There are quite a few images on the forum that are really good, but would benefit from less absolute grey. A material is white, or grey, or metal, and it is shaded well, except that the result almost looks like a black and white image. Sure, working in black and white is fine, but if you’re working in colour it’s best to make greys not quite absolute grey. make them very slightly, blue, or yellow, or red, or whatever.
You can do this either with the materials (a white fur may be slightly blue, an iron might be slightly red) or with the lighting (sunlight slightly yellow, shadows (ao) slightly blue) or both. I’m not saying make everything look like the saturation has been turned all the way up, but don’t make it look like a black and white photo.
Thumbs up to this post! Definitely changing lamps off their standard solid white to have a very slight coloured tinge can make a render much nicer. Also take a look at the colour of shadows - grey shadows can look flat and ugly, get some fill lights in there and tint them up!
Ok, I sort of see your point, but isnt that what a baked ambient occlusion is for? because another reason you never really see a true grey or while is because of the same sort of blended shading from other sources that AO is supposed to simulate?
Set up your preferred stage lighting and your preferred outdoor lighting. Move the lamps to their own layer, one for stage, one for outdoor. Save as default settings. When you want the stage lighting, include the stage lighting layer, when you want outdoor lighting, include that layer instead.