irradiance particles and hdri

I feel like a kid on his first bike ride without the rear training wheels. Let me tell you why. While trying to figure out how to make my exterior archiviz render with mental ray better, I have stumbled upon Jeff Patton's entry on making interior renders "unique". Here he recommends IBL with Irradiance Particles. I'm hooked!

After 4 hours of tweaking with it here is what I have.

I'm still figuring out if I got it working right. The shadows seem soft compared to the HDRI environment which is bright daylight.

 Here are the settings. You can find free HDRI's at www.hdrlabs.com and some at www.hyperfocaldesign.com.

I will surely be updating this.