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Hello kashyyyk
Looking good !!!!!!!
I have still got a long way to go in Carrara, but you gotta crawl before you walk, and then walk before you run.
Question on the water droplets, are you able to modify the size of the droplets as well as add some whole sections of water ?
It would not have to be a huge variety, but if there were a few changes just to fool the eyes it would look terrific.
Was hoping to do that for the DAZ3D August contest, but it had me scratching my head big-time !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thinking of a simple scene for this contest, just have to finish watching Phil's excellent tutorials first.
Regards, Bunyip (Amateur Pixel destroyer)
Welcome Bunyip02! I'm looking forward to your entry!
Wonderful work everyone. Great job rigging the amphibian, EP. Maybe a future challenge could involve rigging an obj? The content browser has a few candidates. Kashyyyk, the creature from the lake looks awesome, as in full of awe. Varsel, very regal. I know we can count on you for a very vibrant scene. Dustrider, you stole my "Stephanie in a chapel with an axe" idea (just kidding), so I am going to do something else for my second entry.
I have always thought that the default terrain textures are rather flat. For my second entry, I am going to focus on improving a default terrain. In the attached, I have inserted a default terrain, applied a zero edge filter, and used the terrain editor for just a few strokes to create a little variation. What we have here is a basic hill. The water pump is from the LS witch house set. The result is my "before" pic (attached).
Theme? Jill on a hill with a pail of water. :-)
And Jill can't go up the hill all alone. There is a Daz figure called "Jack O'Lantern." I tracked him down, brought his texturemap into PS, and added the evidence of why Jill wanted to take him to the hilltop - and it wasn't for water, you know what I mean? Actually, it was pretty easy to cut and paste some lipstick on to Jack's face.
Great work diomede.
I did my weight painting today.
With the holiday this past weekend and my rehearsals starting tonight, I have a feeling this is going to go at a snail's pace.
Back to the terrain. I applied a rain and wind erosion filter (set very low, just 3% or so), then exported the heightmap to photoshop. I used layers to create a broken trail ad successively wider swaths of land. The idea is to be able to use the layers list function to apply different shaders to different regions around the trail, and to be able to use targeted replicators.
In the attached pic, I've used red, yellow, purple and green to show the regions that the opacity masks will separate in a layers list shader tree.
Man! Things do move right along when your out of it for a day or so. Looking good everyone!
Varsel Awsome chair!
kashyyyk I always forget about adding gel images to lights for an extra layer of texture, great tip!
evilproducer Hermie is too cute.
diomede64 You sure have covered some ground. Sorry :red:. Definitely interested in seeing results of your improvements on the default terrain.
I'm slogging away with materials in my project. Clearly it's not my forte, but I'm enjoying it. No new techniques here. I'm able to follow someone else's recipe, then flavor to taste. I hope that's sufficient. How much do we need to alter something to count? Does it need to be dramatic or is subtle ok? I don't think I can do procedural textures like others. I'm trying to improve the look of stock textures maps on a figure and it's clothing which are pretty flat.
I hope I haven't pointed anyone to the wrong path. Sorry. :red:
Here is another step in my attempt to improve the default terrain with a hillside walking path. For the moment, I will still be working with presets, but will make the transitions between the path, the wider swath, and the rest of the hillside less severe.
- start with layer list, with each region having its own preset terrain shader (path is a yellow rock).
* see first pick with divider lines*
- Now, convert each layer's terrain shader to a complex mixer. The terrain shader slides to the first position.
- Fill the second slot of the first layer with a terrain peset that you want to be the base of the entire hill.
- Use control/click/drag to copy this second terran preset to the second slot of each mixer.
- Use a function of choice (fractal, etc.) to combine the mixers. For this, I used cellular.
* see screen grab of shader tree.
- The transition between regions is less severe.
* see second pic *
Nice thing is that you can continue to edit the individual components of the shader tree and add more mixes. You can eve include a texture map of grass of ground cover in the mix.
More work to be done.
My water droplets are on 3 flat sheets, one the width of the whole monsters outstretched arms, and two smaller ones, one for each arm, plus 1 replicator for the monsters body. Here are two of the 4 water drop replicator settings. The other two have a 50% and 70% random size setting.
Here is my finished render of the monster to see the results.
I had to remove the gel it was making the shadows unrealistic looking.
For the water I used the lake water shader, I just adjusted the color a little to match the scene. I left the reflection and refraction the same, since it looked perfect.
Kashyyyk
Very Nice !!!!!!!
Hope you have got some great reptilian eyes lined up for this critter.
diomede64 - Man, your on fire!! your second project is looking great, as well as posting some very informative WIP's!
EvilProducer - Hermit came out great! He really shows how easy it is to model and rig your own figures in Carrara.
kashyyyk - Those water droplets are fantasic! I was felling bad that you couldn't use post for your water, but not now, I like these much better.
Here's an update on my project.
I just had to add in another theme element. So now I have Vicky(6) in the Gated Courtyard with a Really Big Battle Axe (and a big lance) ...... or ..... Vicky (4, + some G4) in the Stockade with Shackles (getting ready to try to grab the keys) ;-P
More stuff added, and more materials edited. The file from my last post was corrupted, probably due to some things I did to the Gated Courtyard model, because it got replaced by a cube >:( So I added it in again, edited the materials again, and decided I really didn't like the original ground texture. I replaced the rather uninteresting ground texture with a road bricks texture set from the Octane LiveDB. I like this much better!
I added the bucket and chalice on the right side of the image, and adjusted the specular and highlight values, both looked very flat. I didn't edit any of the materials on the grain bag, crate, or crate cover/blanket. I also added a custom V4/G4 character inside the stockade with shackles/chains. I only did some very minor editing of materials on the second figure.
I may change the outfit on the second figure before I post in the entry thread, it seems a bit too skimpy (although everything TOS wise is fully covered).
Oh... I almost forgot the keys! I found the keys on sharecg, but needed a big key ring for them. I made the key ring using a torus in Hexagon. I used shaders from the Octane LiveDB for the keys and key ring, then adjusted specular and roughness.
Also, you really need to click on the image to see the full resolution image to really see all the details.
I/m going to have another go at this challenge - seems every time I start an entry something horrible happens to my PC and I have to drop it :)
Thank you, Dustrider for the inspirational subject - all entries looking good!
This one is Geraldine with Sword by the River. G2F relaxing after a hard days' work slaying dragons in the temple:)
I was intending to not use any of my own modelling work in this one and only use freebies - but had to end up doing the sandals, clothing and river. Sword by KarlGarnham and helmet by mehilov, from ShareCG. I'll once again tear my hair out trying to give her some :)
This is very much the start of the project - no shading or lighting yet. Thought I'd post to encourage those, like me, who don't have C8.5 to use G2F. She's dressed and posed in DS then exported as .obj using MCJ's Teleblender - the advantage of this method is that it gathers all the maps in one place, so you don't have to go looking for them to tweak and you can mess with them without accidentally changing the originals.
As always, C&C most welcome:)
Still got another element to add to the scene, just got to get the right character for the scene.
(Taking a break from Critters and trying something different this time around)
This was done in DAZ3D 4.6, but my goal is to bring it into Carrara and get a great result with the reflections, shadows, & skin-tone.
Next render will be from Carrara !!!!!!
Amazing start, Roygee. I always learn something when you post. We've had some threads debating whether genesis2 works in C8.5, and here you are using it in an earlier version of Carrara. Nice.
This will be my second-to-last WIP for my second project this month. In this WIP, you can already see (I hope) the improvement in the terrain shader that comes merely from mixing Dartanbeck's forest shader with the preset complex green. Most of the rest of the work will be adjusting shaders and plant replicators. I will be replacing several simple colors in the terrain shader trees with gradients. I will also be applying several replicators for plants and rocks. When I get the finished product, I will post another WIP, but I doubt there will be any other techniques used.
Screengrab of Lights.
- sun light tied to realistic sky
- spotlight - with point at G2F. Also, spot light is restricted to the G2Fgroup (which includes hair and clothing).
Credits
- Dartanbeck terrain shader (forest for woodland realm) as part of a mixer
- GKDantas realistic leaves (I customized the textures by mixing in a gradient with "global" setting)
- Maple tree preset (customized bark texture, customized branch length and tree shape)
- Oktoberfest dress by trendy renders (I reserve the right to use a custom dress with so much time)
- Cinnia hair (ditto regarding possible custom hair)
- Jack OLantern (Daz character)
- (may use some plants in replicators, such as Lisa Botanicals)
- G2F character Lotus
Original and custom objects
- water well and bucket
- terrain model - customized by erosion filters, zero edge, shader mixers, and with photoshop distribution maps
- plant and rock replicators (planned)
- Jack O Lantern - added lipstick marks to texture map, (May do other shader changes or make an expression morph)
- Maple tree - some branch and shape changes in plant editor, apply custom bark shader, and shader mixer for leaves
Great work, Bunyip02. It would be nice if we didn't have to adjust textures and shaders of objects brought in to Carrara from Daz Studio. But at least Carrara has a have a very powerful shader system to work with.
Edit: So happy with a test render of slightly changed sun angle, moving spot behind the Jill figure, setting global illumination and gamma 2.2, that I had to share. Now, can I add the plant/ground debris replicators and adjust the terrain swaths without screwing it up?
Another couple of great entry's forom Roygee and Bunyip02!!
Roygee - great idea to show people that they don't have to have C8.5 to use any of the Genesis figures! I never even thought of using MCJ’s Teleblender for exporting from DS to Carrara. Great idea!
Bunyip02 - It's great ot see your entry into to the challenge! Can't wait to see more, you can do some really nice car paint in Carrara ;-)
dustrider-
Thanks, this angle makes them look the best.
Bunyip02- no reptilian eyes, I actually used a wax with sss shader and I was going to have it give a glow with a couple red bulbs placed by the eyes, but didn't pursue it any further because of the placement of the camera wouldn't show it, right now it's a just the waxy shader.
It's really awesome to see some new faces mixed in with the regulars. I can't wait to see what gets entered. The harder to choose, the better!
I haven't had much time the last few days, but I have been playing around with camera angles for this:
http://www.daz3d.com/zeppelin-star
I still have to do some work on the textures. Once that's done, I'll get to work on the lighting and the figures.
I'm still trying to decide on how close I want to get. I want to show them obviously on an airship, but I don't want to lose the emphasis on the figures and all the work that I did for them....
I'm also of two minds on the scene I'm trying to evoke. I had initially thought about some kind of Steam Punk inspired action sequence, which could have been funny and surreal with Hermit the Amphibian and Vicki battling Steam Punk roustabouts.
On the other hand, if I want to show the figures better, something a bit more intimate, such as a romantic scene would do that. It could also be funny, albeit in an uncomfortable, kind of creepy way. Maybe if I evoke that cheesy scene from Titanic with Rose Pinktits and Starvey McArtist at the prow of the Titanic?
This post actually finds its origins at this OR4C thread where I got inspired by PhilW's work with the Naeima character and decided to try her out myself. With great help from PhilW , full disclosure! ;0)
Downloaded Naeima from ShareCg and installed her as per the installation guide that came with the download which was thankfully pretty straightforward. Did a test render with gamma correction set to 2.2, ambient at 0 and an HDRI environment set to the background at 163% intensity, and got eyelashes that looked like butterflies. Fixed that by tweaking the alpha channel in the lashes to get rid off the butter flies and used a multiplier operation on the colour channel of the fingernails to paint them. Realised I left the default scene light in there (had intended to render with only the primitive I created with a glow channel together with the HDRI - the whole lighting set-up done as per PhilW's Carrara Realism Training), I removed it and preferred the realism of the render, but I was now missing the highlights on the skin and just bumping up shininess and highlight was not fixing it, so I replaced the distant light and after many trials, got a passable result by setting its brightness to 5%. Not very happy with the render (it feels grainy, I used DOF but I don’t think that’s what it is, can’t figure it out though) but for a quick and spontaneous encounter with Naeima, I’m happy with the baby steps.
The second image is the one without the distant light in the scene, I wanted some shininess on the skin so when I replace the distant light at 5% brightness, I got the result in the third image which I preferred.
And now for the reveal! In the 4th image (which will evolve into my contest entry), Naeima meets Probe or is it Probe that meets Naeima in the Garden of......... Probe is an AI bot gone rogue, I modeled him about 3 years back in Form Z and brought him into Carrara earlier this year, where I re-textured and rigged him- weight painting and all, worked out pretty well in the test animation I did then. He hasn't resumed the adventures he was created for so I'm borrowing him for this contest. The clump of bush that helps Naeima meet the forum's nudity guidelines was created in the Carrara plant generator. The plant generator is alien territory to me, so any time I go in there, I just fiddle with all the controls and hope I don't get a carnivorous plant that will eat its way out of my computer screen.
Next for the contest image, I'm going to replicate some rocks across the infinite plane I set up in the scene, like PhilW did in one of the videos and I'll try to see if I can create some real grass as well (also learnt that from PhilW actually this entry is turning out to be entirely Phil Wilkes inspired). I've been tempted to throw in a space-ship somewhere, but I think I like the sparseness of the scene. As you can see from the screen-grab, the light set-up is so simple, just a glowing mesh, and one distant light plus the HDRI, I'll be looking at ways to improve it though, I really want an image that will pop.
Thanks for stopping by and thanks to all the great artists who have shared their work on this thread. I've been following the thread even if I've not been commenting. Bye for now.
Beautiful work!
that applies to a lot of us ;-)
that applies to a lot of us ;-)
Thanks! One finds ones self in such good company in this forum!
Looking forward to seeing the completed project DADA_universe! Thanks to Phil for being your inspiration. I really like your AI bot too.
Hi All,
Great work from all the entries so far.
Well, you did open it to all abilities so I'll show what I'm working on.
In the time I've used Carrara, I've only used default render settings and light settings (apart from the odd bulb or spotlight).
So what I show here is haphazard trial and error!
Character: DAZ S3 with Stephanie Tunic textured with The Princess Tunics
Environment: Abyss - not DAZ can I mention source?
I haven't any texture of my own.
OK, I've also decided to say no to flat 3D.
So, here I am,"focusing on using my own lighting with optimized materials/shaders to create the best real 3D render I can".
The “Vicky in a Temple/Tomb with a Sword” (in my case a spear) idea is new to me, but why not.
As it's new to me, Vicky cannot be a full fledge heroin, slayer of the dragons, saver of unworthy princes. She has to go through the whole process before.
Here she is a rookie soldier in an Amazon army. As in every army past, present or future, rookies get all the duties seasoned soldiers dislike. One of those is universally night guard duty.
So, here she is, out of her first night guard.
I still have some adjustments to make and, of course, the background. I don't have much time now, but I'll try to post some more details tomorrow.
Great first WIP Marcus, welcome to the challenge!
No worries about not having your own textures, all you need to do is make a significant improvement of the rendered output of a existing texture/shader in your scene (makes it easier for people like me who have zero artistic talent :bug: ).
I see a couple of places in your WIP where you could easily meet this requirement. Stephanie's hair looks a bit too shiney, this could be easily "fixed" by adjusting the highlight and shininess settings. Another possibility to meet the shaders modification requirement would be to give your monster a bit more highlight and shininess (you could also accomplish this easily by giving it just a touch of refelction). Others might have better suggestions, If you need any help doing this, just ask and someone will point you in the right direction (unfortunately I'll be in the middle of nowhere and won't have internet access for a couple of days, starting later today).
I'd definitely be interested in knowing where the environment came from. You can give the name, and where it;s from, you just can't post a link to another site.
I'm looking forward to seeing more on you entry!
Philemo - that really doesn't look like a first try at a “Vicky in a Temple/Tomb with a Sword” render, great pose/expression already!
Sorry, but my overly busy September is going to take me where no man has gone ........ um ...... uh .... I mean it's going to take me where no internet service has ever gone. I'll be out in the middle of no where for a couple of day's (starting in an hour or two). I might possibly be able to check in for a few minutes at night, but will probably be to dead tired for that.
Keep the WIP's coming - I'm hopping I'll find a lot of new entries when I surface again!
Dustrider,
Thanks for your welcoming response and sound advice.
The environment is called 'Abyss Vertical Dungeon' and I bought it last weekend at Renderosity (my first ever purchase from there).
It has four very tall rock walls with side tunnels and sections of brickwork and ledges which can be included or removed.
There are several kinds of stone or wooden bridges and platforms which span the different levels. It has a rock ceiling and a choice of base - either a pond or ruined basement architecture.
The whole thing consists of individual props and as such is a construction kit for fantasy images. It should keep me going for a long time to come.
When I began using it at the beginning of the week I posted some renders here but for this thread I started over. I hope that's OK.
The working screenshots I posted were to show the light settings I stumbled across. What I found interesting was that the yellowish NEGATIVE bulb and the blue spotlight combined to turn the drab brown of the dragon into green.
Philemo: when I looked at your picture enlarged I loved the way the items worn almost had an outline - not what I would describe as toon but a little bit in that direction. Its a look which I like very much.
Very cool