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You did a great job! Sometimes, outside of our usual can actually be a good thing lol!
Love the dragon coming out of the book. Great job with the fire he was s breathing. Dynamic and original. Enjoyed the story as well.
Thank you, @Worlds_Edge.
And I'm glad you enjoyed the story! 
I see I'm overdue for posting something here…
My lastest render took a few hours to setup in DS. I let it render overnight, and as Hubby and I were out of town for the afternoon, I let it render until we got back. I stopped it at 72K samples. I know that sounds excessive, but I wasn't using the computer, and when it comes to fine details in dark areas, longer rendering is always better. There is some faint blue in the sky that didn't show up for several hours, so that was an added bonus, too. And with the beast, the render averaged 4K samples per hour. I would have used it with fewer samples if I hadn't been gone. Anyway…
I actually spent more time with the post work then setting up the scene. I'm a big fan of HDRIs for lighting and the occasional background. This one is from Orestes Eventide set and makes a really nice sky, but as large as I like to render images, there were some artifacts. I was able to smooth that out a bit in Photoshop without losing too much detail. I could have stopped there, with minimal postwork, but I know many of my images could be better with some effects, so I tinkered with the Nik Collection and ended up using Viveza.
Here's the finished image, (links to the gallery page.):
Sundown
And here's a copy of the render before postwork, click to open in a new window/tab.
The original is beautiful but the postwork definitely gives it that little bit of more. Really gorgeous!
Very nice post working. Looks natural, but brings out a lot of detail in the right places while smoothing out the noise.
I like the hard light on Paolo, I could tell the dragon was coming out of the book, and Sundown is gorgeous.
Thank you, @Worlds_Edge.
Thank you, @Novica. You covered a lot of ground quickly with that one sentence. I'm impressed.
Actually, as busy as you are these days, I'm both delighted and surprised you found the time to catch up on this thread, let alone post a comment. Thank you for both.
By the way, to one and all, Riversoft Art's First Anniversary Contest voting is open. Please drop by and vote!
Awesome work on the windmill pic. I hope that one day I can be that good!
@themidget, Thank you. Just keep doing what you love, and you can't help but get better at it.
Here are a few WIPs from the scene with Megah and Stryker. This is the set I've decided on, The Basement, with a lot of modifications to make it one large room, with the stairs on one side. I'm still working on the details that will make it look lived in, as well as depressing, in spite of Megah's efforts to make it look homey.
I left the front wall off for these WIPS to let light in, and have a ghost light attached to the camera for the close shots. I worked hard on that lamp, trying to make it positively ugly. Not sure if I succeeded.
I'm working with Megah and Stryker in another file. When I'm happy with the details of the set, I'll merge the two.
Most interested in where this is going!
Your Newman is adorable. Your windmill scene is stunning, and the basement scene has so much realism, like that washer, I think that's at my daughters house right now. :)
Also wanted to drop in and thank you for the tip about the render settings you left on another post. The setting the time to 0 and turning off render quality, great tip! Thank you!
Thank you, @deathbycanon.
Newman is more than just a pretty face, though. He has a very distinctive personality. He acts like a ragdoll with you pick him up, but when he's done with the loving, he lets you know, vocally and with his "body language." He hates to use the pet door, so he sits by the front door until someone opens it, whether to let him in or out, or just because they were going in or out themselves. (Unless he has a need that won't wait, of course.) He'll walk right past the pet door to find hubby watching TV, go through this little routine of rubbing against hubby's legs, meowing, (more like a squeek,) and if that doesn't work, jumping into hubby's lap. And the well-trained staff member will get up, walk past the pet door another 25 steps or so and open the door for the cat, and then go back to watching his program on TV! (Gotta love 'em both, ya' know?) LOL
Sometimes everything just comes together. That's what happened with the windmill scene. I'm really happy you like it.
That washer is one of the props that came with The Basement, as is the vacuum. I've moved the props around, (and hidden anything I don't want to use.) In these images, the only things I've added are the laundry, and everything in the area of the hanging tapestry and apple crates.
I'm glad you found that tip useful. Now if we could just convince all the PAs to uncheck Progressive Rendering when they create Render-Settings for their products! lol
Here's another WIP of the basement, with more "stuff" added:
And here's a closeup of the "ugly" lamp. It doesn't have a bottom! I don't think it will be seen from an angle where it will be an issue though. A simple plane and transmap can fix that, if necessary.
The basement is starting to get a lived in look, that's for sure. You have a real knack for giving that look to your scenes and making them look so much less sterile.
At first glance, I thought I was looking at an image of someone's basement living space
Great job!
Trish
Its coming together quite nicely!
Goodness, you're working hard on this one! Achieving good results too.
Thank you, @Worllds_Edge. That "knack" comes from being a perfectionist. Trust me, it's a both a blessing and a curse!
Thank you, @Stormlyght. It made me smile that a WIP could fool you!
Thank you, @IceDragonArt.
Thank you, @the midget. Work is off and on, or I'd go crazy with all the little bits and bobs to add.
Summer's Fae
This is actually a variation of the original image I created for the PFDLives edition of Llola Lane's Monthly Render Challenge. In the original, the camera is to the side, showing the entire fae and she is much closer to the tree. This month's challenge is the shape of a triangle. The pose of the fae's legs create a triangle, but I also modified the transmap for the leaves so that all the leaves are triangles, too. I used Khloe for Karyssa for the fae, and in the original, she isn't wearing a stitch of clothing, which is why I created this variation. If you'd like to see the original, I've posted it here, in my Deviant Art gallery, tucked behind a mature content filter due to the full nudity.
I'm pretty sure my girl didn't want this version published; Apparently faeries do not like to wear clothing, a strictly human construct, one she quite approved of—for humans!
I have never had a pose or expression change on me after saving, but this one did. The neck bent further back, the smile became less wide and the mouth dropped open further, the eyes pointing up and the lids slightly open. Some of the issues I had I could chalk up to being tired and forgetting the local camera dimensions needed to be added to the general Render Settings for the spot renders and stuff like that. But not the expression. Thank goodness I used Expression Mixer to create the expression in the first place. (It keeps the last applied settings!) I zeroed out all the dials for her face, opened Expression Mixer and reapplied the expression. (I had to adjust the neck bend manually, though.) It took me three days, three full renders and what seemed like a hundred spot renders to finally get this image completed! Spot renders were around the eyes. Those beautiful lashes and the "wet" hair were intersecting. I finally got spots I could use to "paint" the hair over the lashes. The original image is 4000 pixels wide, and the eyes/lashes/hair is still a very small area to work on!
But forget the fae for a moment. That set is really nice. If you don't have it already, you may want to wishlist Tree of Life from Flipmode. I loaded it mainly for the HDRI, but realized the set tiself would be perfect for the Sycamore Tree I used from Daz's Sentinels of the Forest. This set has some of the nicest ground textures I've seen in a long time; specifically not so stretched as to look blurry, pixelated, or full of jpeg artifacts. And if you look closely at the water, you can see the rocks on the bottom.
I like the trees from the Sentinels product because, though it is an older product, the roots have several bones each. I used the bones to adjust the roots, along with DForms to create a morph for the center island to bulge upward and meet the base of the tree. Unfortunately, the morph caused the island to intersect with it's vegetation, so I hid those for this render. All in all, a really wonderful set.
For a complete list of products used, or to see the 2K wide image, visit the gallery page here.
Do you ever have trouble coming up with an idea for a 3D scene? I do, most of the time. It's one of the reasons I decided to participate in Llola Lane's monthly challenges, both here on Daz and on the alternate thread on the PFDLives forum, (members only, but it's free to join.) Even when real life is throwing lemons at me, I still manage to get my head into creative mode when I have a specific goal. This month's challenge is the shape Rectangle.
While looking for a bit of inspiration in my product list, I came across the Alley Scene, and was immediately intrigued by the grid of the pseudo-roof. I set up the camera angle, removing the ground, and used the camera settings in the Parameters to fill the frame with the set. Then it was just a matter of finding an HDRI that provided sunlight and white clouds on a blue sky. I tried several before settling on this one from the Sunny Sky HDRIs from Dimension Theory. I moved the dome using both the Rotation setting and the x-, y-, and z-axes in the Render Settings->Environment until I was happy with the pattern of the shadows on the left wall. Here's a screenshot. All the objects in this scene are from the default load of the Iray scene preset.
And here is the scene as rendered through the camera:
Lookin' Up
I think you did a great job on the rectangle theme. Something I would not have thought of.
I do occaisionally lose focus and struggle a bit with what to do. when that happens I pick a category and start at the top, and make a render around whatever item at the top of the list that I haven't used yet. If I want to challenge myself I pick more than one category lol. Might be scenes, might be characters or clothing or animals.... My biggest problem with challenges and contests is that I can't ever seem to get them done on time.
The windmill scene is quite nicely done! Seems you are doing some interesting things with environments lately.
^__^
Thank you, @IceDragonArt. I just opened Smart Content, the Products tab, selected All Products, and started scrolling. I took note of a couple of products as I went along, but when I saw the Alley Scene thumbnail, I knew I wanted to give it a try and stopped searching.
Thank you, @Rakuda. The environment sets seem to lend themselves well to the shapes in the challenge. The windmill scene is one of my favorites.
I haven't had anything new to put up on this thread for a number of reasons, but one really big reason is products that don't work the way they should. Do you remember the thread in The Commons complaining about issues using the G8 Morphing Fantasy Dress on Teen Josie/Willa/Ktarya? (If not, here's the link.) In that thead, I pointed out that the G3 MFD had exactly the same issue.
Here's an image from the original thread, showing the issue with the right hip, as well as problems with the armpits.
Now here's a viewport capture of four G8 figures wearing the PC+ Breeze outfit I recently purchased. Figures are from left to right: G8 Base Female, Monique 8, P3D Mylou, and P3D Hailey.
One of the things I found interesting is while the top and jacket have the same issue as the MFD, it is on opposite sides from each other. The top has the issue on the figure's right side and the jacket has the issue on the figure's left side. The problem is most pronounced on Hailey, the shortest figure, but you can see even Monique has the distortion, if less pronounced.
Now look at the same four figures wearing the Seven Seas Outfit that came in The Girl 8 pro bundle:
There isn't the slightest bit of distortion showing on any of the outfits!
I've had similar issues with products for the males, too, when the outfit includes long flowing over-garments. I'm going to do more testing, but at this point, I think I may stop buying any clothing sold as PC+. At least until I've learned how to fix issues like the one above with Breeze.
That's disappointing. And honestly, I don't know why they don't fix this stuff. The morphing fantasy dress is a fun product and I would use it more often I think if it wasn't such a pain to work with sometimes. I wonder sometimes if that issue would require an entire remodel of the clothing and maybe that's why they don't fix it.
@IceDragonArt, Fisty commented on it in the MFD thread:
My question is, why does the exact same issue show up on clothing that's not a refit of something older? As @Fisty pointed out, it will do the same with a new mesh, but why doesn't Daz/PC+ test for this problem? How does this even get past QA? Is it because the item doesn't claim to support any figure other than G8F? Even so, if this is just a matter of proper weight maps and JCMs, QA should be testing specifically for this. As a user, I shouldn't have to learn what the PAs know, just so I can use PC+ clothing items on more than the base figure.
Okay. Turns out I'm still "a bit" put out about this because I wasted a lot of time trying to use Breeze on a PA's character. I thought dForce would solve the problem, but it did not. Usually, time spent fighting with a product ends up being a learning experience. Not so with Breeze. The only thing I learned was to be very wary of PC+ clothing items.
Thanks I will have to check it out. I don't remember a thread on that (but that doesn't mean anything at all because half the time, I can't remember what I came into the room for lol) I've come across several threads and thought oh, this looks interesting, and I've already commented. I've learned to skim through before commenting lol.
Here's the link.