Mastering Lumion 3D

Welcome to this treasure house of Lumion 3D! This article will guide you through the intricacies of using Lumion—the next generation graphical tool. It will also present crisp notes from the book, Mastering Lumion 3D.

Why Lumion 3D?

''To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I confess, absurd in the highest degree..."

- Charles Darwin

The eye is indeed one of the most complex structures man is gifted with. The eye beholds the beauty of nature in the most magnificent way. To replicate what the eye sees in nature onto the computer screen requires the finest tools man has ever developed. Lumion 3D is one such tool. It has a strong emphasis on architectural visualization. Hobbyists use it a lot to create architectural CAD art. Professionals use it to create mock-ups of concepts. The result is ultra-realistic visualizations of concepts for buildings, outside areas, furnishings, landmarks, and skyscrapers.

The core of this product comes from the fact that architects and designers do not need to know computer graphics skills, but just to learn the tools and workflow in Lumion.

Highlights of Lumion 3D

Indeed, you can breathe life into your architectural designs with Lumion. These are some of the features that stand out:

Ease of use: Adding trees, clouds, people, artistic effects, and materials, and converting your 3DS Max design into an amazing 3D image or 3D flythrough movie is easy. It enables anyone to create movies and images without any prior training. Through Lumion, you can make beautiful SketchUp renderings yourself. You don't need to outsource this work any longer.
Fine graphics: The graphics in Lumion is too good. It has an edge over other contemporary software in this regard.
Speed: Generating animation is fast with Lumion. In comparison to traditional 3D rendering programs that take days to process animations, Lumion takes anything from a few minutes to a few hours.

Why Mastering Lumion 3D?

Lumion can be an intuitive tool, but that doesn't mean we can automatically produce a better architectural visualization. The reason why Ciro Cardoso, the author, wrote this book was because like you, the first time he picked up Lumion, he felt that there was something missing on his projects.

Mastering Lumion 3D covers the process of picking a 3D model, preparing it, and then building layers on top of layers of detail, using textures and optimized 3D models. However, it doesn't stop there because several chapters are dedicated exclusively toward explaining how to use Lumion's effects and other special features to take your project to an expert level.

This book is written in a way that will hopefully cover all the questions you may have when starting the first steps with Lumion. On the other hand, if you are an intermediate or advanced user, you can find some unique techniques that will make you look at Lumion from another perspective. The journey to write this book was filled not only with the author's experience, but also from what he learned while working with other great professionals.

What you need for this book

Lumion Version 4 is used for all the examples in this book, but you can follow the explanations using the free version or a previous Lumion version. Although Adobe Photoshop is used in some examples, you can use GIMP as an alternative. Also, ensure that your system has a good graphics card. This will make working with Lumion fun.

Who this book is for

This book is designed for all levels of Lumion users, from beginners to advanced users. You will find useful insights and professional techniques to improve and develop your skills in order to fully control and master Lumion. However, this book doesn't cover the process of transforming 2D information (CAD plan) into a 3D model. If you are really interested in drawing great architectural designs, this book is for you.