Cloudy plastic color saturation

[mattjgerard]

I'm trying to utilize the configurator to take a product with a bunch of variables and kick out all the iterations without having to do it manually. I think I'm getting that figured out, but in that I'll be ending up with hundreds of images I'm trying to minimize the manual photoshop work that I have done int he past when outputting these in smaller batches.

One issue that I have always had is the color saturation (or lack thereof) when shining colored lights through cloudy plastics. I am lighting up sealed LED light tubes, and I have the CP tube material looking fine unlit. I have the LED's setup with a multimaterial for all 7 states (6 colors and off) but the colors are just way washed out. I can't get a good rich color like the actual real life lights produce. In the past I'd pull it into PS and do a bunch of layer effects and adjustment layers to get it to pop to the right saturation.

I don't want to mess with the CP options too much as it looks perfect when unlit, and I really want a material that I can use lit or unlit. I've tried everything I can think of in the area light settings all to get the correct perceived color. I'm frustrated with the Image Styles, as the Basic doesnt' have saturation control, but when I switch to Photographic the image goes flat and grey and I can't get the look that I gt with the Basic settings back so I can even start to play with the saturation controls. Just switching to the photographic button should keep the same look as the Basic, I would think.

Anyway- here are a couple screen grabs of the item and settings. If I can get this to work with minimum post work I'll be saving myself days of work.