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[Released] Now-Crowd Billboards - Modern City Life

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Comments

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245

    I just bought this product, based on the fantastic customer support RiverSoft Art provided for me over in the Party Time thread. I was actually asking about the free Christmas Elves, but got stellar support anyway! Who could not buy from such a great vendor? I look forward to making my first Modern City Life billboard image and posting it here.

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:

    I just bought this product, based on the fantastic customer support RiverSoft Art provided for me over in the Party Time thread. I was actually asking about the free Christmas Elves, but got stellar support anyway! Who could not buy from such a great vendor? I look forward to making my first Modern City Life billboard image and posting it here.

    Thank you very much!  I really appreciate the kind words.  I look forward to you posting your images smiley

  • xyer0xyer0 Posts: 5,938

    I agree. Great vendor!

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    xyer0 said:

    I agree. Great vendor!

    blush​blush​blush​

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    edited January 2018

    Here it is! My first Modern City Life Billboards render. The only "real" character is G8M in the foreground. I darkened the diffuse color of the billboards a bit to blend better with the night scene lighting from HDRI Haven's Modern Buildings Night. I think it looks pretty darn good, but I welcome suggestions for improvement on my use of the billboards.

    (Darn. I forgot to adjust G8M's eyes to look at the camera. They are off a little.)

    G8M Modern City Billboards.jpg
    2000 x 1500 - 1M
    Post edited by barbult on
  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:

    Here it is! My first Modern City Life Billboards render. The only "real" character is G8M in the foreground. I darkened the diffuse color of the billboards a bit to blend better with the night scene lighting from HDRI Haven's Modern Buildings Night. I think it looks pretty darn good, but I welcome suggestions for improvement on my use of the billboards.

    (Darn. I forgot to adjust G8M's eyes to look at the camera. They are off a little.)

    Looks good!  The shadows for the bike billboard match nicely; nice work! smiley  Who is the person in the background on the bridge?  I can't recognize it since it is so small.

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245

    The person on the bridge is part of the HDRI.

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:

    The person on the bridge is part of the HDRI.

    Ah!  Good, I thought I was going senile as I couldn't remember doing such a billboard smiley

    Your image looks really good.  And thank you again for being a great customer!

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    edited January 2018

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    G8M Konigsallee with billboard.jpg
    1600 x 2000 - 2M
    Post edited by barbult on
  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    edited January 2018

    The billboards are high enough resolution and quality to be in the image foreground, too. Both people are billboards.

     

    Konigsallee Billboards.png
    1600 x 2000 - 4M
    Post edited by barbult on
  • xyer0xyer0 Posts: 5,938
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    This looks great, barbult!

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    edited January 2018
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    Post edited by RiverSoft Art on
  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    The render of Modern City Life billboards comes out the same, whether I have Use Soft Mask checked or not. I always get a rendered shadow. The Opacity channel mask always shows the fuzzy white shadow area.

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    The render of Modern City Life billboards comes out the same, whether I have Use Soft Mask checked or not. I always get a rendered shadow. The Opacity channel mask always shows the fuzzy white shadow area.

    Strange.  I just checked my installation of Modern City Life and it has the files.  The soft mask files are called *.mask.png; the hard mask files are called *.solidmask.png.  Do you have those files in the Runtime directories?

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    edited January 2018
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    The render of Modern City Life billboards comes out the same, whether I have Use Soft Mask checked or not. I always get a rendered shadow. The Opacity channel mask always shows the fuzzy white shadow area.

    Strange.  I just checked my installation of Modern City Life and it has the files.  The soft mask files are called *.mask.png; the hard mask files are called *.solidmask.png.  Do you have those files in the Runtime directories?

    No, I don't have any *.solidmask.png files in Runtime\Textures\RiverSoft Art\Now-Crowd Billboards\Modern City subfolders. I even uninstalled with Daz Connect and installed with DIM, in case it was a Daz Connect issue. Here is a little snippet of what I see in one of the folders.

    Edited to add: DIM installed 15 packages. Should there be more?

     

    No solidmask files.JPG
    756 x 212 - 40K
    Now Crowd DIM.JPG
    337 x 393 - 44K
    Post edited by barbult on
  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245

    I'm having a ball with this product. I really like the everyday nature of the billboards. They fit in with the type of scenes I make. I found in this image that I can use DOF to reduce some of the too-crisp look of the billoards in the background on the slightly fuzzy HDRI. 

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    The render of Modern City Life billboards comes out the same, whether I have Use Soft Mask checked or not. I always get a rendered shadow. The Opacity channel mask always shows the fuzzy white shadow area.

    Strange.  I just checked my installation of Modern City Life and it has the files.  The soft mask files are called *.mask.png; the hard mask files are called *.solidmask.png.  Do you have those files in the Runtime directories?

    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    The render of Modern City Life billboards comes out the same, whether I have Use Soft Mask checked or not. I always get a rendered shadow. The Opacity channel mask always shows the fuzzy white shadow area.

    Strange.  I just checked my installation of Modern City Life and it has the files.  The soft mask files are called *.mask.png; the hard mask files are called *.solidmask.png.  Do you have those files in the Runtime directories?

    No, I don't have any *.solidmask.png files in Runtime\Textures\RiverSoft Art\Now-Crowd Billboards\Modern City subfolders. I even uninstalled with Daz Connect and installed with DIM, in case it was a Daz Connect issue. Here is a little snippet of what I see in one of the folders.

    Edited to add: DIM installed 15 packages. Should there be more?

     

    Huh, you are right.  I can confirm the zips I uploaded contained the files, but the ones in DIM do not have it.  I will contact Daz to see what happened.

    In the meantime, you can download the solid masks for all billboards here: http://www.RiverSoftArt.com/Files/NowCrowdBillboards-ModernCityLifeSolidMasks.zip  Don't worry, it is a small 45MB file smiley

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:

    I'm having a ball with this product. I really like the everyday nature of the billboards. They fit in with the type of scenes I make. I found in this image that I can use DOF to reduce some of the too-crisp look of the billoards in the background on the slightly fuzzy HDRI. 

    I am very happy that you are enjoying the product! smiley  That looks really, really good.  Very nice job of integrating the billboards into the HDRI.  The DOF worked well.

  • FenixPhoenixFenixPhoenix Posts: 3,084

    The only reason why I haven't gotten any of your billboard products yet is lack of space :(. I first need to buy a hard drive (which I will, hopefully soon!) and dedicated it only to DAZ haha. (But I kid you not, I'll do it!)

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    The render of Modern City Life billboards comes out the same, whether I have Use Soft Mask checked or not. I always get a rendered shadow. The Opacity channel mask always shows the fuzzy white shadow area.

    Strange.  I just checked my installation of Modern City Life and it has the files.  The soft mask files are called *.mask.png; the hard mask files are called *.solidmask.png.  Do you have those files in the Runtime directories?

    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

    I made another image with the same G8M guy (changed the color of his clothes and lightened his skin some) and one billboard way in the back on the right side of the image. To make the billboard blend with the low contrast and blur of the HDRI I ended up rendering the billboard separately and compositing it in Photoshop. I erased most of the billboard shadow, because it was too strong for the HDRI. Later I thought, why not just composite the billboard PNG itself instead of rendering it first? Has anyone tried that?

     

    That looks great!  It's just a subtle detail added to your render.

    If you don't want to have the pre-rendered shadow in your scene.  Uncheck the "Use Soft Mask" in the Change Angle script.

    You can certainly just composite it yourself.  However, if you use the billboard, it can have light and shadows cast on it based on elements in your scene (not with HDRIs but with 3D geometry).  This can make it seem more real.  But the Now-Crowd Billboards is just a tool, use it how it makes you want and you feel gives the result you want.

    The render of Modern City Life billboards comes out the same, whether I have Use Soft Mask checked or not. I always get a rendered shadow. The Opacity channel mask always shows the fuzzy white shadow area.

    Strange.  I just checked my installation of Modern City Life and it has the files.  The soft mask files are called *.mask.png; the hard mask files are called *.solidmask.png.  Do you have those files in the Runtime directories?

    No, I don't have any *.solidmask.png files in Runtime\Textures\RiverSoft Art\Now-Crowd Billboards\Modern City subfolders. I even uninstalled with Daz Connect and installed with DIM, in case it was a Daz Connect issue. Here is a little snippet of what I see in one of the folders.

    Edited to add: DIM installed 15 packages. Should there be more?

     

    Huh, you are right.  I can confirm the zips I uploaded contained the files, but the ones in DIM do not have it.  I will contact Daz to see what happened.

    In the meantime, you can download the solid masks for all billboards here: http://www.RiverSoftArt.com/Files/NowCrowdBillboards-ModernCityLifeSolidMasks.zip  Don't worry, it is a small 45MB file smiley

    Downloaded, installed and working. Thank you!

  • AlmightyQUESTAlmightyQUEST Posts: 2,003

    Thanks for the direct link, but if DAZ does make a DIM update, can you see if they can just add a single file? Normally it will just look like all files need to be redownloaded, which isn't usually too much of a problem, but this product is a bit of an exception smiley.

  • barbultbarbult Posts: 24,245

    One more image with a billboard in the back. Again I used DOF to blend everything. I added the City Bike back by the billboard for added interest.

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    giselle3000 said:

    The only reason why I haven't gotten any of your billboard products yet is lack of space :(. I first need to buy a hard drive (which I will, hopefully soon!) and dedicated it only to DAZ haha. (But I kid you not, I'll do it!)

    No problem.  I hope you enjoy them when you do have the space.

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:
    RiverSoft Art said:
    barbult said:

     

    Huh, you are right.  I can confirm the zips I uploaded contained the files, but the ones in DIM do not have it.  I will contact Daz to see what happened.

    In the meantime, you can download the solid masks for all billboards here: http://www.RiverSoftArt.com/Files/NowCrowdBillboards-ModernCityLifeSolidMasks.zip  Don't worry, it is a small 45MB file smiley

    Downloaded, installed and working. Thank you!

    Great!  That is how it is supposed to be! smiley

    AlmightyQUEST said:

    Thanks for the direct link, but if DAZ does make a DIM update, can you see if they can just add a single file? Normally it will just look like all files need to be redownloaded, which isn't usually too much of a problem, but this product is a bit of an exception smiley.

    The last time I had a script update, Daz only updated one of the zips.  Hopefully, they will do that for this but I don't have any control over that.

  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    barbult said:

    One more image with a billboard in the back. Again I used DOF to blend everything. I added the City Bike back by the billboard for added interest.

    I like this one a lot!  You are really embracing using the product.  Instead of crowds though, you use the product as Now-Accents! smiley  "Adding a drop of people to your backgrounds to keep it interesting" smiley

  • BeeMKayBeeMKay Posts: 7,019
    edited January 2018

    I've been making good use of your bilboards, too. Here's the latest page from Demon Division Webcomic, and as the scene unfolds, there will be some more people of the billboard crowd featured.

    Demon-Division_011_English.jpg
    950 x 1344 - 323K
    Post edited by BeeMKay on
  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    BeeMKay said:

    I've been making good use of your bilboards, too. Here's the latest page from Demon Division Webcomic, and as the scene unfolds, there will be some more people of the billboard crowd featured.

    Nice!  Really good!  I like your use of rotating the billboard to disguise that they are not actually moving

  • BeeMKayBeeMKay Posts: 7,019
    edited January 2018

    Thanks. smiley It worked pretty nice with the couple, as they would no make large movements when they just start walking, and cover parts of each other.

    With the others, it's tricky; I have to take into account how much time passes in the scene and how much movement there would be realistically in that short or long timeframe. Technically, the lady in white and the couple shouldn't have moved that far, as the jogging character would've covered the distance between his position in image 1 and the crash site in a second or so, but I just go with artistic license here. wink

    With walking characters, a left foot-right foot variation would be cool so you could actually cover a walking cycle somewhat. But that would just mean more images.

    Post edited by BeeMKay on
  • RiverSoft ArtRiverSoft Art Posts: 6,578
    BeeMKay said:

    [...] I just go with artistic license here. wink

    With walking characters, a left foot-right foot variation would be cool so you could actually cover a walking cycle somewhat. But that would just mean more images.

    Well the artistic license worked.  I didn't even think about how slow the running guy moved smiley

    The walking character idea is nice but it would mean a whole new billboard.  Fortunately, you don't need to.  Just add 180 to the Y rotation of the billboard. 

     

    Woman Walking.jpg
    1000 x 1000 - 45K
    Woman Walking 180.jpg
    1000 x 1000 - 45K
  • BeeMKayBeeMKay Posts: 7,019
    edited January 2018

    Nice try, but that would mean she'd swap her handbag in mid-step. Not to mention the shadow-flip-flopping. devil

    It should work for other characters you have in your set, though.

    Post edited by BeeMKay on
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