Separate Lighting for Subject and Background (HDRI Inclusion/Exclusion)

[madoarceo]

Hi! I'm pretty new to the archviz scene. So, this might sound a little noob-ish.

I have an interior scene that's already been rendered initially and I'm already pretty satisfied with the lighting situation.
But, I decided to finally give Forest Pack a go to have some realistic background for the scene.
After re-rendering, I realized that it would of course mess up the initial lighting that I already have.

My first thought was to have the HDRI lighting to ignore the trees (which I have no idea how either). But then, the trees would be left without lights.
Now, I'm wondering if there's a way to have the room and the trees to have separate lighting from the same HDRI.

What would be your approach for this? Thanks!

[maru]

I am not sure if I understand correctly, but you can select your trees, go to their object properties and deselect "cast shadows" - this will prevent them from casting shadows and affecting the GI of the whole scene, but will at the same time allow them to receive lighting and GI.
You should also probably use the "render selected" feature to render the trees only, and then overlay them on top of the original rendering.

I may be making some mistakes here, this situation is a bit hard to imagine for me.

[madoarceo]

This is exactly what I was looking for! I may have over-complicated the question a bit. Haha! But, you got it right. Although, I tried the first method-- disabling "cast shadows" on the trees-- that didn't work. Still affects the lighting of the room the same way. Not sure why. But, I guess I'll just go with the overlaying option.

Thanks for advice!