75011 Paris - FRANCE
Phone 866-3414-EON
Phone + 33 1 4314 2815
Fax 971-228-0354
Fax + 33 1 4355 3671
Web
www.e-onsoftware.com
Info
www.e-onsoftware.com/info
Support
www.e-onsoftware.com/support
Feedback
www.e-onsoftware.com/feedback
Trademarks
LumenRT 3, LumenRT 3 Review, Cornucopia, Cornucopia3d, "The Natural 3D Studio", "Natural 3D", "The Art of
Natural 3D", "Solutions for Natural 3D Environments" are trademarks or registered trademarks of e-on software, inc.
Windows, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7
are registered trademarks of Microsoft, Inc.
QuickTime, QuickTime VR, Mac, OS X, OS 9 are registered trademarks of Apple, inc.
Flash and Photoshop are registered trademarks of Adobe, Inc.
SketchUp and SketchUp Pro are registered trademarks of Google Inc.
All other product and brand names mentioned in this manual are used for identification purposes only. They may be
trademarks or registered trademarks, and, as such, remain the exclusive property of their respective holders.
Copyright
LumenRT 3 Program 2012 e-on software, inc. All rights reserved.
LumenRT 3 Documentation 2012 e-on software, inc. All rights reserved.
This manual, as well as the LumenRT 3 software described in it is furnished under a license agreement and may only
be used or copied in accordance with the terms of such license agreement. Information in this document is subject to
change without notice and does not represent product specification or commitment on the part of e-on software, inc.
Algorithms used inside this software were developed for visual performance only, and may not constitute a precise
simulation of real phenomena.
Warning: This software and the accompanying documentation are protected by U.S. copyright law as well as by
international intellectual property conventions. Any reproduction, sale, transfer, transcription, storage in a retrieval
system, translation into any language in any form or distribution by any means whatsoever of this software or
accompanying documentation, in part or in full, without the prior written permission from e-on software, inc. is
strictly forbidden. Any such act shall constitute a copyright violation and shall be prosecuted to the fullest extent of
the law.
Printed July 2012
Contents
Getting Started
WHATS NEW
Animated Digital Nature Content .......................................................................................7

Digitial Nature Content Pack..............................................................................................7
Fast Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion................................................................................7
REAL-TIME ARCHITECTURAL VISUALIZATION
KEY BENEFITS .......................................................................................................................10

KEY FEATURES ......................................................................................................................11
Immersive Media Experience Designs in Real-Time 3D................................................11
Digital Nature Enrich Designs with Animated Natural Elements..................................12
3D for Everyone Collaboration Made Simple................................................................12
TECHNICAL INFORMATION
13
SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS .......................................................................................................13

Pre-Processing Machine...................................................................................................13
Navigation/Viewing Machine............................................................................................13
INSTALLATION .......................................................................................................................14
Welcome ............................................................................................................................14
Desired Operation.............................................................................................................14
Software License Agreement .............................................................................................14
Required Dependencies.....................................................................................................14
Install Trial or Full ...........................................................................................................15
User Information...............................................................................................................15
Required Components .......................................................................................................15
Installation Type ...............................................................................................................15
Installation Progress.........................................................................................................16
ACTIVATION ..........................................................................................................................16
Full Product Activation during Installation......................................................................16
Transforming Your Trial Version into a Full Product ......................................................17
Activating the Content Pack for your Full Product...........................................................17
SUPPORT ................................................................................................................................17
UPDATING .............................................................................................................................18
LiveCubes
HOW IT WORKS
20
LUMENRT 3 WORKFLOW ..................................................................................................... 20

Export............................................................................................................................... 20
Pre-Process ...................................................................................................................... 20
Share ................................................................................................................................ 21
LUMENRT 3 LIMITATIONS .................................................................................................... 21
Model Size ........................................................................................................................ 21
Real World Units.............................................................................................................. 22
GETTING STARTED TUTORIAL .............................................................................................. 23
NAVIGATING THE LIVECUBE
27
Basic Navigation Controls ............................................................................................... 29

Extended Navigation Mode Controls ............................................................................... 29
GENERATING A LIVECUBE
33
LUMENRT 3 SKETCHUP PANEL ............................................................................................ 33

ANIMATION .......................................................................................................................... 41
SHARING THE LIVECUBE ...................................................................................................... 42
SAVING STILLS AND ANIMATIONS ........................................................................................ 43
MATERIALS .......................................................................................................................... 44
Water ................................................................................................................................ 44
Bump ................................................................................................................................ 45
Specularity........................................................................................................................ 45
Reflective Materials.......................................................................................................... 46
Texture Maps.................................................................................................................... 46
ANIMATED DIGITAL NATURE CONTENT ............................................................................... 47
Going Further
TUTORIALS
50
OPTIMIZING LARGE MODELS ................................................................................................ 50

MATERIALS .......................................................................................................................... 53
IMPROVING YOUR LIVECUBES
56
SKETCHUP MODELING AND SCENE OPTIMIZATION .............................................................. 56
Smoothing Curved Surfaces ..............................................................................................56

Add Wall and Floor Thickness ..........................................................................................56
Avoid Degenerate Faces ...................................................................................................56
Avoid Very Large Surface Areas.......................................................................................56
Eliminate Orphaned Geometry to Avoid Unusually Large Pedestals ...............................57
Use Groups, Components and Layers...............................................................................57
Use Real World Units........................................................................................................57
Use Fewer Polygons .........................................................................................................57
Export Only Part of the Scene...........................................................................................57
Add Thickness to Carpeting/Flooring ...............................................................................58
Keep Models above the Ground Plane..............................................................................58
Clean Ground Plane Intersections....................................................................................58
Use Planar Faces for Water and Glass Materials ............................................................58
Avoid Using Fake Reflection Maps for Transparent Materials ........................................59
Aim the Sun to Increase Interior Lighting.........................................................................59
Initial Camera Position Is First Scene Tab or Current Camera View ..............................59
Use Perspective Camera Views.........................................................................................59
Reduce the Number of Reflective/Transparent Materials .................................................59
TROUBLESHOOTING
60
Light Appears Around Wall Corners ................................................................................60

Dark Shadows Appear at the Bottom of a Wall or in Corners ..........................................60
Large Objects Going Through Others Seem to Have Wrong Lighting .............................60
Pre-Processing Takes Forever..........................................................................................61
Window Glass Is Blinking when Navigating in LiveCube.................................................61
Pedestal is too Big Compared to the Model......................................................................61
Playback Performance in the LiveCube is Slow or Choppy..............................................61
Some Faces Are Missing ...................................................................................................62
Flickering Polygons ..........................................................................................................62
Object Surfaces are not Smooth ........................................................................................62
Splotchy Looking Shadow Artifacts...................................................................................63
Water Material is not Rendering with Ripples or Caustics...............................................63
No Bumps (or Not Enough Bumps) on Objects .................................................................63
Noisy Looking Areas .........................................................................................................63
I Cant Find my LiveCube File .........................................................................................63
How Do I Launch the LumenRT 3 Application? ...............................................................64
How Do I Avoid Having my LiveCube Files Overwritten? ...............................................64
Animation Playback Pauses at Regular Intervals ............................................................ 64

Video Board Suddenly Not Supported.............................................................................. 64
Overly Saturated Indirect Light ....................................................................................... 64
Some Pictures Are Missing............................................................................................... 65
LiveCube Refuses to Run on another System.................................................................... 65
LICENSE AGREEMENT
66
Section 1
Getting Started
Whats New
Listed below is a description of the new features and capabilities within LumenRT 3.
Animated Digital Nature Content

New in LumenRT 3 is the addition of life-like Digital Nature which allows your designs to be
placed in a natural context surrounded by landscape elements (such as skies, vegetation, and
water) and objects and characters (such as cars, humans, and animals). Fully animated with natural
motions and behaviors, LumenRT 3 Digital Nature delivers a more inviting and engaging user
experience while adding clarity and context for a designs look and feel. Best of all, these Digital
Nature Elements are added as simplified components directly inside of Sketchup and are
automatically converted into high fidelity, fully animated objects in LumenRT.
Digitial Nature Content Pack

In addition to the sample Animated Digital Nature Content included in LumenRT 3, an extra
Digital Nature content pack is available containing hundreds of items including flying birds,
animated groups of characters, detailed cars and objects, a variety of backgrounds, and a large
vegetation library of trees, plants, and shrubs. The Digitial Nature Content pack is sold separately.
Fast Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion

LumenRT 3 now employs a Fast Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion Mode to generate real-time
ambient shadows. While not as high in quality as the higher quality LumenRT 3 baked
illumination, it produces very nice output in just seconds (using draft mode) with very nice looking
results.
Smooth Motion Setting to Soften Sketchup Animation

Sketchup camera animation paths can now be softened to produce more pleasing, life-like motion.
The amount of softening is completely user adjustable.
Large Model Improvements

The generation of large LumenRT 3 LiveCube models has been improved by providing greater
stability, performance, and optimization features. When exporting very large models, stability has
been improved by allowing an optimized process to export models that workaround Sketchups 32bit address space limitation. Also, larger models can be viewed in LumenRT with better interactive
performance on less capable graphics cards by adjusting the display quality up or down using the
F8 and F7 buttons respectively.
Quick Render Button for Fast Previewing

LumenRT 3 contains a separate Quick Render button, which will produce a draft LiveCube in
just seconds using the new Screen Space Ambient Occlusion lighting model.
LumenRT 3 LiveCube Enhancements

The interactive capabilities of LumenRT 3 LiveCubes have been enhanced with several new
features including sun lens flares, a new fly-through naviation mode (F4), and the ability to adjust
the display quality level up (F8) and down (F7).
Real-Time Architectural Visualization
LumenRT 3 is e-on software's revolutionary product for the visualization of architectural projects
in real-time 3D with photo-real illumination.
Thanks to LumenRT 3, architects no longer have to choose between high-quality images and realtime visualization: They can walk or fly through their designs and experience the true quality of
light in fully interactive 3D!
LumenRT 3 real-time environments can even be packaged into convenient, self-contained
executables that can be run on any computer without requiring additional software.
Designed to provide high fidelity visualization with accurate lighting, shadows and reflections,
LumenRT 3 is the ideal solution for:
Creating a virtual interactive showroom
Demonstrating and sharing design concepts
Visualizing 3D models in client presentations
Exposing your projects in fully real-time photo-realistic 3D
Key Benefits
LumenRT 3s output is fully interactive and will run on any computer without special viewing
software making it easy to share designs and collaborate with anyone.
High definition, photo-realistic 3D Viewing
Accurate lighting, shadows and reflections
Fast interactive 3D viewing performance
Runs on any machine no special viewing software required
Incredibly simple, push-button operation
Automated rendering output from SketchUp/SketchUp Pro.
Display greater details with accurate lighting and shadows
Share models with anyone effortlessly
Explore and interact with models in real-time
Gain deeper insights on model features and aesthetics
Create interactive 3D walkthroughs and presentations that will impress your clients
10
Key Features
Immersive Media Experience Designs in Real-Time 3D

LumenRT 3 is a next generation medium that extends traditional visualization and animation
capabilities into the realm of interactive experiences. Instead of just watching canned graphics
and animations, the client becomes part of the action by navigating and interacting with models and
scene elements. With features such as accurate natural lighting, real-time reflections, soft shadows,
and motion blur, designs are brought to life with vivid realism and breathtaking artistry. Key
Immersive Media features include:
Vivid, detailed realism
Accurate natural lighting and soft shadows
Real-time reflections and motion blur
Interactive exploration and navigation of designs
11
Digital Nature Enrich Designs with Animated Natural Elements

New in LumenRT 3 is the addition of life-like Digital Nature which allows your designs to be
placed in a natural context surrounded by landscape elements (such as skies, vegetation, and
water) and objects and characters (such as cars, humans, and animals). Fully animated with natural
motions and behaviors, LumenRT 3 Digital Nature delivers a more inviting and engaging user
experience while adding clarity and context for a designs look and feel. Key Digital Nature
elements include:
Wind and breeze animated vegetation
Natural motion characters and animals
Detailed objects
Animated water with caustics
High-resolution HDRI sky and background maps
3D for Everyone Collaboration Made Simple

With LumenRT, you dont have to be a rocket scientist or computer graphics guru to create
amazing results. In most cases, you can generate realistic, interactive scenes with a single mouse
click directly from your CAD system. There is no special application to learn. Instead, LumenRT
seamlessly transforms your designs into life-like immersive media that can be shared with anyone
without requiring any special viewing software. 3D for Everyone features include:
One-click processing directly from your CAD system
No special viewing software required
Runs on PC and Mac platforms
Works with the popular Architectural Solution Sketchup.
12
Technical Information
System Requirements
LumenRT 3 is a 32 & 64 bits application, designed for the Windows 32/64 bits XP, Vista and 7
as well as Intel Mac OS X platforms. A 64 bit system is highly recommended for authoring
LiveCubes (32 bit systems are fine for playback). LumenRT 3 is either CPU or GPU intensive
depending on the task being performed. The pre-processing phase is CPU intensive while the
navigation/viewing process is GPU intensive.
Performance of the software is directly related to the power of the system running it. LumenRT 3 is
optimized to make the best of all the processors/cores on your system. The power of your video
board directly impacts the frame-rate during real-time 3D play-back.
LumenRT 3 Review for SketchUp requires SketchUp 7 or 8 (free or Pro version).
Pre-Processing Machine
This is the machine on which you will export your scene from SketchUp. So basically it should be
able to run SketchUp, but you'll need a lot of power to process the scene so that it doesn't take ages
to compute.
Windows XP/Vista/Windows 7 32/64 or Mac OS X v10.6+ 32/64 (64 bit recommended)
nVidia GeForce 8800 or newer or ATI Radeon 4000+ or newer video board, with at least
512MB VRAM
2GHz Intel processor or faster (multi-core CPU recommended)
2GB of free RAM (4GB recommended)
4GB of free Hard Disk space.
Navigation/Viewing Machine
This is the machine on which you or your client will navigate and explore the model. The more
complex your model is, the more graphic power it will require.
Windows XP/Vista/Windows 7 32/64 or Mac OS X v10.6+ 32/64
nVidia GeForce 8800 or newer or ATI Radeon 4000+ or newer video board, with at least
512MB VRAM
2GHz Intel processor or faster
1GB of free RAM (4GB recommended)
200MB of free Hard Disk space.
13
Installation
The installation program, which is described below, is located on your installation DVD/download.
The initial start and updating the software is described separately.
Follow these steps to install LumenRT 3 onto your
computer:
Place the installation DVD into your computer's

DVD drive. It should auto-start (Windows) or its
symbol should appear in the Finder (Mac OS). If
not, open the DVD manually.
Double click the Install LumenRT 3 link on the

auto-start screen or double-click on the Setup
application file.
Welcome
Clicking on Next will take you to the Desired
Operation window.
Desired Operation
Select the version of LumenRT 3 that you want to
install: 32 or 64 bits.
Software License Agreement

Read the license agreement carefully. These terms must
be agreed to in order to continue with the installation.
Required Dependencies
LumenRT 3 will first install the required dependencies.
Press Next when this completes.
14
Install Trial or Full

Select whether you are installing the Trial Version or
the Full Verison.
User Information
Enter your Name and the name of your Company (if applicable).
If you are installing the full product, enter your Serial
Number. You can either type these into the
corresponding fields manually or copy and paste them
from an e-mail. If you enter the license numbers
manually, simply enter them as they appear in the
registration information including all digits and letters,
skipping the dashes. If you have received an e-mail
containing the license numbers, simply copy the entire
contents of the email and copy it into the first field.
Please note that this number is confidential, and should
not be communicated to third parties.
You will be asked for this serial number or your
product installation code to download data from our
website.
Required Components
You will have the choice of installing LumenRT 3 for
different version of SketchUp you have on your
computer. Select the location of your main SketchUp
application folder.
Installation Type
During the installation process, you will have the
choice of installing all of the software, or only parts of
it. Since only what is necessary is actually installed on
your hard-drive, we recommend you choose the
Typical installation mode.
The default target directories for the LumenRT
installation are prefilled. If you wish to install
LumenRT in a different location, you can change that
here.
15
Installation Progress
The installation can be canceled at any time as long as
the progress bar is visible by clicking on Cancel.
If the installation is canceled, the installation process
must be restarted completely, as described above.
Activation
Full Product Activation during Installation
If you are using a full commercial version of
LumenRT 3, you must activate the product before you
can start using it. When activation is required during the
installation process, a screen displays with two options:
You can choose to Automatically activate online.

This option attempts to connect to your e-on
software account and activate the product there.
You can choose to Activate the product manually.

Use this option if the machine you are running
LumenRT 3 on is not connected to the Internet. A
screen displays for you to copy or write down the
Installation Code (INST-) that you will need to
activate your software. You will then need to take
this code to another machine that has Internet
access to log into your account, enter your INSTcode.
When you go to your account page to activate, you will

receive an email with an activation key file attached.
Place this key file in a directory that gets backed up
frequently and is safe from accidental erasure.
The next time you are asked for the activation of your
LumenRT 3 product, choose to Activate the product
manually and click to locate the activation key file,
locate it on your hard drive and your product will finally
be activated.
16
Transforming Your Trial Version into a Full Product

If you are using a Trial version of LumenRT 3,
watermarks will appear over your exported LiveCubes
navigation window. These watermarks can be removed
by transforming your trial version into a full commercial
product. There are three ways to achieve this:
From within the host application, through its main

menu, by selecting Plugins | LumenRT 3 | Convert
to Full License
From the LumenRT 3 plugin window, by clicking

the Convert to Full License yellow banner.
From within a LumenRT 3 LiveCube: while

navigating, pressing F1 to display the main help
screen, and clicking the Convert to Full License
yellow banner.
You will then be able to either buy the full product of

your choice online (Standard or Content Pack Bundle),
or activate directly if you already have a full product
serial number. If you buy online, once you receive your
serial number, you shall then proceed with the Activate
Now option. When Activating, you will be asked for
your serial number, and the activation process becomes
similar to the one described in the previous section
during installation of the product.
Activating the Content Pack for your Full Product

If you are using a Full LumenRT 3 Review product license, but not a full Content Pack Bundle
product, you can get the content pack by proceeding as follows:
From within the host application, through its main menu, by selecting Plugins | LumenRT |
Get the Content Pack
You will then be able to either buy the content pack online, or activate it once you have bought it.
Support
If you experience difficulties installing or using the software, the first thing we recommend is that
you visit our website and read through the frequently asked questions to see if there is already an
answer to your problem in there.
If not, please visit www.cornucopia3d.com/forum.
17

As a registered client of e-on software professional products, you also benefit from the following
standard support services:
Phone-based installation troubleshooting for 90 days following your purchase,
Knowledge Base and Frequent Question resources,
Web-based Technical Support,
Registered User Forums,
Free Software Updates
Updating
No software is ever perfect. This is why e-on software regularly releases software updates through
its website. These updates can provide new features as well as bug fixes. Keeping your software
up-to-date by regularly downloading and installing these updates is recommended for optimal
performance.
LumenRT 3 updates can be downloaded at www.e-onsoftware.com and are accessible from your
account.
If you ever need to revert to a previous LumenRT 3 version after having installed an update, it is
possible from within the host application, through its main menu, by selecting Plugins | LumenRT
| Cancel Last Update.
18
Section 2
LiveCubes
19
How It Works
LumenRT 3 Workflow
The process for creating and sharing the interactive LumenRT 3 LiveCube is very simple and
straightforward. The workflow is divided into 3 basic steps: (see the illustration below):
Export
The export process transfers the model from SketchUp to LumenRT 3. This is done by using the
LumenRT 3 export plug-in located directly inside the SketchUp user interface. Invoking the plug-in
will automatically send the model complete with all geometries, materials, lighting, and animation
paths to the LumenRT 3 renderer.
Your computer may appear to lag while this process is performed. You can check the status bar at
the bottom of SketchUp to monitor the export progress (although SketchUp may freeze up
temporarily while the export completes). The export process is faster when you re-export a model
that was just exported.
You can export the entire model, or only part of it. If you wish to export only part of your model,
simply select the part to export and run the menu command Plugins | e-on software LumenRT 3 |
Export Selected.
Pre-Process
The pre-processing phase is what creates the actual LumenRT 3 LiveCube. In this step, LumenRT
3 computes the scene lighting and shadows and bakes this into the LiveCube to produce a vivid,
life-like 3D model.
This rendering step is very resource intensive and can range anywhere from several minutes to
several hours to complete depending on the computing platform, model complexity, and desired
output quality. We have tried to make the progress indicator as linear as possible, however, due to
the great differences in scenarios supported by LumenRT 3, this is not always possible.
20
Share
After the render process completes, LumenRT 3 creates the final LiveCube output (stored as a
folder in the Documents/e-on software/LumenRT 3 folder).
The LiveCube allows users to "walk-around" inside a 3D scene containing the high-fidelity model.
You can share LiveCubes with anyone on a Windows or Macintosh platform. To share a LiveCube,
simply publish it by pressing the Publish button in the help panel. You can share published
LiveCubes by sending the self-running executable file via email or ftp in the same way a selfextracting zip file can be shared. LiveCube recipients simply click the file and it runs automatically.
You can also export screenshots and canned animations from the LiveCube. This feature is not
available in the LiveCubes that you publish for sharing with clients. The animation path is based on
the camera motion that was setup in SketchUp.
LumenRT 3 Limitations
While LumenRT 3 is a very powerful and easy-to-use tool, there are practical limits to what it can
do in terms of its current functional capabilities as well as limits imposed by computing and
graphics hardware. Keep in mind the following when considering the usage of LumenRT 3:
Model Size
Models that contain more than 500,000 faces
(e.g. cities, models with lots of 3D vegetation
models) are not recommended for LumenRT 3
processing.
LumenRT 3 can certainly process large models
of any size, but chances are most graphics cards
will not be able to smoothly navigate the
LiveCube output unless a very high-end graphics
card is used.
For very large models, there is a chance that Sketchup might crash during the export process due to
Sketchups 32-bit addressing limitiation. If this happens, you can disable the Fast Export feature
(see page 334) which will then export the model using a slower, but more reliable method.
Also, the LumenRT 3 pre-processing time depends strongly on the total surface area of the model.
A warning will appear whenever you try to process models with a total surface area over 4,000
square meters (roughly 40,000 sq. ft.) as the time required to process such models may become
prohibitive. For very large scenes, you should consider using the Auto-scale lighting feature (see
page 33).
21
Real World Units

LumenRT 3 lighting is based on real world units.
To maximize realism and ease navigation, its
critical that models are built at the full real world
unit scale (e.g. 1:1 not 1:2 or 1:4).
22
Getting Started Tutorial

The best way to learn LumenRT 3 is to create your own LiveCube. This tutorial will provide a
quick overview of how to create your first LumenRT 3 LiveCube from SketchUp.
Step 1 First LiveCube

To start this tutorial, load the Getting Started
Tutorial/LumenRT
3
Tutorial
step
1/SketchUp/ LumenRT 3 Tutorial - step 1.skp
SketchUp scene from CD. This is a very simple
and crude model of a single-room house with a
pool. The scene was designed to show you how
you can easily create a LiveCube and then
improve its visual impact with a few simple
tricks.
First, we will export the model to LumenRT 3 to
see what it looks like. Click the LumenRT 3 icon
or select the menu command Plugins | e-on
software LumenRT 3 | Export Full Model. This
will bring up the LumenRT 3 interface where
you can select the LiveCube output quality and
environment. Select the Nice Weather
atmosphere, a Grass pedestal and set quality to
Full Lighting, then click Generate. LumenRT 3
will now export the model and then initiate the
pre-processing phase. This process is very CPU intensive but will run in the background so that you
can continue working on other tasks. Here, the model is very simple, so pre-processing and
generating the LiveCube should only take a couple of minutes.
When pre-processing is complete, the LiveCube will appear on screen. The initial start or home
position of the LiveCube will either be the first keyframe of the animation or the current camera
position of the scene if no animation is present. Click in the window to start moving around and
exploring the LiveCube. Press the left mouse button to walk forward. Move the mouse left and
right to look around. The F1 key displays the help menu and explains each of the navigation keys
and navigation modes. As you explore, notice how light flows in through the door and bounces
around the little room. In the next step, we will change the opaque blue window into a glass pane.
23
Step 2 Glass Window

Close the LiveCube and go back to SketchUp.
Select the window pane and assign it a blue glass
material from the standard materials. Because the
material has some transparency to it, it will be
identified as glass by LumenRT 3. Regenerate
the LiveCube. Tick the Overwrite Files
checkbox if you want to overwrite the previous
LiveCube, or untick it to preserve the previous
LiveCube (a version number will be
automatically appended to the new LiveCube
name). When the LiveCube launches, notice how
the window pane now appears as transparent
glass with realistic reflections. Notice also how
more light streams into the room through the
window. In the next step, we will turn the blue
surface in the pool into water.
Step 3 Water Pool

Go back to SketchUp and assign a material from
the water collection to the blue plane in the pool.
Any material with the word "Water" in it will be
identified as water and LumenRT 3 will
automatically add gentle ripple and caustic
effects. Generate the new LiveCube and check
out the water in the pool. If you want to speed up
the process, you can export your model in Draft
quality. Because this mode does not generate
indirect ligthting, the pre-processing phase is a
lot faster. Draft mode is very useful when you
want to fine tune your materials. In the next step,
we will improve the look of the tiles around the
pool.
24
Step 4 - Materials
First, we will add shininess to the tiles around the
pool. In SketchUp, bring up the LumenRT 3
Material Editor (Plugins | e-on software
LumenRT 3 | Edit Materials) and edit the tile
material by adding 20% Specular Amount and
30% Specular Shine. This sets specular highlights
to moderately high and shiny values. You can
check the result by generating a Draft quality
LiveCube. Notice the highlights on the pool tiles.
Now lets tweak the pool material further to
increase the "bumpiness" of the tiles. Using the
LumenRT 3 Material Editor, add a -100% bump to
the tile material to invert the bumps on the material
and increase the bump amplitude. Regenerate the
LiveCube. Using modifications like these, you can
customize the way your materials look in
LumenRT 3 LiveCubes. Once you are satisfied
with your materials, generate a Full Lighting or
better quality LiveCube to enjoy full quality
lighting.
Step 5 Add LumenRT Vegetation

Lets add a tree from the LumenRT content
collection. Open up the Sketchup component
window and navigate from the top level
Components folder to LumenRT | Plants | Acacia1 and then place the tree next to the pool.
Step 6 Time of Day

Now we will change the time of day to see how
this influences lighting. In SketchUp, adjust the
time of day to 7:15 AM and regenerate the
LiveCube. Notice how the amosphere of the scene
has changed because of the change in lighting.
25
Conclusion
Thats it!! You have created your first LumenRT 3 LiveCubes and learned how to improve the
looks of your materials. Now you can try generating LiveCubes of your own models. However, we
recommend you read on in order to get a better understanding of how LumenRT 3 works and how
to avoid common errors. If you run into any issues, please refer to the Troubleshooting section
page 60.
The next section will describe the navigation and viewing features of LumenRT 3 in greater detail.
26
Navigating the LiveCube

In LumenRT 3, the mouse is the primary device used to navigate the LiveCube in a manner similar
to walking through a 3D video game or orbiting inside a 3D application.
You can view a quick tutorial on navigating LiveCubes through the help pannel (F1 then click the
Navigation Tutorial button) or here: http://www.lumenrt.com/navigationtutorial.
LumenRT 3 offers four different navigation modes for viewing and exploring LumenRT 3
LiveCubes:
Walk-Thru Mode (the default mode, activated by
pressing the F3 key) is like a first person video
game. The user operates the mouse controls to
wander through the model as if he/she was
walking through the scene. Pressing the left
mouse button will cause the camera to walk
forward. You will see a small circle in the scene
as you walk which indicates the heading. The
speed of walking increases if you keep the mouse
button pressed. Simply release mouse button to
reset speed.
The camera is fixed to a height of 1.6 meters

above the ground (about the eye level of an
average-sized adult). You can move up or down
using the Page Up and Page Down keys. The
camera will revert to its standard height as soon
as you start walking again.
Walk-thru mode is sensitive to obstacles such as
walls which will halt movement (and display a
halt icon) until the user clicks and releases the
mouse to walk through the wall. Features such as
stairs will cause the movement to simulate
walking up or down the flight of stairs. Users can
move up or down to different floors by using the
elevator up/down keys to lightly fly up or down
to a different floor.
Orbit Mode (activated by pressing the F5 key)
operates very much like a typical 3D application
such as SketchUp. Controls such as pan, zoom
and rotation changes the camera viewpoint in the scene.
27

Fly-Thru Mode (activated by pressing the F4 key) allows you fly through the scene very quickly by
jogging the middle mouse button and pivoting the camera around by pressing thre left mouse
button.
Animation Mode (activated by pressing the F2 key) is an optional form of navigation that becomes
available if the SketchUp scene contains an animation path which is derived from the SketchUp
scene tabs. In this mode, the animation will begin as soon as the LiveCube is launched. Animation
mode also allows a slide show style of navigation similar to a PowerPoint presentation by moving
forward or backward to various scene snapshots using the arrow keys.
You can stop animation playback anytime by pressing the left mouse button which will switch to
walk-thru mode and start walking from where the camera is (and restore the default height).
Time of Day is adjusted by using the G and H keys to set the sun position to an earlier or later
time respectively. Please note that the time of day controls are only active if the LiveCube was
rendered using the Adjustable time of day option during export.
28
Basic Navigation Controls

The basic navigation controls are the first level set of controls. The LumenRT 3 control summary
displays each of the basic movements such as using the mouse to navigate.
Extended Navigation Mode Controls

The extended controls allow refined movements and operation according to the four navigation
modes:
Animation Mode
Walk-Thru Mode
Fly-Thru Mode
Orbit Mode
These extended controls are accessed by pressing F1 (More) from the Basic Navigation Controls
dialog.
Additionally, if the LiveCube was rendered using Adjustable Time of Day, the time of day controls
will appear on the extended controls help screen.
29

An exhaustive list of the LumenRT 3 navigation controls can be consulted online by clicking the
More Controls button on the help screen (F1). It corresponds to the listing included below.
Basic Controls
Key
Description
Help
F1
Displays the help screen.
Toggle FullScreen/Window Mode
Alt + Enter
This will toggle full screen or window

operating mode.
Exit
Esc
The escape key (esc) pauses operation of the

LumenRT 3 viewer window.
Return to Start
Home
The home key (home) will return the camera

to the start position.
Animation Mode
F2
This is the default startup mode when an

animation is present in the exported file.
Walk-Thru Mode
F3
Walk-Thru mode is the default mode for the

LumenRT 3 viewer when an animation is not
present.
F4
Quickly fly-thru the scene using the middlemouse button and pivot the camera side-toside and up-down using the left mouse
button.
Orbit Mode
F5
Orbit mode operates like a standard 3D

application where the camera can be placed
at any angle and height by panning, zooming
and rotating.
Screenshot
F6
Generates an instant screenshot of the current

viewport at full quality, and saves the picture
within the export folder.
Display Quality
F7/F8
Pressing F7 reduces display quality while

pressing F8 increases display quality.
Fly-Thru Mode
Online Help
30
Online Help
on-screen button
Goes to the LumenRT Website.
Publish
Save Animation
Publish
on-screen button
Save Animation
on-screen button
Publishes the LumenRT 3 LiveCube as a

self-executing compressed file suitable for
sharing with others.
Generates a canned animation file of the

camera movement inside the LumenRT 3
LiveCube.
Animation Mode
Controls (F2)
Key
Description
Pause
Space
Tapping the space bar will pause the

animation.
Previous/Next Keyframe
Left/Right Arrow
Keys
Use the left/right arrow keys to jump to

specific keyframes.
Start/End
Home/End
Go to the animation start/end.
Switch to Walk-Thru
Mode
Left mouse
Click the left mouse button to switch into

walk-thru mode.
Walk-Thru Mode
Controls (F3)
Key
Description
Look Right/Left
Mouse Left/Right
Moving the mouse left/right with no buttons

pressed orbits the camera.
Walk
Mouse Down Left
Left mouse down hold walks forward.
Run Forward/Backward
Middle Mouse
Button
Shuttle the middle mouse button to run

forward or backward.
Pan Right/Left
Left/Right Arrow
Use the right/left arrows to move sideways.
Elevator Up/Down
Page Up/
Page Down
Press and hold the page up/page down keys

to jump to another floor above or below
release the keys when you are above the
desired floor.
Key
Description
Look Right/Left
Left Mouse Down

Move Left/Right
Pivots the camera around horizontally.
Look Up/Down
Left Mouse Down

Move Up/Down
Pivots the camera around vertically.
Fly-Thru Mode
Controls (F4)
31

Run Forward/Backward
Middle Mouse
Button
Shuttle the middle mouse button to run

forward or backward.
Pan Right/Left
Left/Right Arrow
Use the right/left arrows to move sideways.
Raise/Lower Camera
Height
Page Up/
Page Down

to raise and lower the height of the camera.
Orbit Mode Controls
Key
Description
Orbit Right/Left
Mouse Down Left
Hold and drag the left mouse button to orbit

around the scene.
Zoom In/Out
Middle Mouse
Button or
Up/Down Arrow
Shuttle the middle mouse button to zoom in

and out. Alternatively, you can use the
up/down arrow keys.
Pan Right/Left
Left/Right Arrow
Use the right/left arrow keys to pan

sideways.
Raise/Lower Camera
Height
Page Up/
Page Down

to raise and lower the height of the camera.
Time of Day Controls
Key
Description
Earlier/Later
G/H
Press G or H to move the sun to an

earlier/later time respectively.
32
Generating a LiveCube
LumenRT 3 SketchUp Panel
To export a model as a LumenRT 3 LiveCube, go to the
SketchUp Plugins menu and select e-on Software
LumenRT 3 | Export Full Model or Export Selected and a
LumenRT 3 dialog will appear. Each of the dialog export
options are described below:
Sky: This selects which type of Sky/Atmosphere to use.
See the Sky Atmosphere Options discussion below for
more details about each atmosphere.

Adjustable Time of Day: When this option is checked,
LumenRT 3 will generate a clear blue sky atmosphere with
a dynamic sun, allowing you to change the time of day in
the Live Cube using the G and H keys. The sun
position is calculated from the actual time zone, date and
geo-position used in the Sketchup model.
Horizon: This selects which type of distant background
will be used. If none is selected, the scene will use an

infinite flat horizon.
Quality: Indicates which of 5 quality settings to use. Draft
generates a fast preview in under a minute. Standard creates a higher quality output with basic
shadows. Full Lighting quality generates a fast (typically 15 minutes depending on system
performance and scene complexity) medium quality output suitable for test viewing. Superior
generates a nice high quality output and takes about an hour. Extreme generates the highest quality
output and can take two hours or more.
Start: After making your selections, hit the big Start button to begin the export and render process.
Export Options Panel

Clicking the wrench icon button will invoke the LumenRT
Export Options panel which contains several additional
settings:
Pedestal: This selects which type of ground plane to use
underneath the model. If none is selected, the model will
simply lay on top of an infinite ground plane.
Smooth Motion: Indicates the degree of smoothing ranging
from 0% (no smoothing) to 100% (fully smoothed) to apply
to Sketchup animation paths exported into LumenRT. A
33

smoothed animation path will generally appear more natural than the standard linear Sketchup
animation path.
Adaptive lighting: This option becomes available when using a non-draft quality level. It is useful
for improving the performance of lighting calculations on large models (e.g. models greater than
4,000 square meters or 40,000 square feet) with a tradeoff of reduced quality. When checked, the
internal scale of the model is reduced to accelerate the lighting calculation and the result is rescaled
back to its original size. The quality of the lighting produced will obviously be lower, but in many
cases, the quality of the result remains acceptable.
You should not use this option for models that require a strong discrepancy in lighting quality, as
the overall quality of the lighting will probably be reduced too strongly on the parts where quality
is an issue (for instance, rendering a building with a large surrounding garden while quality will
be perfectly acceptable for the garden, lighting inside the building may suffer dramatically).
Fast export: This option only appears on Sketchup Windows platforms.
When checked, this

option increases the performance of the Sketchup model export and works well for models
containing less than 200,000 faces. For models exceeding 200,000 faces, or for models that
consume a great deal of memory (e.g. greater than 500 MB), or for any model that causes
Sketchup to crash due to out-of-memory errors, unchecking this option improve export stability at
the expense of speed (about 50 percent slower to export). The option should only be unchecked on
very models that exhibit crashing problems when exporting from Sketchup.
Overwrite Files: Checking this box will direct LumenRT 3 to overwrite previously existing
LiveCube folders with the same name. If unchecked, LumenRT 3 will create a new LiveCube
folder incremented by a numbered suffix (e.g MyModel_01).
34
Sky Atmosphere Options

The sky options set the type of atmosphere used to render the LiveCube scene. Each option
contains a sky map which sets the appearance of the sky (e.g. clear, cloudy, etc) and the intensity of
the direct lighting shadows produced by the sun.
In LumenRT 3, there are two types of light. Direct lighting, also known as diffuse light, is light
produced directly from the sun and typically produces dark shadows -- for example, the shadows
on the ground where a wall obstructs the sun.
Indirect lighting, also known as ambient light, is light that is reflected off of surfaces in the scene
and produces very faint shadows for example, the shadows you see in the corners of a room
interior.
LumenRT 3 produces output that contains both direct and indirect lighting. Brighter, sunnier
atmospheres contain higher percentages of direct light and produce darker shadows than cloudier or
neutral atmospheres which produce very faint direct shadows.
Adjustable Time of Day: When this option is checked, LumenRT 3 will generate a clear blue sky
atmosphere with a dynamic sun, allowing you to change the time of day in the Live Cube using the
G and H keys. The sun position is calculated from the actual time zone, date and geo-position
used in the Sketchup model.
35

Bad Weather: Thick, gray cloudy sky with a mostly ambient atmosphere. This atmosphere
produces very light direct shadows.
36

Blue Sky: Bright blue clear sky with no clouds. Direct shadows are very strong.
Neutral White: Plain white atmosphere for a showroom type look. There are no direct lighting
shadows produced.
37

Nice Weather: Cloud filled sunny summer sky with dark direct lighting shadows. Beautiful puffy
clouds cover the sky.
38
Pedestals
Pedestals provide a platform on which the SketchUp models rest in the LiveCube scene. The
pedestals also show any direct ground shadows cast by the scene model. To eliminate ground
shadows, or if your model already includes some form of base, you can select the No Pedestal
option.
Asphalt: Parking lot material on a square pedestal.

Grass: Green grass on a square pedestal.
Sandy: Sand material on a square pedestal.
White: Plain white material on an octagonal pedestal.
Difference in Export Rendering Quality

LumenRT 3 offers a choice of rendering mode thresholds which vary by the degree of rendering
quality offered and the amount of time needed to complete the render. In general, you should
choose a rendering quality level that will deliver the quality you need with the least amount of
rendering time.
There are five export rendering quality modes available in LumenRT 3:
Quality Mode
Rendering Time
Indirect Lighting/Shadow Quality
Draft
Under 1 minute
Fast screen-space occluded shadows
Standard
~ 5 minutes
Fast screen-space occluded shadows
Full Lighting
~ 15 minutes
High quality with indirect lighting
Superior
~ 1 hour
Superior lighting quality
Extreme
Very slow
For complex scenarios
Rendering time is an approximate time for a 100K face model running on a quad-core 3 GHz machine.
39

Draft quality generates a very fast preview that will render in under a minute. It contains fast screen
space ambient occluded shadows. Draft mode is very useful as a quick test render, particularly for
checking animation paths, the direction and intensity of direct lighting from the sun as well as
material options. In most cases, you will not want to distribute Draft quality renders to others.
Standard generates a fast, quality render using an occluded indirect lighting calculation for
shadows. This is the primary, final quality mode used for scenes which have the adjustable time of
day switch enabled. Standard mode quality renders will complete in around 5 minutes depending
on scene complexity and the power of your system.
Full Lighting generates a medium quality render that will complete in 15 minutes or less depending
on scene complexity and the power of your system. It contains full indirect lighting and shadows
that may appear rough or splotchy in some cases. Full Lighting quality will work just fine for many
final productions, particularly for outdoor or exterior renders.
40

Superior generates a high quality render that will complete in around 1 hour or less depending on
scene complexity and the power of your system. It contains high quality, smooth indirect lighting
and shadows.
Extreme generates a very advanced lighting simulation that should be reserved for difficult lighting
scenarios where artifacts appear in the other modes (for instance, when no direct light penetrates
the volume).
In most cases, you will never need to use this rendering mode unless you have a complex indoor
scene with lots of indirect lighting and no direct light.
The pre-processor automatically generates a log file that is placed in the same folder as the
LiveCube, inside the Scene sub-folder. The file is called LumenRT.log.
Animation
Animation in LumenRT 3 allows full motion
replay of a predefined camera animation path.
This is very useful when you want to include a
showroom style or kiosk type of guided walkthru. In addition, the sun position is fully
animatable which allows the creation of time-ofday renders.
Animation paths are created in SketchUp by
using SketchUp scene tabs and setting the
associated animation path properties. Each scene tab in SketchUp represents a single camera key
frame. When aggregated together, the scene tabs create a full-motion camera animation path.
41

For more information on how to create scene tabs and animation paths in SketchUp, please visit
http://sketchup.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=151692
If the SketchUp model contains scene tabs, LumenRT 3 will automatically create an animation path
derived from these tabs in a fashion similar to how SketchUp creates animations. The animation
timing and hold frames are controlled by whatever timings are used in the SketchUp model.
The animation path created in LumenRT 3 is a close approximation of the actual SketchUp
animation path although there may be some minor differences. Using the Smooth Motion
LumenRT option setting will generate a smoother, more natural looking animation path.
The initial start or home position of the LiveCube will either be the first keyframe of the
animation or the current camera position of the scene if no animation is present.
You can save the camera animation by clicking the Save Animation button in the Help panel (see
page 43).
Sharing the LiveCube

The process of sharing LiveCubes with clients and coworkers is very simple and straightforward. It does not
require any special viewing software or even a copy of
LumenRT 3. Instead, a compressed, self executing copy
of the LiveCube is created which is capable of being
shared with anyone on a PC or Mac platform
The compressed, self-executing file is very similar to a
self-extracting zip file. By simply clicking on the file, the
LiveCube will run automatically (you need to manually
unzip the file on the Mac platform).
The source LiveCubes are found in your Documents/e-on software/LumenRT 3 folder. Click the
LumenRT 3.exe icon to run the LiveCube.
To create a sharable LiveCube, select the Publish option button from the LumenRT 3 help screen
(Key F1). This will save the compressed file to a location of your choice. You can select the target
42

platform for the LiveCube from the drop-down box (Windows LiveCube, Mac LiveCube or both).
Then, just e-email or FTP the shareable LiveCube to anyone you wish.
Also, as useful aid to help your clients understand how to navigate inside the LumenRT 3
LiveCube, you can provide them with the following video link:
http://www.lumenrt.com/navigationtutorial
Adding Your Logo over a Published LiveCube Splash Screen

To add a custom logo in a published LiveCube, add a corresponding jpeg image file named
UserLogo.jpg to the root of your exported source LiveCube folder (next to the LumenRT 3
launcher file), located in Documents/e-on software/LumenRT 3. This has to be done before
clicking the Publish button from the LumenRT 3 navigator help screen. This will add your logo to
the published LiveCube splash screen upon start.
Saving Stills and Animations

LumenRT 3 lets you capture screenshots of the LiveCube anytime simply by pressing the F6 key.
The screenshots are automatically anti-aliased and saved as Jpeg files in the LiveCube folder.
Screenshots are automatically numbered in sequence.
You can also save a canned animation file of the LumenRT 3 camera animation. This file can then
be played back in any animation player. The movement is based on SketchUp camera views and
delays (see above section on Animation, page 41).
You can export the camera animation as a .AVI (on Windows) or .MP4V (on Mac) animation file.
To generate the animation file, simply press the Save Animation button in the Help panel (press F1
to display this panel). Select the destination file from the File Selection dialog and press Save to
save the animation file. Each frame will be sequentially rendered, anti-aliased and saved into the
animation file. Depending on the duration of the animation and the power of your system, this
process may take a while.
43
Materials
Materials are one of the primary factors for making a scene in LumenRT 3 look good. Using the
right texture maps along with the proper material settings can dramatically improve the appearance
and increase realism.
LumenRT 3 material modification takes place directly
inside of SketchUp using the LumenRT 3 Material Editor.
Materials are either treated automatically (in the case of
water and transparent materials) or by setting material
properties as attributes using the LumenRT 3 Material
Editor. The LumenRT 3 Material Editor is accessed by
going to the Sketchup menu Plugins | e-on software
LumenRT 3 | Edit Materials.
The LumentRT Material Editor contains all of the active
materials used in the Sketchup model. Each material is
accessible from the Material drop-down
control or by using the LumenRT 3 Material
Picker to select materials from objects in the scene.
Listed below describes how materials are treated and adjusted for LumenRT 3.
Water
Water materials are designed
to render materials for
objects such as pools, ponds,
and fountains.
Any material containing the
string Water (not case
sensitive) in the SketchUp
material name or has the
Water property checked in the LumenRT 3 Material Editor will create a
pulsating, water ripple effect in LumenRT 3.
For example, a material with the name BlueWater will have the
LumenRT 3 water effect applied automatically. The water produced in
LumenRT 3 will also contain nice reflections increasing realism, but also taxing overall
performance.
44
Bump
Bump adjusts the amount of bumpiness at the
surface of the material. The bigger the value, the
bumpier the surface.
Bunp values can range from -900% to +900% in
the LumenRT 3 Material Editor. LumenRT 3
automatically creates a grayscale version of the
color map to generate the bump.
Positive values will make the bump appear above
the surface while negative values will make the bump appear below the surface.
SketchUp materials starting with the name Stone, Brick or Roofing will have a bump of 5%
applied.
Specularity
Specularity describes the surface quality of the
material (shiny or dull). The specular highlights
create spots of light on the surface of the object,
in the direction of the light sources. The
smoother the surface, the more concentrated and
bright the spots will be (e.g., think of polished
marble). The highlights are built with two
parameters: the intensity of the light spots that
appear on the surface and the size of the spots.
To add specular highlights to a material such as a shiny metal material, there are two settings that
must be set.
1. Specular Amount sets the intensity of highlights. 0%
indicates no specularity while a value of 100% indicates
very intense speculat highlights.
2. Specular Shine sets the sheen of the specular highlights.
1% indicates very dull highlights while a value of 100%
signifies a very shiny material.
Listed below are common settings for a variety of
materials:
StainlessSteel: Amount=50% Shine=60%
Plastic: Amount=25% Shine=20%
Wood Floors: Amount=30% Shine=50% creates a wood
floor with a nice waxy sheen
45
Reflective Materials
Reflective materials include objects such as glass
and mirrors.
Any material that contains some level of
transparency (e.g when the SketchUp material
opacity is less than 100%) will contain some
degree of reflectiveness. This will produce realtime reflections in LumenRT 3 such as the sky
reflecting on a pane of glass. In LumenRT 3, the
Index of Reflectiveness (IOR) is set to a default
value of 1.6 (glass) for all reflective surfaces.
Mirror surfaces are set for any material
containing the name mirror (not case sensitive)
in the material name.
Alternatively, the LumenRT 3 Material Editor
can be used to set Mirror or Glass materials by
checking their respective properties.
Texture Maps
For materials that use texture maps, make sure
that there is sufficient resolution in the map. A
good rule of thumb is that maps should at least
have a dimension of 256 x 256 pixels. Also, to
improve performance, avoid using texture maps
that are larger than 1024 x 1024.
46
Animated Digital Nature Content

One of the most important new features in LumenRT 3 is the ability to surround models with rich,
high fidelity content that breathe life into your designs. Listed below are examples of the six
categories of animated content available with LumenRT 3 and LumenRT 3 Content Pack.
Animals
From dogs and cats to flying birds LumenRT 3
offers a rich variety of animals to populate your
scenes with fully animated walk paths and natural
movements.
Buildings
Many simplified buildings offered in a variety of
shapes ands sizes make great filler for midrange
and background scenery.
People
Dozens of fully animated characters sitting,
standing, walking, and talking will help bring
your scenes alive. Characters are arranged
individually, in pairs, and small groups.
Plants
Fully breeze animated trees and shrubs add a
realistic visual context for your models. Choose
from dozens of species and varieties in the
LumenRT 3 Content Pack (sold separately).
These plants are added as low poly models into
the Sketchup scene but are automatically
transformed
into
their
high
resolution
counterparts in LumenRT.
47
Vehicles
Add cars and trucks to the scene. Choose the
exterior color or let LumenRT 3 choose a random
color.
Cyclorama Backgrounds
Cycloramas provide midrange and background
fill by encircling the entire scene with an alpha
plane. They are quite useful for adding dense
looking backdrops without taxing performance.
48
Section 3
Going Further
49
Tutorials
Optimizing Large Models
When creating LumenRT 3 Live Cubes, its important to ensure that SketchUp models are fully
optimized for efficient rendering and navigation performance. This tutorial demonstrates how to
optimize models containing a large number of faces and components for use with LumenRT 3. The
key optimization factors involve the effective use of layers and hiding unnecessary geometries and
components.
You can follow along with this tutorial by downloading the demonstration model Big House by
master SketchUp modeler Andres from the 3D Google Warehouse.
Step 1
Load the model into SketchUp.
Step 2
Examine and interrogate model info by displaying the model information window Window |
Model Info. Notice that this is a large model with over 100K faces which translates to well over
500K polygons (faces are exported as triangle polygons in LumenRT 3). The large poly count
indicates that this model may experience rendering and navigation performance issues in LumenRT
3. So lets try and optimize this model a bit.
50
Step 3
Purge the model of any orphaned
components and materials by clicking the
Purge Unused button on the Model Info
window. This will clean up the model by
getting rid of any unused component
definitions and materials. Also, there is a
very useful free Sketchup plugin called
CleanUp located in the Sketchucation
Plugins forum:
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.p
hp?f=323&t=22920
This plugin will do a more thorough cleanup
of the model and reduce unnecessary items.
Step 4
This model contains very high poly trees and
vegetation where the object components such
as leaves are modeled as separate
geometries. This will obviously cause a
major increase in the polycount. Our choices
here are to replace the vegetation with
LumenRT plants which will automatically
convert into high performance animated
objects in LumenRT or to use billboards. In
this case, we will replace the high-poly plant
models with LumenRT plant objects.
Step 5
Turn off any other unnecessary layers and
hide unnecessary components/geometry. In
this case we are going to hide the interior
furniture and replace the high poly cars with
LumenRT Car objects.
51
Step 6
Check for any stray geometry by zooming
the model to fit the viewable area (right click
Zoom Extents). The model should fit nicely
in the viewable area. If the model does not
fully zoom up, then you have some stray
geometry in the scene. Either delete or hide
the stray geometry.
52
Materials
Materials are a key factor for making
high quality scenes in LumenRT 3.
Using the right texture maps along
with the proper material settings can
dramatically improve the appearance
and increase realism.
You can follow along with this
tutorial
by
downloading
the
demonstration model Gables House
with Interior by master SketchUp
modeler BmrCT from the 3D Google
Warehouse.
Step 1
Load the model into SketchUp. This
model (which has been slightly
modified with the addition of a pool) contains a nice variety of materials including brick, wood,
water, glass, and stone.
Step 2
Do a quick test render in LumenRT 3
by exporting the model using draft
quality Plugins | e-on Software
LumenRT 3 | Export Full Model and
then select Draft quality.
While the quality of the lighting and
shadows is low in draft mode, you
can still get a good idea of what each
material will look like.
53
Step 3
Examine the model in LumenRT 3
and take note of the appearance of
each material. Does it look right? Do
the materials need bump or specular
highlights added? Do the glass and
water materials look correct?
After making some mental notes,
return to SketchUp to edit and
enhance the materials.
Step 4
Brick and Stone materials are automatically preset in LumenRT 3 to contain a small amount of
bump (5%). In this case, we will increase the
exterior Brick bump amount to 15% which will
provide sharper details and reliefs.
Step 5
Select the brick material in the LumenRT 3
Material Editor (Plugins | e-on software
LumenRT 3 | Edit Materials). Increase the brick
bump amount by entering 15 into the Bump value
box.
Step 6
Shiny materials such as plastic and leather will
look more realistic by adding specular highlights.
In this case, we add specular highlights to the
leather seats in the living room. Select the Red
Leather material and lets add 30% specular with
a shine of 50%.
54
55
Improving Your LiveCubes

SketchUp Modeling and Scene Optimization
While LumenRT 3 can process any type of SketchUp model, its important to adhere to proper
practices when constructing models in order to achieve optimal results. In general, if models are
well constructed in SketchUp (e.g. air tight models, properly joined components, etc), then they
will look good in LumenRT 3.
Listed below are several tips for creating your models in SketchUp in order to optimize the final
result in LumenRT 3.
Smoothing Curved Surfaces

In SketchUp, all curved surfaces appear with
some level of smoothing applied. However, these
surfaces will appear to be unsmoothed in
LumenRT 3 unless they are converted into
groups or components. If you run across any
condition as shown in the figure below, convert
the object into a component or group to ensure
that smoothing is properly applied.
Add Wall and Floor Thickness

Adding thickness to walls and floors will
improve the quality of shadows and light,
especially for interior renders. If walls or floors
are constructed primarily of single planar faces
with no thickness, lighting artifacts such as light
leaks may occur.
Avoid Degenerate Faces

Avoid overlapping faces or putting two faces
together with opposite normals or else LumenRT
3 will remove one of the two faces.
Avoid Very Large Surface Areas

Because LumenRT 3 computes indirect lighting
over the entire model, if your model
encompasses large surface elements such as
roads, parking lots, gardens, etc. the processing
time will become extremely long as LumenRT 3 computes lighting for these elements.
56

A warning will automatically be displayed during processing if the surface area of your model
exceeds 4,000 square meters (roughly 40,000 sqft). While LumenRT 3 is perfectly capable of
handling large surface areas, you can greatly speed up the processing by not including large
unecessary elements.
Eliminate Orphaned Geometry to Avoid Unusually Large Pedestals

Delete or clean up all orphaned geometry or else the pedestal
will be way too big in the scene compared to the model and
processing times will suffer.
Use Groups, Components and Layers

Keeping your model well organized by using groups,
components, and layers provides greater ease and flexibility
when deciding which sections of the model to export. Also, it's
generally better to separate each part of the model in order to
remove or change materials easily.
Use Real World Units

LumenRT 3 lighting is based on real world units.
To maximize realism, its critical that models are
built at the full real world unit scale and
proportions (e.g. 1:1 not 1:2 or 1:4).
Use Fewer Polygons

Hiding unnecessary layers and getting rid of
unneeded geometry will help to reduce the model
size and improve overall interactive performance.
There is a very useful free Sketchup plugin called CleanUp located in the Sketchucation Plugins
forum:
http://forums.sketchucation.com/viewtopic.php?f=323&t=22920
This plugin will do a very thorough cleanup of the model and reduce unnecessary items.
Export Only Part of the Scene

LumenRT 3 only exports visible layers and nonhidden geometries so switching layers off and
hiding geometries will reduce the model size
upon export. Also, there is an option under the
LumenRT 3 Plugin Export menu in SketchUp to
export only a selected portion of the model for a
more concise and efficient export.
57
Add Thickness to Carpeting/Flooring

Carpets and floors will look better in LumenRT 3
if they have a bit of thickness (1cm is a good
thickness for example).
Keep Models above the Ground

Plane
Everything should be modeled above the
SketchUp ground plane. Anything below the
ground plane will not be visible in LumenRT 3.
Clean Ground Plane Intersections

Avoid polygons that penetrate far underneath the ground plane. This can result in bad looking
shadows around the intersecting corner or edge.
Use Planar Faces for Water and Glass Materials

For a swimming pool, lake, or any water plane,
use a planar face, and not a cube. Applying water
to a cube or other non single plane object may
produce odd results (double reflection, photons
going through the floor, etc). The same is true
when creating a glass or window surface -- it is
better to have a single planar face instead of a
cube.
58
Avoid Using Fake Reflection Maps for Transparent Materials

Do not simulate reflection on glass with maps.
LumenRT 3 will handle reflections automatically
for
any
material
that
contains
transparency/translucency (i.e. materials that are
not fully opaque).
Aim the Sun to Increase Interior

Lighting
Aim the sun to have light enter any rooms
through windows for a more dramatic effect.
Initial Camera Position Is First

Scene Tab or Current Camera
View
When exporting from SketchUp to LumenRT 3,
the initial start or home position of the
LiveCube will either be the first keyframe of the
animation or the current camera position of the
scene if no animation is present.
Use Perspective Camera Views

LumenRT 3 uses real world perspective cameras
so its important to use perspective cameras in
SketchUp as well. SketchUp parallel or two-point
perspective cameras will not look right in
LumenRT 3.
Reduce
the
Number
of
Reflective/Transparent Materials
Reducing the number of reflective and/or
transparent materials will also improve
interactive performance since these types of
materials are very GPU intensive.
59
Troubleshooting
For the latest information on troubleshooting and solving LumenRT 3 issues, please visit the
LumenRT 3 and Architectural user forums at http://www.cornucopia3d.com
Listed below is a list of common problems you may have using LumenRT 3 along will suggested
solutions:
Light Appears Around Wall Corners

Sometimes it may happen that you see bright
areas of light appear in corners or near the floor
where there shouldnt be any. This phenomenon
is known as "light leak" and is an artifact usually
caused by using walls or floors that are
insufficiently thick. To correct this problem,
make your walls and floor thicker (using a more
ambient atmosphere such as the neutral white
atmosphere may reduce this effect slightly).
Dark Shadows Appear at the Bottom of a Wall or in Corners

If very dark and splotchy looking shadows
appear at the base of a floor plane wall
intersection, in most cases this is caused by the
wall extending under the floor. Try trimming the
wall exactly to the intersection of the floor plane
to eliminate this problem. Likewise, if splotches
appear around an object, you probably have faces
of that object extending "inside" the object, and
you should trim the faces so that they do not
penetrate inside the object.
Large Objects Going Through Others Seem to Have Wrong Lighting

It may happen that for some long & thin objects that go through others, the resulting lighting be
awkward (either much too bright or much too dark). One way of improving this kind of situation is
to force the host application to intersect these objects against the model before exporting, so its
faces be properly cut according to potential lighting discontinuities in the final illumination
solution.
60

In Sketchup, this is done by first exploding the problematic geometry so it doesn't belong to any
component anymore, and then choose via the main menu Edit | Intersect Faces | With Model to
perform the cuts.
Pre-Processing Takes Forever

The mathematics involved in processing the illumination of a scene are very complex and time
consuming, especially if the scene itself is complicated. Because LumenRT 3 computes indirect
lighting over the entire scene, if your scene encompasses large surface elements such as roads,
parking lots, gardens, etc. the processing time will become extremely long as LumenRT 3
computes lighting for these elements. You can greatly speed up the processing by not including
large unnecessary elements or using the Auto-scale lighting option which will greatly improve
performance with a tradeoff of reduced lighting quality.
Also, if pre-processing appears to take abnormally long to process an otherwise reasonably sized
model, make sure that no other processor intensive applications are running (because LumenRT 3
runs in the background, it will yield processing power to the other applications) and that your
computer is not switching into power saving mode during processing.
Window Glass Is Blinking when Navigating in LiveCube

If the windows in the LiveCube scene are
blinking during navigation or animation, it most
likely is caused by duplicated glass panes in your
windows which causes multiple reflections
bouncing off the glass. Although LumenRT 3
attempts to correct this automatically, there are
some cases when you will have to remove the
second glass pane manually. Making sure to
create windows using a single planar face instead
of a cube is a good way of eiliminating this problem.
Pedestal is too Big Compared to the Model

Check to ensure that no small orphaned polygons
are floating around the scene perimeter. Delete or
hide these if possible.
Playback Performance in
LiveCube is Slow or Choppy
the
If the LiveCube playback and navigation

performance appears slow or choppy, first ensure
that you or your clients are using a suitable
modern graphics card. Slow-downs can occur if the scene contains a large number of faces (e.g.
greater than 200,000) or if the scene has many reflective/transparent materials. Reducing the
61

number of polygons exported (e.g. turning off layers, hiding components) and reducing the number
of reflective materials will improve performance significantly.
Some Faces Are Missing

If some faces are missing from the scene, check
to ensure that the polygons are not overlapping
with other polygons containing opposite normals.
Also, make sure that the area in question is
receiving enough light. Faces that are found to be
in pitch dark may be removed automatically by
LumenRT 3 in order to speed up playback.
Flickering Polygons
If you find that some polygons are blinking or
flickering in the LiveCube it could be caused by
a visual artifact phenomenon known as Zfighting when 2 polygons are overlapping and
are at almost exactly the same distance and
position from the camera. In this situation, the
renderer doesnt know which polygon to display
first (since they are both at the same location) so
the display just alternates back and forth between
both polygons. To correct this, avoid coincidental
overlapping polygons (increase the space
between the polygons).
Object Surfaces are not Smooth

Make sure when creating curved surfaces in
SketchUp that they are made into a component,
or group, and that the smooth normal option is
checked in the SketchUp Soften Edges option.
62
Splotchy Looking Shadow Artifacts

If shadow artifacts appear, particularly near
object corners and intersections, try using a
higher quality render setting (e.g. from Full
Lighting to Superior or Extreme). In addition, reaiming the sun or opening up the room to allow
more light in can help to lessen shadowing
artifacts. Also, make sure that light is able to find
it way into your rooms. Leaving doors open is a
good way of letting light in (and it also helps
navigation). Another cause for this could be that
the scene is simply too large (check that there are
no orphaned polygons floating around the scene
perimeter).
Water Material is not Rendering

with Ripples or Caustics
Make sure that the word water (case
insensitive) appears somewhere in the material
name and that the water material is transparent in
SketchUp.
No Bumps (or Not Enough Bumps)

on Objects
Check to make sure that the material is using a
texture map and that the bump settings are set in
the material name (e.g. WoodFloorb=50%). You
can increase the amount of bumps by raising the
"b=xx%" value. Values beyond 100% are
possible.
Noisy Looking Areas

In some cases, if the area being viewed in
LumenRT 3 is too dark, there may be some noise
in the picture. Allowing more light to reach this
area will solve the problem (e.g. by opening
doors).
I Cant Find my LiveCube File

Please check in your
software/LumenRT 3 folder.
Documents/e-on
63
How Do I Launch the LumenRT 3 Application?

LumenRT 3 operates as a SketchUp plug-in. In SketchUp, go to Plugins Plugins | e-on software
LumenRT 3 to start the export and rendering process.
How Do I Avoid Having my LiveCube Files Overwritten?

Please uncheck the Overwrite Files checkbox when exporting from SketchUp to LumenRT 3.
Animation Playback Pauses at Regular Intervals

The model probably contains too many polygons more than your graphics card can handle.
However, you can try switching to full screen mode (alt + return key) to see if this improves
performance (avoids screen synchronization problems). Otherwise, you will need to slim down the
model.
Video Board Suddenly Not Supported

If you lock your computer session shortly after launching a LumenRT 3 process, and before the
LumenRT 3 pre-processing window appears, the application will not be able to start correcly and
will report your video board as not supported (because it fails to create the required contexts due to
locking your session).
Overly Saturated Indirect Light

If the colorful light that is bounced onto walls
feels a little too colorful and saturated to be real,
this is probably because some of your materials
in the scene use colors that cannot exist in reality.
For instance, if you want to create a red wall,
chances are you will create a 100% red color,
with no green or blue, which, when looked at
from a physical point of view, means that the
material is bouncing back 100% of the red light
that it received. In reality, this never happens. For instance, good quality paints will only bounce
back about 80% of the light they receive. Although LumenRT 3 attempts to automatically limit this
effect, the result of "impossible" colors may feel fake because of the way LumenRT 3 accurately
simulates the physics of light. Turning down the saturation of your colors is a good way of
avoiding this.
64
Some Pictures Are Missing

Pictures that are imported directly into SketchUp
without being assigned to a material will not
appear in the LiveCube. If some pictures appear
to be missing, make sure that they are assigned to
faces using a material.
LiveCube Refuses
another System
to
Run
on
You cannot copy a LiveCube folder to another

system and run it there. If you want to run a LiveCube on another system, you need to Publish the
LiveCube first (see page 42).
65
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ownership of the Product and all other rights not expressly granted to you by this Agreement, remain with e-on
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softwares intellectual property rights under international copyright law. It is not a legal copy of the Product.
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The Product is owned by e-on software, inc and is protected by U.S. copyright law as well as by international
intellectual property conventions. Any reproduction, sale, transfer, transcription, storage in a retrieval system,
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Any portion of the Product merged into or used in conjunction with another program will continue to be the property
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When you make such transfer on a permanent basis, you may not keep any copies of the Product, and you must
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Content and Content Limitations
You may distribute or otherwise sell images and animations generated using LumenRT 3 LiveCubes as well as
published LumenRT 3 LiveCubes provided that you own the rights to the materials they contain. You may not
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LumenRT3 Reference Manual

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

e-on software, inc.

e-on software europe

6107 SW Murray Blvd, Suite 264

Beaverton, Oregon 97008-4467 - USA

75011 Paris - FRANCE

Phone + 33 1 4314 2815

Fax + 33 1 4355 3671

Printed July 2012

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

Animated Digital Nature Content .......................................................................................7

REAL-TIME ARCHITECTURAL VISUALIZATION

KEY BENEFITS .......................................................................................................................10

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS .......................................................................................................13

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

LUMENRT 3 WORKFLOW ..................................................................................................... 20

NAVIGATING THE LIVECUBE

Basic Navigation Controls ............................................................................................... 29

LUMENRT 3 SKETCHUP PANEL ............................................................................................ 33

OPTIMIZING LARGE MODELS ................................................................................................ 50

IMPROVING YOUR LIVECUBES

SKETCHUP MODELING AND SCENE OPTIMIZATION .............................................................. 56

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

Smoothing Curved Surfaces ..............................................................................................56

Light Appears Around Wall Corners ................................................................................60

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

Animation Playback Pauses at Regular Intervals ............................................................ 64

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

Animated Digital Nature Content

Digitial Nature Content Pack

Fast Screen-Space Ambient Occlusion

Smooth Motion Setting to Soften Sketchup Animation

Large Model Improvements

Quick Render Button for Fast Previewing

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

LumenRT 3 LiveCube Enhancements

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

Real-Time Architectural Visualization

Creating a virtual interactive showroom

Demonstrating and sharing design concepts

Visualizing 3D models in client presentations

Exposing your projects in fully real-time photo-realistic 3D

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

High definition, photo-realistic 3D Viewing

Accurate lighting, shadows and reflections

Fast interactive 3D viewing performance

Runs on any machine no special viewing software required

Incredibly simple, push-button operation

Automated rendering output from SketchUp/SketchUp Pro.

Display greater details with accurate lighting and shadows

Share models with anyone effortlessly

Explore and interact with models in real-time

Gain deeper insights on model features and aesthetics

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual

Immersive Media Experience Designs in Real-Time 3D

Vivid, detailed realism

Accurate natural lighting and soft shadows

Real-time reflections and motion blur

Interactive exploration and navigation of designs

LumenRT 3 Reference Manual