Help with realistic interior render in Maya (mental ray)

Mar95

Hi, so basically I am trying to render an interior scene and I am having a hard time to make it look more photo realistic.. I have some experience with modeling and texturing(game modding) but never actually bothered to create a render. So this is a first timer for me :I . Maybe some of you with a better eye for this could provide me with a sweet advice or two.

Now for some information of my scene:
The lighting is basically only one Spot light with these settings:

So that the scene is not too dark I added ambient occlusion to every material and enabled final gathering with these settings:


This is the final result:
Please ignore the textures on the stairs and on the edge of the table...models are not unwrapped yet. Also the window and door glass are missing...still need to figure out how to do decent looking glass. And last but not least I didn't start the detailing phase, so things like i.e. the stove knobs are missing.

Thanks a lot for reading. I am looking forward to your feedback If you know any good tutorials on interior rendering please let me know...maybe I didn't find the one yet

ZacD

Well, Polycount isn't the best place to ask about rendering with Mental Ray, or any that isn't real time. You should look around for architecture visualization forums and tutorials. I wouldn't add ambient occlusion to the materials themselves, I would do that as a separate rendering pass, that gives you more control and makes iteration quicker. 

Your materials are the first thing that looks unrealistic to me, try using the mia_material. 

Blond

As ZACD said, Polycount is more focused on game art then Raytraced realistic rendering.
Though, 'm going to help you a bit here:

For your materials, use the physcally based material of mental ray ( mia materials)
Lighting: Add some final gather (or global illumination) for more grounded results.
Use linear clorspace workflow

Mar95

Thanks a lot Zac and Blond!
I am sorry I didn't realize polycount is not the right place to ask about realistic renderings.
But thanks a bunch for the tipps you still gave me

I'll start learning about the mia materials(been using blins and lamberts so far).
Linear clorspace workflow...no idea what it is but google will probably help
Also great idea about joining an architecture visualization forum.
 
Again...thanks a lot