How to Render Your Models In Blender

I spent the last few days figuring this out. There are lot of tutorials out there online on this and setting up lighting is something it seems that you need a masters degree in and you could still learn more in the process. What I really wanted was a photo studio blend file to get me started and then learn by playing instead of trying to follow along the endless stream of YouTube videos. So now that I've got something I'm sorta happy with I've decided to be that person for those people who are coming next.

You can get a quickstart using the blend file and HDR file that I've attached but here are some pointers.

• Add the HDR file to the Scene / World Settings. It's in the blend file but for some reason not applied properly by default. Download both files and then import that HDR file (see the screenshot for reference) - then the rendering lighting shouldn't be hot pink :)
• Make sure that you're using the "Cycles" render engine (This is in the Render Tab)
• Make darn sure that you're using GPU (Your Graphics Card) to do the rendering instead of your CPU otherwise it will be hecka slow - you can find these settings in the Render tab and in Blender Preferences -> System settings etc... use your GPU
• If it's going slow you can change the Max Samples values or bump up the Noise Threshold in the Render Tab, You can change the Quality etc... in the "Denoise" settings and if you don't have Denoise turned on then you can turn it on and lastly lower the resolution in the Output Tab - I've got this set to 1280x960 which is pretty good cover size but keep in mind that some model sites will crop these images so keep you model centered with good spacing on the left/right

When you open the file you should maybe have a split view, you can change the left-hand view to render mode and leave the other view alone. If all is good you should see a sort of render preview on the left-hand side now.

There are FOUR lights. I mean three. There are three lights. Fill, Side and Back. The Fill light is the brightest and will direct the color profile in the biggest way. I have this set to a grey because that's what I liked - you can change the colors in the light settings panel. The side light I've set to Blue and the back light has been set to Red - you can play with these values until you find what you like.

The backdrop is a nice little curved plane that makes it look the model is in a little space.

The material I've added to the model highlights the curves on the associated model and makes it "pop" a bit more which is nice. The material has a couple settings you can play with - notably the "Color Ramp" node - you can slide the black/white dials around a bit and the "Base Color" in the Principled BSDF you can change, due to the lighting this won't change the model much but I used this to make my rabbit model look like a chocolate bunny for easter. Source for this linked below.

There is an HDRI added to the world settings. These set baseline lighting for the blend file. I used Rodin to generate this and ran with it. Those files are here and yours to use if you want. There are a TON of other HDRI options out there and lots of great free ones on https://polyhaven.com/ etc... so experiment and find what you like!

How to Render You Models In Blender: go to the Render tab and then click Render Image, it should take a while and then you can save that image somewhere / anywhere you want. If you haven't imported your STL then do that in the file menu, position it and do the Render (also delete or move other models out of the camera view beforehand).

Hopefully this helps - feel free to ping here if you have any questions and remix if you have a better lighting setup for me to use :)!!

Main Sources:

• I created the backdrop based on this tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJ7ZlQnTwt0 * BUT I never really understood his lighting setup and building the actual photo studio / box around the model seemed cool but also not what I wanted
• There is a material in this blend file that I copied from this YouTube tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2_4eSB1ip4 - this channel also has a lighting tutorial but my brain was too cooked at this point.

My rant saved for the bottom because I don't want it to spoil the (hopefully) helpful content above: I see a LOT of posts that use renders of completely unrealistic versions of their models and when you look at the mesh you see all sorts of messy and impossible geometry (many using direct AI output without optimizing for print). The crazy thing is that they get tons of engagement and likes. So I wanted to find a way to create a nice render of my work without distorting the geometry so much that it's not an honest representation of what the model could/should/would look like when printed. I saw a funny meme / eponymous law "Slop's Razor" where if you can't tell it's AI generated then it doesn't need the AI label. It's silly but that's how a lot of people operate - I think it's important to label your work and it'd be nice to include more degrees of "AI Generated" to allow for "AI Assisted".

I'm currently on a journey to try to create 1000 free models for DND and TTRPG games and learning Blender in the process - you can follow my adventure on my Patreon on here if you'd like: https://www.patreon.com/c/Adamnant

You can see my renders on my profile for models that I haven't printed yet (or where I just chose the render over the model). In general I still really think that printed work is ideal but I need to work on my IRL photostudio lighting, dial in my print quality and get my resin printer running again (still too cold outside for it here).