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Author Topic: Animating the size of lights, but not from centre?  (Read 271 times)

2025-06-08, 11:20:16

caspian

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Animating the size of lights, but not from centre?
Is there a trick to animating the size of a light? I have a rectangle strip light and I want to animate the size to illuminate part of an object. But I want the light to grow from one side and not the centre which it does by default. I thought maybe the Axis Centre node would do it but it messes with all the lights in the scene. How might I solve this? Would it just be to animate a shape that blocks the light and not the light itself?
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C4D 2025 / Corona 12 / Mac 15.5
2025-06-09, 14:51:27
Reply #1

TomG

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Re: Animating the size of lights, but not from centre?
You could also use geometry with CoronaLight Material applied - there's no performance hit there except in the case of spheres. This would let you animated the changing rectangle with all the usual C4D controls for a geometric object.
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Tom Grimes | chaos-corona.com
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2025-06-09, 23:55:27
Reply #2

Cinemike

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Re: Animating the size of lights, but not from centre?
Quote from: caspian on 2025-06-08, 11:20:16
Is there a trick to animating the size of a light? I have a rectangle strip light and I want to animate the size to illuminate part of an object. But I want the light to grow from one side and not the centre which it does by default. I thought maybe the Axis Centre node would do it but it messes with all the lights in the scene. How might I solve this? Would it just be to animate a shape that blocks the light and not the light itself?

What's the axis centre node? I only know the Geometry Axis capsule and it leaves other lights alone.

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2025-06-10, 03:25:26
Reply #3

caspian

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Re: Animating the size of lights, but not from centre?
Yes, it's the Geometry Axis node. As all my lights are in a Null it affects them all. But I just realised that I can put the light I want to change the axis centre of into a child null and put the Geometry Axis node in that.
… or just make a light material for that light. That might be easier.
Thanks for your input.
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C4D 2025 / Corona 12 / Mac 15.5
2025-06-10, 12:13:51
Reply #4

Cinemike

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Re: Animating the size of lights, but not from centre?
Quote from: caspian on 2025-06-10, 03:25:26
Yes, it's the Geometry Axis node. As all my lights are in a Null it affects them all. But I just realised that I can put the light I want to change the axis centre of into a child null and put the Geometry Axis node in that.
… or just make a light material for that light. That might be easier.
Thanks for your input.

Even having all lights in a Null does not matter when you place the capsule as a child of the one specific light.
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