Originally posted by BFG10K:
To me the Blinn implementation looks better because it's sharper and more defined.
You are correct, but there are numerous ways to sharpen Phong without losing what you gained by using it in the first place. With this in mind, I am working to keep it sharp while provide much more natural lighting. I have however opted to keep non-infinite lights (everything besides the sun and env lights) using blinn since 90% of the time these lights will be indoors where blinn will look better. I will say that if I can tune phong to look better indoors, without performance degredation, then all lights will become phong.
Now, before anyone asks how you can use phong and blinn at the same time, the scene renders lights in 3 stages. First, infinite lights such as the sun, ambient and cube map environment lights are rendered. After that, bloom is rendered and then model lighting.
Anyway, I have come very close to getting the reflections and light intensity balanced. After that, I will optimize it as best as i can then attempt phong on the model lights. Dependant on how everything is shaping up tonight, i may go ahead and post up what i have for you guys to play with.