Daz 3D is part of 
Connect
DAZ Productions, Inc.
7533 S Center View Ct #4664
West Jordan, UT 84084
Licensing Agreement | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy | EULA
© 2024 Daz Productions Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Comments
well, actually I don't figure out your lighting settings of the whole scene, I will probably create an hemispherical cloud dome as participating medium if fog filter didn't have to work fine. I would add a big glowing half-cylinder behind the camera to lit the scene more and simulate city light flares
Thanks Magaremoto - I've saved this comment on my HD for when I get to that point in the animation. Hopefully later this year.
I guess what you mean. in my opinion Chicago and Philadelphia are very interesting to live in for some time
Apologies, but I just have to comment.... :)
Wow. I'm so impressed I'm almost speechless. That's quite possibly the first time in memory that someone actually suggested the use of an actual photo as a guide for generating CG images. Wow. Bravo magremoto !!!
IMO, if you really want to develop CG images that impact viewers, a key step in the process is analyzing the real world and figuring out why it visually impacts viewers.
In this case, a gorgeous nighttime image of the Chicago skyline will make you almost breathless. The variations in lighting and color and texture and composition all work together to make our jaws drop. And without all of those complex components as a guide, via a photograph, it's too easy to get it 60% right, and forget or be unaware of many of the components, and call it good.
But when you analyze and study a photograph, it's much easier to determine how good or not-so-good your images are.
Anyway, just my opinion and I'll shut up now...
BTW, still no C9 betas? What's up with that?
Actually, depending on what is going in the upper atmosphere a city can look very dark, especially at street level looking up.
The way I see it, many of the city night scape images you see in Google images are from professionals taking shots at particular times to capture a certain feel.
I live in the Caribbean. I have seen the same cities from afar, from the main highway, and some nights you would think the entire city is a sports event and other nights it is pitch black above the sky scrapers as I watch from the highway as I pass by. And only around the skyscrapers do you see so much light bouncing.
A full moon in the Caribbean is so bright that in a clear night you can actually see your shadow and see 100 feet in front of you. Looking at a city when the full moon is shinning is very different than in a typical night.
Ha ha. Go on then I'll bite. I am using reference images, I have a whole collection of reference night images on Pinterest here. Which anyone is welcome to browse and use. http://www.pinterest.com/scififunk/the-city-at-night/
Overall I'd like to do that above city glow. I think it would add to the scene. atm nearly all of the time is going on the modelling. The project is two years behind with all the implications that brings. so alas I have to move on.
However, although I have to leave a few things undone this time, the next big scene should involve less modelling and I hope to address these issues then. This time out I've used 2x zplanes with slight grey colouring and blur to make the city go off into the distance.
Then again this whole discussion is a little moot. Octane is coming soon. Yes it will bring it's own problems, but we'll all get closer to photo realism at that point.
Onwards!
Not just in the Caribbean. ;-) What you need is clear atmosphere and to be away from light pollution. Try the frozen north when the air is so cold it has hardly any moisture. It is unbelievable how bright it gets just from the star shine.
A frame from Episode 9.
I'm getting closer to releasing this now. The animation is complete (minus fixes). 28 fixes to go plus a whole load of overnight rendering.
EPISODE 9 is almost upon us!
Rendering completed now. Currently working through the post (visuals and rest of audio).
Episode 9 features stern looking authority figures like this character.
Looking forward to seeing the final video, the stills have been very impressive!
Thanks Philw.
I'm putting on the Camera lens blur via After Effects now. Man, what a difference some DOF makes!
Awesome Sauce, Boss!
Thanks man,
I'm on a sugar filled rush to finish this thing now (been waiting since May 2011).
Yeah, I know. Big fans, like me, notice these things :)
I really love the drive that you have towards this. And it's really refreshing to see, because my goal is so similar to what you're doing. We both have unique styles from one another - you'll see that part in time - which I think will be really cool in the end. I can hardly wait to show you some of mine. I've been talking about it since I've started the idea years ago! But, you know how it is... there's a lot to prepare for before finally cranking out those renders night and day.
At first, I was a bit jealous of those of you who have, and know how to use well, After Effects from Adobe. That new subscription thing is cool, though, making it affordable to to a lot more people, and then you're also working with the latest and greatest. Personally, I wouldn't mind working with older versions of stuff - so long as it does what I need it to.
But I'm really growing a comfort zone for my Dogwaffle Howler now, which has diminished my desire for other effects-in-post software. It's not the same... I know. But the difference is gorgeous for the difference in what I am doing... again... contributing to our styles will be so different in the end.
But your inspiration and 'behind-the-scenes' coverage is so fun to take in, lie as it occurs. And then you put together tutorials on the success of getting around what seem to be impossibilities along the way. Look at the huge collection you have up there now! I love that!
I commend you for all of this and, as always, eagerly await the next episode... always!
So you really have to just keep doing this. Okay?
Absolutely! For as long as I can maintain this part-time working lifestyle I'm committed.
Tell you what Dartan, I'm very excited about what Octane is going to do. You've done the right thing holding back on the renders. I'm going to have to re-render the old (DAZ) episodes (1-4 and the Pilot) in Octane to bring it all up to a similar standard of "look".
I've not made a tutorial for a while because I want viewers to have the "future shock" for the first time in the episode, but there were more obstacles to overcome to make this one, and I'll be sharing them when we are live.
btw. Please do PM me when you get to render something final (or even demo) from your own film. I'm very interested in other Independents work (because we all know what a tremendous (but fun) time sacrifice it is).
I'm still cautious in tip-toeing towards Octane. I would have to do it from Carrara, as that's my animation tool. But it's also my shader environment as well. I'm not so sure that I want to adopt a whole new shading solution to what I've already done - but we'll see. The Octane developer sure looks like he's making it an easy switch-over from Carrara shaders to his, though.
But the way things are right now, it seems that Carrara is rendering fast enough for me to do my show. That's always been one of my favorite things about Carrara. But to get even faster... that's a proposition that's nigh impossible to ignore! :ahhh:
The Octane plugin for Carrara will also give me the opportunity to save my Octane shader creations directly to my browser.
My Shader browser has become a very powerful tool in all of my production. Clips browser too. You know... when I animate a car to come cruisin' the streets in a normal fashion, it is a car whose shaders have been massively tweaked to look how I want the car to look - so I save the shaders. But I can also store the animation in a clip, that can now be used on other moving things. Pretty neat.
I'll absolutely PM you. I am constantly rendering animations, but none have been for the actual production. Just tests before I save the scene. I am eager to get this going, so production is in progress, but in several different directions at the same time - so for a solo artist, this takes, like you say, a lot of time.
That's good stuff with the Shader and Clip browser. Very disciplined.
If you do make the switch to Octane then you'll keep all of this of course. I don't know if you are aware of this but there is a live database of shaders being added to all the time for Octane Renderers. For example I'm very inexperienced with Octane atm, but using someone elses Emitter shader I was able to get Wall lights, Hanging lights, table lamps and even figure out how to make my own spotlight.
You just type in the name of what you want into a search text field, and more often than not someone has been there before you. Click on the shader and drop it into the name of the shading domain (at least thats how it works in DAZ). Easy.
I'll be sharing my journey of course, but the Octane stuff will be split between their forum and threads on this one.
Looking forward to your PM at some point then.
Looking amazing Sci Fi,
Hows octane on the render speed? Are you rendering everything 1080p?
Also, Dartanbeck Adobe is now giving away it's Creative Suite 2 free. That includes After Effects CS2.
Got a link. I nosed around the Adobe website, but I must have missed it.
Never mind. I googled it. Turns out it's only for those with an existing license.
I would love to get my hands on some free software, sure. But I'm really happy with my Howler! :)
That's weird as I downloaded it and installed it on my PC, but I only had licenses for CS 6 MAC not CS2 PC.
You should only have to sign up for adobe. https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/entitlement/index.cfm?e=cs2_downloads
That's a brilliant share man, thanks a lot!
Downloading like a nutter right now.
Regarding Render sizes and speeds. Yes I moved to 1080p with Episode 8, and I'm not going back to 720. I plan to re-render the old DAZ episodes in 1080p using Octane and the cloud (if it will work for DAZ scenes).
First up is learning all those light based tricks to speed up rendering. Atm I can render daylight scenes very fast (varies but always under the minute at 2000 samples). It's the night / multiple light scenes where study is needed.
I plan to learn some tricks to get me by, and then pay to use the cloud for the final render (think of it as renting a super computer rather than losing money to buying the best hardware you can afford). The network rendering (coming with 2.0 of Octane) will enhance my local rendering speed as well.
Very exciting times!