Home » 3D Projects » Bespoke designer light fittings by Ingo Maurer

Bespoke designer light fittings by Ingo Maurer

As an experiment, we wanted to create some photo-realistic compositions of designer light fittings. Using these Ingo Maurer lights (model courtesy of Model + Model). The fitting smoothly moves from a compressed state to a decompressed one, exposing a series of randomly arranged ring lines.

We first set about creating the composition. We wanted something simple but effective; a composition that would show off the lights in all their beauty. To help with that we decided to use contrasting colours. The black on white principle here has enabled us to provide maximum contrast and therefore make the lights stand out. In terms of camera position, a simple straight on view enabled us to draw a nice comparison between the compressed and the decompressed states.

Next were the materials. The main light bowls are a simple off-white material with low reflectivity and a small amount of gloss to spread reflection and avoid any harsh highlights. The wires and the handle at the top are brushed steel. The challenge was in recreating the effect of the lights being tuned on. To address this we used a VrayLight material on the underside of the bowl, giving it a yellow colour and set the emitter value to an appropriate value.

Finally to set up the lighting; we used a typical studio lighting rig with one main light, and smaller lights positioned to the left and right of the actual light fitting. The colours of each light were varied to add a certain amount of variation into the scene. The image was created entirely using 3D software so that post-production work was kept to a minimum.