Post Your Renders like it's the year 2020!!!

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  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566
    edited January 2017

    Messing around with the Aged version of the SS Marcoor Control Room

    The solid black in the back to the right is where the corridor hooks up - just empty scene in this render.

    Again, this image is demonstrating just keeping it simple with lighting. Very few lights, just to set the room up. When I add other element, like the characters, they will be lit using additional lighting to help them stand out in such a dark scene.

    Marcoor Aged Control A.jpg
    1280 x 720 - 342K
    Post edited by Dartanbeck on
  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566

    One might be tempted to add more cone effects - like from the wall lights, for example. Doing so can have an effect of over-doing it and taking away from the drama instead of adding anything useful.

    So I like to try and keep it simple, make it dramatic, and never forget that the stage is nothing more than the background of what we really want the audience to look at for the few seconds it'll be on screen

  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,987

    Dart , simple is good, Yes it works well, nicely suggestive and no overstatement :)

    Wendy, wrote

    a silly video I tossed up today cheeky

    Wendy, I watched that without sound, very creepy , it was pretty amamzing !

  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,987
    edited January 2017

    Pimpy love that render, should be framed. Mark those cores made me laugh out loud.

    Post edited by Headwax on
  • PhilWPhilW Posts: 5,145
    edited January 2017

    I'm having a break from doing textures on my latest product to just do a little quick fun image - with more than a nod to the wonderful pinup art of Gil Elvgren!

    Oops-Final.jpg
    2000 x 1500 - 457K
    Post edited by PhilW on
  • VyusurVyusur Posts: 2,235
    PhilW said:

    I'm having a break from doing textures on my latest product to just do a little quick fun image - with more than a nod to the wonderful pinup art of Gil Elvgren!

     

     

    She must be cold enough in her dress that she doesn't feel her feet any more.

  • VyusurVyusur Posts: 2,235

    Messing around with the Aged version of the SS Marcoor Control Room

    The solid black in the back to the right is where the corridor hooks up - just empty scene in this render.

    Again, this image is demonstrating just keeping it simple with lighting. Very few lights, just to set the room up. When I add other element, like the characters, they will be lit using additional lighting to help them stand out in such a dark scene.

     

    Magnificent!

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566

    Thanks ;)

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566
    edited January 2017

    Here's a more complete setup, though it's still not really finished. I really love these models!

    This one features the Control Room as well as both corridor sets as well as their add-on Aged texture packs. When I went into Howler to add my signature, I saw a wonderful opportunity to try out the Bloom features in Howler's Bokeh Blur, which I really like. 

    The bloom can be pretty intense and I also wanted to practice some more of my Visual Effects techniques along the way, so instead of applying the bloom directly, I did it in Swap and composited results in like I would in an animation clip. I used to dislike the banding which often occurs from Carrara's Aura effect, but it really doesn't bother me anymore. It looks fine most of the time, especially in video.

    See the Gallery comments for a complete listing of content used

    I was also messing around with a photo for some temporary promos for the new band my singer and I just joined, and I couldn't help trying it with this ;)

    can you tell which one is me?

    GlasHamrWebSFa.jpg
    652 x 719 - 624K
    Post edited by Dartanbeck on
  • VyusurVyusur Posts: 2,235

    Guy wearing blue bandana?

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566
    edited January 2017
    Vyusur said:

    Guy wearing blue bandana?

    Yup. He's the drummer for Dow Jones and Glas Hamr

    He's me ;)

    The guy in front with the hat and the look on his face is the Singer for Dow Jones, my sound producer and life-long friend, Bass player/singer for Glas Hamr, and I am his personal stone worker - for him and his wonderful wife yes

    All of these guys are close friends  - I was in Glass Hammer until the band retired, then joined Dow. In the meantime, another band took the name "Glass Hammer", so they changed the name to Glas Hamr

    Edit (again) - Probably too much sharing, eh? LOL

    Post edited by Dartanbeck on
  • VyusurVyusur Posts: 2,235

    Just like I like it.

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675

    the hills are alive smiley

  • magaremotomagaremoto Posts: 1,227

    another shot of stonemason's tuscany corner - no postwork

    hey DB, just curious to know what drummer has inspired you (if any), when I was young I liked the guy of Kansas (can't remember his name), is he active yet?

    tuscany man2.jpg
    3600 x 2010 - 1M
  • PhilWPhilW Posts: 5,145

    Dart - that lighting looks terrific!

    I was briefly surprised that you had joined Glass Hammer, before reading what you put, I think it is the other Glass Hammer that I am familiar with! (Steve Babb, Fred Schendel et al).

  • pimpypimpy Posts: 274
    edited January 2017

    Thank you!

    head wax said:

    Pimpy love that render, should be framed. 

     

    Post edited by pimpy on
  • pimpypimpy Posts: 274
    edited January 2017

    wild animals...flamingos 

    (free flamingo model found at most-digital-creations smiley)

    flamingos.jpg
    1500 x 660 - 966K
    Post edited by pimpy on
  • pimpypimpy Posts: 274

    Oppps!  Thank you Dart!!!! smiley

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566

    another shot of stonemason's tuscany corner - no postwork

    hey DB, just curious to know what drummer has inspired you (if any), when I was young I liked the guy of Kansas (can't remember his name), is he active yet?

    Many. I really like some of Kansas' stuff, and have played a couple of their songs in a couple bands. I think Phil Ehart has always been (and still is) their drummer, and he's fatastic!

    My brother is a Bass player and always practiced to Led Zepelin, so Jon Bonham was a huge inspiration to me, as was Barrymore Barlow, one of Jethro Tull's many drummers, Neil Peart from Rush, and many, many others. I love playing riffs from both Alan White and Bill Bruford from Yes - that's always a blast! Alice Cooper had a really killer drummer back in the days of that album (Killer) and Billion Dollar Babies, Welcome to my Nightmare, etc., I've picked up a lot of techniques from many of these folks. April Wine, Head East, Juudas Priest, Metallica, Megadeth, Riot, Sweet, Jimi Hendrix, Aerosmith, Kiss, Scorpions, Triumph, it just keeps going... and I'm still inspired by many new artists that I don't even know who they are! LOL

     

    PhilW said:

    Dart - that lighting looks terrific!

    I was briefly surprised that you had joined Glass Hammer, before reading what you put, I think it is the other Glass Hammer that I am familiar with! (Steve Babb, Fred Schendel et al).

    Yup. Different band altogether! :)

    ...and Thanks! Yet another really simple lighting setup. 

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566

    Misty, Love the living hills! Reminds me of early spring, before the leaves come out on the trees :)

    Pimpy... Nice Scene!

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675

    smiley  of these 1 is rendered at light quality = excellent, 1 is  light quality = fast, both are .png

    can yoo tell which 1 is the excellent?  lol

  • PhilWPhilW Posts: 5,145

    Top one has a bit more definition to it - look at the detail on the dragon wings and the tree bark.

    A lot of people seem to stick all the parameters to the max to do a final render and then wonder why it takes such a long time. If you get to know what each one does and the effect it can have on the final image, you can generally set them to be "good enough" - ie. pretty much indistinguishable from being maxed out - but render in a fraction of the time.  I remember seeing explanations from the one and only Howie Farkes on various render settings, worth seeking out (on his personal site?)

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566

    Lighting can be tough - even if it doesn't feel like it is.

    I used to just aim the light to illuminate everything face-on so everything was lit for the render. But the more I practiced and got critiques from others, the more I realized that face-on illumination makes for a boring picture.

    So my pal bought me a book, Digital Lighting and Rendering, by the veteran cinematography/digital CGI lighting expert and teacher, Jeremy Birn, which taught me a lot, since I have no background whatsoever in photography.

    Anyways, Light quality settings definitely play a big role in the rendering solution, but not so much as a Higher Quality = Better, easier render. It is really necessary when using shaders that require intense lighting calculations, so that those calculations can get even more intense to correct anomalies, if that makes any sense.

    When using Global Illumination and Indirect lighting, we're asking the render engine to measure the colors and brightness values that surround the scene to be rendered, and it calculates all of that information as it makes contact with surface shaders, calculates what happens according to the shader's setup, reflects from there and continues on its path - and this is done all the way around the scene. Pretty extraordinary, and way over my head.

    Since there are all of these calculations involved, we generally prefer that the engine not waste too much time on any of them - just get the job done and move on. Higher quality settings with higher photon counts, tighter lighting resolutions and all of that, help to veto the fact that we want a fast render, and has the engine take more time to 'think' about every interaction.

    It doesn't make anything easier for making things look better, it simply improves the accuracy of what we've already set up.

    That being said, I've created this whole Painting with Shadows experiment to help get my mind around how to better light my scenes. It all started when I watched Cripeman's awesome mind-blower on Global Illumination, and why we should all try experimenting with it. But I use my Painting with Shadows idea no matter what sort of lighting solution I end up using - just to get more artistic with my end result. Folks have always suggested that I shut off all lights but one, and look at how that one light effects the scene. hen try the next light by itself, and so on. That is great advice - and I ignored it for a long time. It wasn't until I actually heeded that advice that I started getting result I truly like.

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675

    yeah, was top 1.  smiley  

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566

     

    PhilW said:

    I remember seeing explanations from the one and only Howie Farkes on various render settings, worth seeking out (on his personal site?)

    Nope. Those were his notes on the now vanquished ArtZone pages :(

    I went to his site, hoping that he had resurrected them there. Someone should contact him and ask if he still has those saved somewhere. I loved those notes!

  • cdordonicdordoni Posts: 583

    Being that my Father was in the Blue Angels, I'm a bit biassed ;)  But I'm also a big fan of the Christian Eagles yes

     

    Pilot? ... which aircraft?

    I've only seen them live with the A4s, although I've seen video with the F18s.

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566
    cdordoni said:

    Being that my Father was in the Blue Angels, I'm a bit biassed ;)  But I'm also a big fan of the Christian Eagles yes

     

    Pilot? ... which aircraft?

    I've only seen them live with the A4s, although I've seen video with the F18s.

    No, he just jumped out of aircraft ;)

    I don't know much about it, but I guess they do all manner of research toward war-times maneuvers and such, and the team is much larger than just the manuever pilots, often thought of as stunt pilots.

    Yeah, when I was a kid, they sent my Dad Best Wishes framed posters, with the whole team's signatures on the bottom. One of them shown them in F11A - Grumman Tigers! 

    For fun, they used to break the sound barrier over our house to create that ever-so-horrifying sonic boom! Ouch! I was REALLY young then.

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,566

    I still have his jump suit and helmet :)

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,168
    edited January 2017

    A delivery for Stezza.  For medicinal purposes only.  wink

    Click to read the bottle.

     

    wip nighttime.jpg
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    Post edited by Diomede on
  • StezzaStezza Posts: 8,054

    Thanks @diomede

    at first I thought it may of been a Dickens Cider devil

This discussion has been closed.