Lighting and shadows play a key role in 3D Animation because it convinces the audience that the story is believable psychological and physical. Lighting in any 3D application is as much of an art as it is a science, and most would argue that the importance of good artistic skills outweighs the importance of good technical skills.
Given that computer graphics can not currently faithfully simulate the complex nature of the light, we are forced to use various additional lights to enrich computer graphics and skillfully, artistically simulate real-world phenomena.
To make an object visible and to create a realistic render it is necessary to set a light’s type properly and set positions of light sources, then adjust the intensity of lights, directions and light diffusions. Even a basic knowledge about lighting can contribute to improving the overall sense and mood of the displayed scene.
Most software offers several different kinds of lights that you can add to your scene. Some of the figures in this section are designed to make the individual light as visible as possible and even highlight the light sources with visible glow effects. You can choose types of light as a matter of convenience, after you know where you want to apply and confine your illumination, you can use whichever tool will make the light easiest for you to control.
Light would not even exist without its counterpart, shadows. Shadows are a darkening of a portion of an object because the light is being partially or blocked from illuminating the object. They add contrast and volume to a scene.
Setting up shadows takes just as much time and attention as setting up lights. You can think of all of your illuminations as one half of your lighting design, and shadows as the other, equally important half. Shadows can add richness to the tones and shading of your image and improve your composition. Besides their artistic importance, rendering shadows is a key technical area to master.
People commonly think of shadows as obscuring and limiting vision. But shadows can often reveal things that otherwise would not have been seen.
Effective use of 3D lighting and its shadows helps the animation give out a real-life feel. According to some architects, animation has the potential to become even a part of designing methods, to become a part of the creative thinking process during development.