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46 votes
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How do the new light probes in EEVEE work?

There are three types of Light Probes Reflection Cube Map Reflection Plane Irradiance Volume Reflection Probes The two first are, as the name suggests, to calculate reflection maps for reflective ...
Duarte Farrajota Ramos's user avatar
18 votes

How do I get proper reflections (Eevee)?

By default, Eevee will reflect the HDRI and the lights but it won't reflect the objects of your scene. For flat surfaces like mirrors you need to create a Light Probe > Reflection Plane. It's easy ...
moonboots's user avatar
  • 164k
18 votes
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Rendering a fake mirror

You can use "Is reflection ray" output from "Light path" node and plug it into the alpha input of the "Principled shader". This will work for both Eevee and Cycles. For ...
lemon's user avatar
  • 60.6k
13 votes
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Why do reflections on a smooth-cube look more 'definite' than a flat shaded one?

It's an optical illusion. Actually, the flat-shaded cube has a reflection which is more clear and more detailed. But why doesn't the flat-shaded cube look detailed? It's because the flat-shaded cube ...
Sophie Swett's user avatar
12 votes

Why do reflections on a smooth-cube look more 'definite' than a flat shaded one?

The built-in HDRI images are fairly low resolution, in addition, there is some blur added by default. Finally, your image shows the flat-shaded square pointing at the curtains, which are blurry from ...
Ron Jensen's user avatar
  • 3,530
10 votes
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Can't get simple uneven reflection map working

Here's my example to show you what you can do. I guess you're right, it's coated for preservation. I've tried my own take on it. I gave the Principled BSDF a slight (estimated) Roughness of 0.2 for ...
Gordon Brinkmann's user avatar
9 votes

Rendering a fake mirror

You must use the Input > Light Path node as a factor between the material of the object and an Transparent node. For your green cube use the Is Glossy Ray output (non visible in the mirror): For ...
moonboots's user avatar
  • 164k
8 votes

Why do reflections on a smooth-cube look more 'definite' than a flat shaded one?

When using an HDRI the light is coming into the scene from infinitely far away. This means when looking at the flat shaded cube it will reflect only a tiny portion of the background. The smooth ...
Allen Simpson's user avatar
7 votes
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How to turn off reflections on glass

Glass is supposed to be transparent and reflective (and other thing is refractive, can disperse and absorb light, etc). If you take away the reflections then it will no longer look like glass. ...
susu's user avatar
  • 14.1k
7 votes

Why do reflections on a smooth-cube look more 'definite' than a flat shaded one?

The other answers are correct: the difference is that the smooth cube reflects a large contiguous area of the room, while the flat cube reflects three small isolated areas of the room. Since a small ...
scurest's user avatar
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7 votes
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Blender reflects an HDRI that no longer exists in a project and ignores current ones

You have baked the indirect lightings, so the reflections will stay even if you remove the HDRI. To fix it, delete the lighting cache in the Render panel:
moonboots's user avatar
  • 164k
6 votes

How to achieve a retroreflector material in Eevee

Just found a possible solution: the dotted and striped appearance can be eliminated by using a snap factor on the Incoming vector:
igmar's user avatar
  • 199
6 votes

How do I make an object reflect light through a volume at a specific angle?

You can not solve this in an honest way. The implementation of Cycles engine does not allow this. The bright light in the volume is visible only because the beam knows in which direction the sun is. ...
ugorek's user avatar
  • 430
6 votes

Same material on different objects, different reflection

In addition to Harry McKenzie's answer In your material, the normal is image-based, in Tangent space. That means the local 3D spin of X and Y directions about the Z normal is dependent on the U and ...
Robin Betts's user avatar
  • 78.2k
5 votes
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how to show reflection of a different object in cycles

I slapped together a quick example. In short - The visibility options for the first object (Suzanne) have glossy, shadow and diffuse turned off. The second object (cone) has only visibility for ...
tobkum's user avatar
  • 994
5 votes
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Reflective Glass shader, like those in our window

The standard Glass shader gives you exactly that. Or if you prefer Principled BSDF like me: Set Transmission to 1 Use Roughness and Transmission roughness to control the glass type Add thickness to ...
jachym michal's user avatar
5 votes
Accepted

Using Cycles renderer the reflections look good in viewport but not in in the render, why is this happening?

The issue is not the reflections, but the fact that they are blocked by something else. It looks like you have another object on top that is not visible in the 3d viewport but is renderable. Those ...
susu's user avatar
  • 14.1k
5 votes
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Why does my bathroom mirror distort so much?

Reflective and refractive surfaces are very dependent on the surface Normal. Make sure the Normal is pointing in the right direction (outwards) and that the surface is set to Smooth or Flat shading as ...
Rich Sedman's user avatar
  • 45.1k
5 votes
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Why wont the sunlight affect the mirror?

The sun light affects the mirror just the same as the wall. The reason you don't see any effect is probably because you have a "perfect mirror" made from a 100% perfectly glossy material. ...
Duarte Farrajota Ramos's user avatar
5 votes

How can I hide a part of an reflection in Cycles

If you are looking how to eliminate reflection of object in its surface at all like in Eevee try this ... ... or you can go to Object Properties > Visibility > Ray Visibility and uncheck Glossy....
vklidu's user avatar
  • 37k
5 votes

What is causing this stretched shading on the mesh and how can I fix it?

Try adding Subdivision Surface modifier. Probably your topology doesn't allow it though… Your question is a good example of why Subdivision Surface or NURBS workflows are powerful. This might not be a ...
Markus von Broady's user avatar
5 votes
Accepted

Same material on different objects, different reflection

The Color Space option of the Image Texture nodes should be Non-Color except for the Base Color Image Texture which should be sRGB.
Harry McKenzie's user avatar
  • 14.2k
4 votes
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Is there a way to have an object show up only in a reflection?

Use the light paths node on the Earth to isolate the reflection light ray. In this picture I have a sphere emitting light, but it is only seen on the reflection of the plane. On the right is the node ...
Pythogen's user avatar
  • 917
4 votes
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Is it possible to change reflection direction?

You can map the normal input to obtain some various deformation effects (distorting mirror) so: The node setting is the following (mix rgb is only here for the gif above): The mapping: add some X if ...
lemon's user avatar
  • 60.6k
4 votes
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Depth of Field on glossy surfaces (cycles)

If the reflective ball is inside the FOV, it will probably still preserve the sharp image due to light path has been concentrate from outer light, it will be harder to tell the blur effect if a convex ...
HikariTW's user avatar
  • 7,911
4 votes

Is There A Way To Make Reflections Act Similar To Cycles In EEVEE?

Creating a Light Probe > Reflection Cubemap and a Light Probe > Irradiance Volume brings you close to the Cycles result. If you need any explanation on light probes, please ask.
moonboots's user avatar
  • 164k
4 votes

Curved glass reflections in Glass material

The simulation of refraction depends on light rays being bent twice. Once on the way into the glass, via a front-facing surface, and once on the way out, through a back-facing surface. Your 'good' ...
Robin Betts's user avatar
  • 78.2k
4 votes

Extract the current objects surface as generated by Blender so it can be applied to another object

I'm not sure how you render your panoramic nor how did you apply that to the mesh. In order to get the result that you want you first need to render your scene using a panoramic camera with ...
Emir's user avatar
  • 5,798

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