Still suffering with SMOKE material, trying to make Vapor

So I see that even the most basic smoke needs tons of light in order to brighten up, which means the extra light blows out the rest of the scene.

I have read that the volume scatter should, well, “scatter” the light through the volume, but it doesn’t look right no matter what. Even completely white smoke is still mid-gray at best while using both sun lamp and Hdri to light it.

One can always “cheat” with emission but that is not realistic at all, especially when the volume passes by both rays of light and shadowed areas. Is there no way to simulate water vapor in Blender?

Like seen here?

In the light paths tab in the render settings, make sure there are at least 1-2 volume bounces. This will make them take longer to render but will also brighten the scatter.

Ah, that was IT! I knew there was a magic button somewhere :stuck_out_tongue:

Thank you so much, Beet!

You’re welcome. Glad I could help.