Lighting

Ambient is the lighting hue applied to areas that are occluded from the sky, such as indoor areas.

Ambient defaults to [0, 0, 0] (black). As long as the red, green, and blue channels of this property do not exceed the corresponding channels in OutdoorAmbient, the change in hue will be reserved for areas occluded from the sun/moon.

Note that when GlobalShadows is disabled, there is no distinction between areas occluded from the sky and non‑occluded areas. In this case, OutdoorAmbient will be ignored and the hue from the Ambient property will be applied everywhere.

The intensity of illumination in the place.

Changing this value will influence the impact of the light source (sun or moon) on the place's lighting. Note that Ambient and OutdoorAmbient can also be used to influence how bright a place appears. For example, setting OutdoorAmbient to [255, 255, 255] will make the place appear brighter than its default value of 127, 127, 127 (as it is more white).

A numerical representation (in hours) of the current time of day used by Lighting. Note that this property does not correspond with the actual time of day and will not change during gameplay unless it has been changed by a script.

For a measure of Lighting time formatted as a 24-hour string, use TimeOfDay. Changing TimeOfDay or using SetMinutesAfterMidnight() will also change this property.

The hue represented in light reflected in the opposite surfaces to those facing the sun or moon.

The surfaces of a BasePart influenced by ColorShift_Bottom depends on the position and orientation of the BasePart relative to the sun or moon's position. Where the sun is directly overhead a BasePart, the shift in color will only apply to the bottom surface.

This effect can be increased or reduced by altering Brightness.

Note that ColorShift_Top and ColorShift_Bottom will interact with the Ambient and OutdoorAmbient properties if they are greater than [0, 0, 0]. Also note that the influence of ColorShift_Bottom can be very hard to identify when GlobalShadows is enabled (default).

The hue represented in light reflected from surfaces facing the sun or moon.

The surfaces of a BasePart influenced by ColorShift_Top depends on the position and orientation of the BasePart relative to the sun or moon's position. Where the sun is directly overhead a BasePart, the shift in color will only apply to the top surface.

This effect can be increased or reduced by altering Brightness.

Note that ColorShift_Top and ColorShift_Bottom will interact with the Ambient and OutdoorAmbient properties if they are greater than [0, 0, 0].

Ambient light that is derived from the environment with a default of 0. This property is similar to Ambient and OutdoorAmbient but it's dynamic and can change according to the sky and time of day. When this property is increased, it's recommended to decrease Ambient and OutdoorAmbient accordingly.

Specular light derived from environment with a default of 0. This property will make smooth objects reflect the environment and it is especially important to make metal look more realistic.

This property determines the exposure compensation amount which applies a bias to the exposure level of the scene prior to the tonemap step. Defaults to 0 (no exposure compensation) and has a range from -5 to 5. A value of 1 indicates twice as much exposure and -1 means half as much exposure.

Unused. The maximum Range of PointLight, SpotLight, and SurfaceLight objects is always 120 studs; this property does not change that clamp.

This property is typed as RolloutState. It is non-scriptable and hidden in the Studio Properties window.

A Color3 value giving the hue of Lighting fog. Note that fog properties are hidden when Lighting contains an Atmosphere object.

The depth from the Workspace.CurrentCamera, in studs, at which fog will be completely opaque. Note that fog properties are hidden when Lighting contains an Atmosphere object.

The depth from the Workspace.CurrentCamera, in studs, at which fog begins to show. Note that fog properties are hidden when Lighting contains an Atmosphere object.

The geographic latitude, in degrees, of the scene, influencing the result of Lighting time on the position of the sun and moon. When calculating the position of the sun, the earth's tilt is also taken into account.

Changing GeographicLatitude will alter the position of the sun at every TimeOfDay. If you're looking to obtain the sun or moon's position, use GetSunDirection() or GetMoonDirection().

Toggles voxel-based dynamic lighting in the place. When set to true, shadows are rendered in sheltered areas depending on the position of the sun and moon. The lighting hue applied to these sheltered areas is determined by the Ambient property while the lighting hue in all other areas is determined by the OutdoorAmbient property.

When false, shadows are not drawn and no distinction is made between indoor and outdoor areas. As a result, the Ambient property determines the lighting hue and OutdoorAmbient will do nothing.

Shadows are calculated using a voxel system and each lighting voxel is 4×4×4 studs. This means objects need to be larger than 4×4×4 studs to display a realistic shadow. Shadows are also recalculated when BaseParts are moving.

LightingStyle indicates the artistic intent behind lighting in the experience, as an LightingStyle option. LightingStyle.Soft is the stylized look; LightingStyle.Realistic is the naturalistic look. The actual shadowing path also depends on PrioritizeLightingQuality (for example, Soft with that property enabled uses shadow maps rather than voxel lighting).

OutdoorAmbient is the lighting hue applied to outdoor areas.

OutdoorAmbient defaults to [127, 127, 127]. As long as the red, green, and blue channels of Ambient do not exceed the corresponding channels in OutdoorAmbient, the hue of the lighting in outdoor areas will be determined by this property.

The effective OutdoorAmbient value is clamped to be greater than or equal to Ambient in all channels, meaning that if a channel of Ambient exceeds its corresponding OutdoorAmbient channel, the hue of Ambient will begin to apply to outdoor areas.

Note that when GlobalShadows is disabled, there is no distinction between areas occluded from the sky and non‑occluded areas. In this case, OutdoorAmbient will be ignored and the hue from the Ambient property will be applied everywhere.

This property determines whether outlines are enabled or disabled in a place.

Outlines can be disabled on a global basis, using this Lighting property, or alternatively on a surface-by-surface basis for BaseParts using SurfaceType.

Although this property can be set by scripts, it recommended this property is set in Roblox Studio prior to publishing the place.

This property indicates whether you prefer lighting/shading quality or view distance to scale down first. As the rendering quality level reduces, a setting of true prioritizes features such as advanced shadows and high‑quality shaders at closer distances, while a setting of false prioritizes view distance.

This is supposed to change the color of player shadows, but currently doesn't do anything.

Controls how blurry the shadows are with a default of 0.2. This property only works when Technology mode is ShadowMap or Future and the device is capable of rendering shadow maps.

Determines the lighting system for rendering the 3D world. This property is non‑scriptable and only modifiable in Studio.

A 24-hour string representation of the current time of day used by Lighting. For example:

local Lighting = game:GetService("Lighting")

Lighting.TimeOfDay = "11:00" -- Set time of day to 11:00 AM
Lighting.TimeOfDay = "21:30" -- Set time of day to 9:30 PM

Note that this property does not correspond with the real-world time of day and will not change during gameplay unless it has been changed by a script.

For a numeric measure of Lighting time, use ClockTime. Changing ClockTime or using SetMinutesAfterMidnight() will also change this property.

Returns the number of minutes that have passed after midnight for the purposes of lighting. This number will be nearly identical to ClockTime multiplied by 60.

Note that this number will not always be equal to the value given in SetMinutesAfterMidnight() as it returns minutes after midnight in the current day.

Returns a Vector3 representing the direction of the moon from the position (0, 0, 0). Note that when the moon has "set" and is no longer visible, the Vector3 returned by this method will continue to point towards the moon below the horizon.

GetSunDirection() is a variant of this method for obtaining the direction of the sun.

Returns the moon's current phase. There is no way to change the moon's phase so this will always return 0.75.

Returns a Vector3 representing the direction of the sun from the position (0, 0, 0). Note that when the sun has "set" and is no longer visible, the Vector3 returned by this method will continue to point towards the sun below the horizon.

GetMoonDirection() is a variant of this method for obtaining the direction of the moon.

Sets TimeOfDay and ClockTime to the given number of minutes after midnight.

This method allows a numerical value to be used, for example in a day/night cycle Script, without the need to convert to a string in the format required by TimeOfDay. It also allows values greater than 24 hours to be given that correspond to times in the next day.

The following code sample includes a simple day/night cycle script. The speed of time and the initial time can be changed using the TIME_SPEED and START_TIME parameters.

This event fires when a Lighting property is changed or a Sky is added or removed from Lighting. See the skyChanged parameter for when that flag is true versus false. Some Lighting property changes never fire this event:

• Changing GlobalShadows will not fire this event.
• Changing fog properties FogColor, FogStart, or FogEnd will not fire this event.

In cases where this behavior is not desired, the Object.Changed event or Object:GetPropertyChangedSignal() method can be used.