Mouse control

Use right mouse button to look around. The W and S key to move forward and backward. To move
left and right use the A and D key. For moving up and down use Q and E. Pan the camera by holding
the MIDDLE MOUSE BUTTON and move the mouse around. You can orbit around a model by placing
the target in you camera cross-hair, hold down the O key and move the mouse around.

If you try to load scenes or LS3 files made with an earlier version of Lumion, models may be be
missing in Lumion 4.x, i.e. replaced by red questionmarks.

NAVIGATION

(W) / (Up arrow): Move camera forward

(S) / (Down arrow): Move camera backward

(A) / (Left arrow): Move camera left

(D) / (Right arrow): Move camera right

(Q): Move camera up

(E): Move camera down

(Spacebar) + (W/S/A/D/Q/E): Very slow camera

(Shift) + (W/S/A/D/Q/E): Fast camera

(Shift) + (Spacebar) + (W/S/A/D/Q/E): Very fast camera

Right mouse button + Move mouse: Look around

Middle mouse button + Move mouse: Pan

Mousewheel up/down: Move camera forward

(CTRL) + (H): Reset camera pitch to horizontal viewpoint

(O) + Right mouse button: Orbit camera.

Double-click with right mouse button on models: Instant 'teleport' to the position that was clicked
on.

MISCELLANEOUS

(F1): Editor quality: 1 Star

(F2): Editor quality: 2 Star

(F3): Editor quality: 3 Star

(F4): Editor quality: 4 Star

(F5): Quick save (Saves a file called QuickSave)

(F7): View the Lumion terrain at the maximum level of detail.

(F9): If you press F9, all trees and plants in the viewport will be rendered at their best level of detail,
so that it's easier to see where you need to add more trees and plants in a scene.

Home -> (CTRL) + (F11): Fullscreen.

Home -> (F11): Maximize window with/without taskbar (press twice to toggle).

Sliders: You can double-click on all sliders in Lumion to manually type in values. Press Shift while
adjusting slider values to fine-tune them (more digits after the decimal point will be displayed).

SAVE & LOAD CAMERA VIEWPOINTS

(CTRL) + (1) (2) … (9) (0): Use this function to save up to 10 camera positions.

(SHIFT) + (1) (2) … (9) (0): Load previously saved camera viewpoints. The saved slots are also
available as easily accessible thumbnail images in Photo mode.

BACKGROUND RENDERING

Lumion always renders movies and image sequences in the background (which correspond to the
MP4 and Images tabs in Movie mode), so that you can check your emails etc while it is rendering.
Background rendering is not supported when rendering a still image via Photo mode or the Single
tab in Movie mode.

IMPORTANT: For the background rendering process to work when you render videos or image
sequences, you should not switch to another program until the first image is done rendering. Avoid
moving/re-sizing/minimizing the Lumion window while it is rendering, and do not click on the Show
Desktop button in the lower right corner of Windows. This will reset the exposure in Lumion which
means that the video has to be rendered from scratch again.

IMPORTING & UPDATING MODELS

Edit Materials -> (CTRL) + Reload Model and re-apply materials (new file) button: If the name or
location of an exported object file (DAE, FBX etc) has changed, this button allows you to manually
select the location/name of the file:
Edit Materials -> (ALT) + Reload Model button: If you import a model that uses over 100mb of
texture memory, Lumion will cap the maximum texture resolution at 2048x2048 pixels. However,
you can bypass this limit by pressing ALT while you click on the Reload model button. If you apply a
Standard or Lightmap material to your imported model, any texture you load will be loaded at
whatever resolution your graphics card is capable of displaying (up to a maximum of 16384x16384
pixels).

Import model -> Animation on/off button: This function lets you import move/rotate/scale
animations via FBX/DAE, for example from 3D Studio Max (FBX is the recommended format for
animated models).

Imported material scale: If you apply a Standard material to an object, a Scale slider value of 0
means that the imported texture coordinates are used. If you set the Scale slider to 1.0 in Lumion,
and the surface is aligned with the world axes, each texture "tile" will cover an area of 1x1m in
Lumion. Rectangular textures will be re-scaled so that they are square in Lumion.

Load/Save material set function: You can now save materials in a scene to a file, and automatically
apply those materials to another imported model provided that they use the same material names
in your 3D modelling application (Edit materials -> Load/Save material set buttons):

SELECTING, COPYING, MOVING AND ALIGNING OBJECTS

(CTRL) + Drag with Left mouse button: Rectangular selection tool for selecting multiple objects.

(CTRL) + (SHIFT) + Drag with Left mouse button: Add new rectangular selection to existing selection.

(ALT) + Move selected object(s): Copy-paste selected object(s) by pressing ALT while dragging one of
the selected objects.

(ALT) + (X) + Move selected object(s): Copy-paste selected object(s) and retain the rotation of trees
& plants by pressing ALT while dragging one of the selected objects.

Place object mode -> (CTRL) + Left-click: Randomly place 10 copies of the currently active object
library model.

Place object mode -> (Z) + Left-click: Place a new object with +/-0 to 50% random scale.

Place object mode -> (CTRL) + (Z) + Left-click: Combined operation of above mentioned Place Object
Modes. Randomly place 10 copies of the currently active object library model with +/-0 to 50%
random scale.

(F12): Drag Model mode lets you move objects by clicking directly on them and dragging the mouse
to move them. In addition, (H) lets you move objects up and down while (R) allows you to rotate
them.
(G): This function will make objects that you are moving or placing in your scene snap to the Lumion
terrain while ignoring all other object types.

(F): The orientation of all objects (apart from Trees/plants) can be made to adapt to the surface
angles of other objects. Move object button -> Press (F) for "Flatten" -> Move the object(s) to make
them adapt to the surface angles of other objects. This function only works on surfaces that are
facing the sky, i.e. less than 90 degree angles.

(SHIFT) + Move selected object(s): Press shift while dragging selected objects to move them
horizontally with snapping turned off.

(SHIFT) + Rotate/Rotate Pitch/Rotate Bank selected object(s): Press shift while rotating objects to
temporarily turn the 45 degree angle snapping off.

(K) + Rotate/Rotate Pitch/Rotate Bank selected object(s): Press (K) while rotating objects to make all
of the objects face the mouse cursor.

(CTRL) + "Same height" command: The selected objects will be placed at the same height as the
object you clicked on. (CTRL)-select objects -> Context menu -> Click on the icon of the object that
has the height you want the other objects to inherit -> Transformation -> Same height.

(CTRL) + "Space" command: The selected objects will be placed in a straight line as defined by the
object that you clicked on to execute the command and the object that is furthest away from that
object. (CTRL)-select objects -> Context menu -> Click on the selection icon of one of the selected
objects -> Transformation -> Space)

"Align" command: This command lets you centre selected objects so that their pivot points are at
the same position (CTRL-select objects -> Context menu -> Transformation -> Align). If you need to
move or manipulate one of the overlapping objects, place the mouse cursor over the small
overlapping object selection icons and use the Arrow Up/Down (W/S) keys to toggle between the
objects.

(L): Scale model.

(R): Rotate Heading.

(P): Rotate Pitch.

(B): Rotate Bank.

SPOTLIGHTS

To preview shadows from spotlights in Build mode:

1) Select the spotlights in Build mode to temporarilly turn on real-time shadows.

To preview shadows from spotlights in Movie/Photo mode:

1) Go to the Photo or Movie section.

2) Apply a Global Illumination effect (New effect -> World tab -> Global Illumination).

3) Click on Preview spotlight GI and shadows in the effect panel.

4) If you want to view the shadows in Build mode, click on the Build with effect button in the top left
corner.

In Light Properties -> Optimize for, choose what is most important for each light:

Accuracy: The shadows are updated every frame (Slow!). Every time you add a light with Accuracy
turned on, the entire scene has to be rendered once more. Add 10 lights and the scene has to be
rendered 10 times more every frame. Each light uses a 1024x1024 pixel shadow texture.

Speed: The shadow from the light uses a static 512x512 pixel texture which is not updated (Fast,
moderate memory usage)

Memory: The shadow from the light uses a static 128x128 pixel texture which is not updated (Fast,
very low memory usage)

To reduce render times, we recommend that distant lights (e.g. street lights) in your scene use either
the Memory or the Speed option, so that the shadows are not updated every frame. If your graphics
card has enough memory, the best option is Speed.

You would only ever use Accuracy for your lights if something that casts shadows is moving near the
light (a car driving past a street light for example). Or if the light itself moves/rotates (stage lighting
for concerts for example). Or if you need high-resolution shadows in certain areas (typically close-
ups of interiors).

SHADOW ARTIFACTS (BANDING, FLICKERING, LIGHT LEAKAGE)

Shadows in Lumion are added on top of all surfaces with an offset. The reason an offset is needed is
that the shadows will otherwise flicker (or display banding artifacts) when the shadows are very
close to surface. If the offset is set too high, furniture (as an example) will appear to hover above the
floor. In reality the furniture is not hovering of course, but the offset shadows give the illusion of it.
It's difficult to get the offset right as the optimal offset varies from scene to scene, depending on the
sun position and the camera position. For that reason, you have to add the Shadow effect to your
clip and experiment with the Shadow correction and Shadow Slope sliders until the artifacts are
gone.

The Shadow correction slider controls the offset directly whereas the Shadow Slope slider is used to
prevent light leakage through models.

UPDATE SUN, SKY, LIGHTING, CLOUDS AND REFLECTIONS

(U): If you press the U key, the sun, sky, lighting, clouds and 360 degree reflection texture will be
updated. This is often necessary if you switch between Build/Movie/Photo mode and the sun is in
different positions. If you keep the U key pressed in Photo/Movie mode, the Cloud effect will be
rendered in (almost) final render quality. This is useful if you want to see what the clouds will look
like while adjusting the cloud sliders. Bear in mind that the Volume Clouds effect has to be rendered
in 3 star quality to see what these clouds will look like in final render quality.

GLOBAL ILLUMINATION

You must render images/videos with the Global Illumination effect in 3 star quality. If you render it
in 1 or 2 star quality, the lighting will appear to flicker and you will only see a pixelated preview of
the global illumination lighting on your renderings.

VOLUME CLOUDS

You must render images/videos with the Volume Clouds effect in 3 star quality. If you render it in 1
or 2 star quality, you will only see a pixelated preview on your renderings, and the clouds will appear
to move and change shape as the camera moves.

REFLECTIONS IN LUMION

There are 2 types of reflections in Lumion:

1) Planar reflections (New effect -> World -> Reflection):

This Movie effect allows you to specify up to 10 reflection planes in your scene. Any model surface
which is co-planar with a specified reflection plane in your scene will have accurate reflections. This
is ideal for mirrors, marble floors etc. The effect includes a Threshold slider which allows you to
adjust the distance at which nearly-co-planar surfaces will be included in the reflection plane. The
tradeoff is accuracy but it's usually not noticeable. Please note that if you have some nearly co-
planar surfaces that you want to assign a single reflection plane to, you need to assign the plane to
the surface which is closest to the camera so to speak.

Please note that the following objects and materials are not reflected due to technical limitations:

- Ocean.

- Native Lumion water planes.

- Waterfall, Water and Glass materials.

- Special effects: Fountains, Smoke, Fire and Fog.

- Grass.

Every time you add 1 reflection plane, Lumion has to mirror all models & render the entire scene
once more. For that reason, try to use as few reflection planes as possible:

2) Projected reflections:

Projected reflections in Lumion rely on a single 360 degree panoramic reflection texture which is
projected onto any reflective materials that are not using planar reflections. The projected reflection
method is only an approximation and will never provide as realistic reflections as the planar
reflection effect above. In Lumion 4.x, add the Lights -> Utilities -> Reflection control object to your
scene to specify the position where the 360 degree panoramic reflection texture should be rendered
at.

If you do not add this object to your scene it will be placed a few hundred meters above the terrain.
If you are rendering interiors, the best position for the Reflection Control object is often near the
camera position. Bear in mind that you can also animate this object with the Move/Advanced Move
effects in the Movie section.

HOW TO PREVENT SURFACES FROM FLICKERING/DISAPPEARING

If you notice that surfaces flicker or disappear when moving the camera, add a Standard material to
the surface that you want to be on top. Then adjust the Depth Offset slider in that material but avoid
extreme Depth Offset values - you should only adjust it a little bit, until the flickering stops (The best
method is of course to make sure that your surfaces are offset a bit in your 3D modelling application,
so that the flickering is less likely to occur in the first place).

OBJECT COLOURS

Objects -> Edit properties -> Object Color allows you to change the colours of many of the Transport,
Indoor and Outdoor models, e.g. furniture and vehicles. Note that you can also copy-paste a colour
from outside Lumion to any color selection window in Lumion. Simply press CTRL + C to copy a
highlighted hexadecimal colour in text format, eg, "ff0000" (red), and press CTRL + V to paste this
colour onto the solid bar on the right side of the color selection window.

TERRAINS IN LUMION

The editable part of the terrain in Lumion occupies a 2048x2048m square. Beyond this, you will not
be able to change the height or paint the landscape. When you load a heightmap texture it will
stretch to the full extent of the 2048x2048m square, but will 'fade out' to 0m along the edges to
blend with the endless terrain outside the editable area.

If you load a standard JPG file, 100% black equates to a terrain height of 0m and 100% white is equal
to a terrain height of 200m. In other words, each greyscale step (from 0 to 255) is equal to
0.78125m.

As for the height scale of imported heightmap textures, the RGB values normally range from 0 to 1.0,
but if you create a 32-bit image in Photoshop (Image -> Mode -> 32-bits per channel), you can boost
the whiteness (and the terrain height range) by up to x20. In other words:

RGB 0 to 1.0 in Photoshop = 0m to 200m in Lumion

RGB 0 to 2.0 in Photoshop = 0m to 400m in Lumion

RGB 0 to 3.0 in Photoshop = 0m to 600m in Lumion

Once you've created your heightmap, you'll need to save it as a 32-bit DDS heightmap in "32f"
format using Nvidia's DDS plugin for Photoshop:

http://developer.nvidia.com/nvidia-texture-tools-adobe-photoshop

TIP: You can also import your own terrain as a DAE/FBX object and apply a Landscape material to it.
This allows you paint on it just like the "native" terrain in Lumion:

MATERIAL SLIDERS

Try to experiment with each material slider to find out what the various values do.

Reflection/Clip/Bright: An important slider is the Reflection/Clip/Bright slider in Lumion 4.x

(Reflection or Clip slider in Lumion 2.5). This slider allows you to specify whether an alpha channel in
your diffuse texture is used as a reflection mask (= Reflection), alpha clip mask (= Clip) or as an
emmissive mask (= Bright).

Scale: Material size. Set this to 0 if you want to use imported texture coordinates instead of
automatically applied texture coordinates.

Reflection colorize: Tint reflections with overall material colour.

Reflection Falloff: Reflection amount vs viewing angle.

Brightness: Material darkness vs brightness.

Glossiness: Reflection blurriness vs sharpness.

Bump: Material roughness (provided that you use a blue/purple normalmap).

Reflectivity: Reflection amount. Can be combined with a specular/reflection mask in the alpha
channel of the Diffuse texture.

Saturation: Black& white versus colour.

Emissiveness: Material glow.

MOVIE SECTION TIPS

Entire Movie versus Clips: You can apply a Movie effect to a single clip or to the 'Entire Movie'.

'Entire Movie' is selected by clicking on the large button in the lower left corner of the screen in
Movie mode. If a new Movie effect is applied while 'Entire Movie' is selected, this effect will affect all
clips in your movie.

The exception to this rule is if you have also applied the same Movie effect to one of your clips. In
this case, the Movie effect in the clip will override the Movie effect that is applied to 'Entire Movie'.

Double-clicking on a clip thumbnail: This allows you to edit the clip without having to click on the
Edit clip button in the top-left corner.

Create Movie Effect keyframes: The small circular button to the right of the effect sliders allows you
to set keyframes:

Build with effects: This button in Photo/Movie mode allows you to preview effects in Build mode:

Save Movie (or Create movie from clip) -> Images tab -> Frame range -> Custom -> Shots: This allows
you to render each camera keyframe in a clip or in the entire movie as still images.

USING LAYERS
About Layers: Layers are useful for organising large projects. The Layer buttons in Build mode allow
you to show or hide models. You can also animate the visibility of Layers in your clips with the Show
Layer and Hide Layer effects.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

WHERE ARE MY LUMION SCENES AND IMPORTED MODELS SAVED?

Your Lumion scenes and imported models are saved in these folders:

Documents/Lumion 4/Scenes: All scenes saved in Lumion 4 (2 files per scene)

Documents/Lumion 4/Library: Models imported in Lumion 4 (up to 4 files per model)

The Documents/Lumion 4/ folder is on the C: drive by default.

If you would like to move the Documents/Lumion 4/ folder to a different location, please follow
these instructions on the Microsoft website:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310147

As with any other important data on your harddrive, we recommend regular backups of the
Documents/Lumion 4/ folder.

HOW DO I LOAD A LUMION SCENE ON ANOTHER PC?

If you need to load a Lumion scene on another PC, you need to copy the Documents/Lumion 4/
folder to that PC. Remember to restart Lumion after copying the folders.

Alternatively, if you have Lumion Pro, you can also export the scene as an LS4 file which includes
imported models. This makes it easier to move scenes between PCs.
HOW DO I LOAD A LUMION 3 SCENE IN LUMION 4?

If you need to load a Lumion 3 scene in Lumion 4, you need to copy the Scenes & Library folders in
Documents/Lumion 3/ folder to Documents/Lumion 4/. Remember to restart Lumion after copying
the folders.

Alternatively, if you have Lumion Pro, you can also export a Lumion 3 scene as an LS3 file which
includes imported models. The LS3 file can then be imported in Lumion 4.

WARNING: Lumion is not backwards compatible, so if you save a scene or an imported model in
Lumion 4 you can't load them in Lumion 1, 2 and 3.

RED QUESTIONMARKS

If you notice a red questionmark in one of your scenes, it means that the files for that model are
missing in the Documents/Lumion 4/Library folder. It is currently not possible to display the file
name of missing models.

Here's how to delete questionmarks in your scene:

1) Lights & Special objects category -> Context menu -> Selection -> Select all similar

2) Trash object -> Click on one of the questionmarks to delete them

HOW DO I LOCK MODELS SO THAT THEY DON'T MOVE WHEN I MODIFY THE TERRAIN?

Select models -> Context menu -> Transformation -> Lock Position -> On

HOW DO I MAKE MY OWN THUMBNAIL IMAGES FOR MY IMPORTED MODELS?

CTRL-select the object and make sure that its thumbnail is displayed in the lower left corner. Move
the camera until you're happy with the way the model appears on the screen, and press and hold
CTRL. Then left-click on the thumbnail to update it.

WHAT DOES THE 'LIMIT ALL TEXTURE SIZES' OPTION DO?

'Limit all texture sizes' on: Textures that are bigger than or equal to 1024x1024 pixels are
automatically reduced to 512x512 pixels in all modes. This applies to built-in materials as well as
textures used by all models (stock and imported models). There is no override function.

'Limit all texture sizes' off: If you import a model that uses over 100mb of texture memory, Lumion
will cap the maximum texture resolution at 2048x2048 pixels. However, you can bypass this limit by
pressing CTRL while you click on the Reload model button. If you apply a Standard or Lightmap
material to your imported model, any texture you load will be loaded at whatever resolution your
graphics card is capable of displaying (up to a maximum of 16384x16384 pixels).

HOW DO I IMPORT ANIMATIONS?

It is possible to import move/rotate/scale animations from some 3rd party modelling 3D

applications, e.g. 3DS Max and Maya. The frame rate has to be set to 25 frames per second and the
preferred export format is FBX file. Collada format (DAE) also works but the interpolation between
keyframes will be linear.

It is not possible to import vertex animations, morph animations or bone animations in Lumion.

HOW DO I ORGANISE MY IMPORTED MODELS IN GROUPS SO THEY HAVE THEIR OWN TABS IN
LUMION?

Go to Libraries/Documents/My Documents/Lumion 4/Library and create one or more folders for

your models - the limit is currently 14 custom folders.

For example: Libraries/Documents/My Documents/Lumion 4/Library/My Furniture

Once you've done that, move the relevant model files to the new folders (note that there are up to 4
files per model). The folders and any model files that you have moved to the custom folders will
appear in the numbered tabs in the Imported Model browser after you have restarted Lumion: