Hi, I was wondering how to get it so it looked like rays of light were shining through something. What I have so far is a plane with a logo on it, and the parts I want to shine through 100% alpha.
Here is what kind of effect I was hoping for:
Will try to make a mini-tute:
Make it so, that you have a plane, with the logo being carved into it. Boolean
could do this, but I usually prefer to convert the text/logo/thing to mesh (if it’s
not already) and then grab the outer vertices of it, and extrude way outwards.
Afterwards, I’ll delete the logo faces, thus making the logo carved into the plane.
Then, place a spot light behind the plane, facing the camera. You now need
to turn on the “halo” buttons in the light setup to make the light “volumetric”,
so that you’ll be able to see the light rays. Believe there’s plenty of info on this
in the wiki, or this forum. No need to repeat that.
If you render now, you’ll already have achieved pretty much the effect you’re
looking for. Now it’s just about tweaking it, and improving on it.
Just the basics. Hope you can understand me, even though I have some problems
expressing myself in english…just aint got that sharp edge and full vocabulary, that
I’ve got with Danish, to it yet. But I’m working on it. 
//Mathias
So an image with an alpha channel doesn’t work huh. I was afraid of that. Dang. Oh well, thanks for your help.
Will try to make a mini-tute:
- Make it so, that you have a plane, with the logo being carved into it. Boolean
could do this, but I usually prefer to convert the text/logo/thing to mesh (if it’s
not already) and then grab the outer vertices of it, and extrude way outwards.
Afterwards, I’ll delete the logo faces, thus making the logo carved into the plane.
- Then, place a spot light behind the plane, facing the camera. You now need
to turn on the “halo” buttons in the light setup to make the light “volumetric”,
so that you’ll be able to see the light rays. Believe there’s plenty of info on this
in the wiki, or this forum. No need to repeat that.
- If you render now, you’ll already have achieved pretty much the effect you’re
looking for. Now it’s just about tweaking it, and improving on it.
Just the basics. Hope you can understand me, even though I have some problems
expressing myself in english…just aint got that sharp edge and full vocabulary, that
I’ve got with Danish, to it yet. But I’m working on it.
have you actually tried this? it appears not to work when i follow along. the ‘volumetric’ light appears not to respect solid objects. when i punch a hole through a disc and shine a volumetric light through it, the light doesn’t just go through the hole - it reappears on the near side of the object, at the full width of the spotlight.
What M.h.p.e. suggested will work but, you have to adjust the Halo Step value that’s found on the same panel.
i see that option is only available for yafray.
No Yafray needed. Blender Internal render.
Halo Step = 1
The text is just two Text objects (no need to convert them to meshes). The second line was put on Layer 2 and the Spotlight was set to only light objects on the same layer as itself (Layer 1).
thanks for the help. i’ve got it working now. you were right, the button was there, i don’t know how i missed it.
Actually I doubt that this is the wanted effect, if you look at the reference it looks like the letters are emitting the volumetric lighting rather than a lightsource from behind. I remember a picture in the C4D Manual (yes, I’ve actually read that 
) that shows exactly the effect that we’re heading for.
But I doubt that this is possible in Blender that way, so you’d probably have to stick with the (nice ) tut by m.h.p.e.
>>> I remember a picture in the C4D Manual
This was “Inverse volumetric” spot (under “visible light” dropdown). I used it a lot. Don’t know if it is in newer versions.
it is. i just tested c4d 9.6 and this function is still there. i really loved this function in c4d and i miss it in blender for a long time.
Cutout letter with area around letter masking out light. Added glow.
I wouldn’t want to do a lot of text this way because it was a bit of a pain cleaning up the internal edges. But it works.
What would be the easiest way to add a cloud texture to the halo light. I tried adding a texture to the light but there was no effect on the halo part.
The more I look at the original posters image, the more it looks like it’s just a blurred zoom effect on the letters with a little alpha applied and, composited with the main letters. The “light” isn’t projecting from the letters.