Getting Started with Vray 3 6 For SketchUp – START HERE IF YOU’RE A BEGINNER
In this video, I introduce you to the different functions contained within Vray 3.6 for SketchUp, as well as helping you create your first rendering!
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Introduction to Vray
In this video, we’re going to start of using Vray by getting familiar with the interface, as well as creating our first very simple render.
My goal with these videos is to create a series of tutorials that are easy to follow to help people getting started with Vray. I think a lot of the problem with rendering is that people really try to start way too advanced, and they get confused and they quit. I’m hoping to give more of a step by step approach to Vray rendering.
To start off, when you first open Vray, you’re going to have 3 toolbars (at least in version 3.6)– you’ve got a V-Ray for SketchUp toolbar, a V-Ray lights toolbar, and a V-Ray objects toolbar.
Let’s take a look at the V-Ray for SketchUp toolbar first. This contains the tools that you’re going to use to edit your rendering, as well as the actual render buttons themselves.
The first thing we’re going to click on is the asset editor. This is where you can adjust your material settings, your environment settings like sunlight, etc, model geometry settings, and general render settings. We’ll get into these in more depth later, but for right now, let’s focus on the first and second options, where you can edit your materials and also your lighting.
The material list section allows you to edit the different kinds of materials within your model, allowing you to adjust all the different settings for your materials. There’s two different sections in here that you can access by clicking on the arrows to the left and the right of your material. On the left, you can access V-Ray’s library of materials and presets. You can add these by either dragging them into your scene, or by right clicking and selecting add to scene.
You can then apply them to your materials within SketchUp by selecting an object, right clicking and picking apply material to selection. Note that this also gets added in as a SketchUp material that you can then apply to any face you choose. You can adjust the settings for the various materials off to the right, which we’ll discuss further in a future tutorial – this includes everything from relection/refraction settings to bump mapping and other settings.
Now let’s look at the “Lights” tab. This tab contains the settings for the different lights within your model. This tab works in conjunction with the Vray lights toolbar, which allows you to add different kinds of light, like rectangle lights, sphere lights, spot lights, IES lights, and more. Once you add these to your model, you can adjust them within your lighting tab.
The Vray geometry tab is going to allow you to adjust the different Vray geometry objects within your model, all of which can be accessed in the Vray objects toolbar (grass, infinite planes, etc)
The settings tab allows you to adjust everything from the kind of render you’re doing (CPU/GPU, etc), your camera settings, where you can adjust things like your render size, exposure, your environment settings, and more.
Finally, let’s take a quick look at how to actually run your rendering. Within the asset editor, there are 2 different kinds of renderings – render with Vray and render with Vray interactive. The “Render with Vray” option will simply run a static rendering within your render window. The “Render with Vray Interactive” button will start an interactive render that adjusts as you move your camera. This will open up a window where you can see your rendering. This window contains a huge number of settings which we can adjust in the future, as well as options for rendering different regions within your model.
About Justin Geis
Hi, I'm Justin Geis, and I'm the founder of The SketchUp Essentials. I started using SketchUp as part of my work as a general contractor in 2008. I quickly realized the power of the software and started using it for personal projects. I started The SketchUp Essentials as a place to share easy to follow SketchUp tutorials and tips to help everyone harness the power of 3D Modeling in their lives. When not working with SketchUp, I enjoy playing soccer and spending time with my wife and our two dogs.
