Ok this is my first go around with UDK (Also a bit embarrassed to ask such a simple question). So far I've been doing good by setting goals and then researching how to accomplish those goals. It's a slow but crucial learning process.

I really want to have a specific look to the scene I'm making, and I achieved something close by playing around with AO and bloom and what not in the post render settings. The problem is that after I build the lights, the scene looks completely different!

Before (Look I'm aiming for):


After (boo):


All I'm doing is building the lights with the default settings. Maybe I've tweaked the post render settings so much that it is causing problems with the preview? Any suggestions or advice would be much appreciated.

Well... if I was to try to get the effect you have in the preview I'd play around with a bright dominant directional light pointed straight down and then bump up my bloom values under the world properties. Also you'd have to go around to the properties of the assets you don't want casting shadows and turn that off (such as the roof).

That being said, I think you should try for a balance between the 2 images so that you see the minor elements, like the billiard balls and chair legs.

For that kind of effect, I'd go the route of Post-Processing