I’ve got a question to the area lamp type. In the lesson it is mentioned that it is a directional type of light source. Then, why does the top cube produce a shadow? It seems to be clearly outside of the “rectangular cone” produced by the 5mx5m area lamp. Is the area lamp type really purely directional?
Yes. Hard to make anything out from your image. However below is a simple test and demonstration.
Dark behind the area lamp.
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Hi
Its not clear what you’re asking. Have you tried looking at your scene at anything but top-orthographic view? That may shed light on your issue and you may even find yourself answering your own question.
Good luck.
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Probably your cube is hovering over the floor face if you use Cycles.
If you use Eevee, then it’s just basic Eevee behaviour to render fast.
Eevee has realistic shadow calculations turned off by default.
Eevee is for games and animation (NOT stills)
Cycles is for realism, can be used for anything, but it takes longer to calculate
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Hi guys, sorry if I was not clear enough, please refer to the below sketch which should illustrate what I mean. From the lecture’s notes I assumed that the area light only illuminates what’s inside the “red imaginary cube” formed by the area light (refer to my image). But it now seems to me that everything “in front” of the area light plane gets illuminated. If that is so, I wonder what changing the area light dimensions (size x, y) does…
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Ah. No it is not a spotlight, contained to a cone or ‘cube’.
The light is not focused only into a beam. It is an area of light emission.
If you had a Lightbox, as transparencies or old x-rays would be put on/over, that is probably the best comparison. So a bigger one would spread the light out to a bigger area and soften shadows. The light is most intense directly in front but it still gives off light forward, and ever more faintly sideways.
Ok played with lights.
Area light First 1m sq.
Second 10m sq
third 100msq
(cubes default size)
Smaller area concentrates the light, I guess a tiny 1cm square would more or less be a spotlight.
Now the other types with the power the same as the last Area light.1000w
Spotlight
Point light
Sunlight 
Sunlight is the same light power but delivered per sq M! You would not want the sun in your living room as a reading lamp!
(Even apart from the frazzling heat and the need for a room bigger than the sun)
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It’s not a square ‘laser type’ of a light beam.
The latest Blender lamp does support light masks/templates. Forgot how this feature is really called.
Your lamp shines a light on the floor and floor cube 1. Which bounces light back at Cube 2, casing this shadow on the wall! Cycles have a feature where you can say how many light ray bounces are permitted. if you put that to one. Most cube 2 shadows are gone.
BUT! You are using Eevee. Eevee has a very, very simplistic way of light shadow calculations. So some unrealistics shadow behavior can be expected. It’s just how Eevee works.
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