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Nooooo! So sorry, EP.
I am really impressed with the quality and speed being displayed. Among the complete or near complete, Silene, Headwax, and Kashyyyk each have very different interpretations, yet each is very much in the pulp tradition. And there is such professionalism by BooksbyDavid, Pimpy, Varsel and the rest. This is a very fun month.
As I seesaw back and forth between my ideas, I thought I would show one potential convenience associated with modeling and rigging within Carrara. It becomes very easy to use the vertex modeler to edit in the posed position as long as you have created a morph first. I will show how with my revised Femme Fatale.
I loaded my Femme mannequin in the vertex modeler. I modeled an off-the-shoulder glamorous dress in the same vertex object, but as a different polymesh. Before you attach the bone skeleton to the figure mesh,
- in the vertex modeling room for the figure mesh
- double click a polygon of the body to select it all, and use the top menu Selection : Name : Polygons to name the figure.
- under the morph tab midway down in the properties tray, select whole body, then create a morph area (name body)
- with the body morph area highlighted, click the arrow to the right to bring down the menu, and choose create target
- you will be prompted to choose a name for your morph target (choose "shrink")
- make any small placeholder morph, then choose validate and choose save, (I select all and scale to 99% for shrink)
- repeat by double clicking the dress, and use Selection : Name : Polygons to name the dress
- make a morph area and morph target for the dress (I scale to 101% but it any small change will do)
- make sure your morphs are saved, once validated they will be available under the general tab in the properties tray
What difference does it make?
My Femme Fatale has an off the shoulder dress. But when posed, the straps bend. To fix, I could try to use bone influences, etc. But it is very convenient to use the vertex modeler in the posed position to edit an existing morph.
- in assembly room, attach the figure mesh to the bone skeleton. this is under the animation tab from top menu
- pose the figure - identify any undesired results. In this case, I want to adjust the dress arm straps
- highlight the figure mesh and enter the vertex modeler (you can do this in the assembly room)
- your figure will most likely revert to its unposed "T" posiition
- in the top right menu, click the animation editing mode (middle choice)
- Your figure will change to its currently posed position (you may get an undesired double)
- In the modeling tab midway don, choose he morph tab
- Highlight the morph area for dress. You placeholder morph should be listed below
- Click "edit" next to the saved morph target (dress grow in my case)
- Use modeling tools to adjust dress as desired. I fixed the arm straps, but this can be used to address poke-through, etc
- (note - it can also be used to adjust elbows, knees, etc. if you want to fix joints, or you can create muscle bulges, etc.)
- make sure to save and validate the morph
Hi sukyl,
...exatly I don't know how it works but I love it too! Btw you dont must change parametric mapping. When you create a new texture in model room Carrara convert c all the old texture into the new one.
in this case I changed the original shader founded some times ago on CarraraCafe in the Mark Bremmer's tutorial. Here you can found the fantastic tutorial and the free scene .car file
http://carraracafe.com/tutorials/complex-lighting-tutorial-by-mark-bremmer/
pimpy Thanks for the explanation and lighting tutorial link. That's a hugely informative tutorial!
I took a break from robot building to set up the rest of my scene.
Here's a test render inserted into my earlier cover mockup. The robot will be standing about where the big cylinder on the right is.
Mark
EDIT: Both of these character had expressions on their faces when I posed them in DAZ Studio. When I opened the file back up in Carrra, the poses were fine but their expressions reset back to default. None of the expression/face dials seem to be doing anything in Carrara - no matter what I set them to, the expression does not change. I can't even move their eyes.
Does anyone have any idea what is going on?
EDIT AGAIN: Just noticed my test render had some poke-through that would have violated the TOS, so I removed the image. Whoops! I'll try again in a minute.
Ok, let's try this again.
Scene is all set up except for my robot, which I'm still working on (he'll go where the big grey cylinder is). The attached image is my test render of the final scene, sans robot, inserted into my cover mockup.
In the final version, I'm going to try and flatten the colors a bit in Photoshop to give it a more painted look and will lower the blacks a bit and shift the whole thing toward yellow to make it look a little aged. Unless it looks horrible, in which case I will do none of those things. :)
I don't know for sure. In a different thread a similar issue came up in which some morphs for Genesis 2 characters were not active after being exported from Daz Studio as a scene file. There was more than one potential culprit, but the general consensus seemed to be that the .duf file exported from Studio from which Carrara loads has to be in the same directory as the main genesis 2 files for studio. Not sure that really is the culprit, or even if it was for that case, that actually applies to the characters you are using. Maybe someone else has more specific info.
Hmmm. This is V4 and M4, so it's probably (?) not the same issue. I actually chose to use them because of all the random little issues I've read about people having with Genesis in Carrara; I figured the older figures would work perfectly, and other than the expressions, that has proven to be the case.
It's not a critical issue really - their expressions are not the focus of this image, and I can always play with it later.
Got my robot rigged at last. The rigging is terrible, but it's the first time I've ever rigged anything and I really don't plan on a ton of movement.
Just need to pose him in the final image, render, do a little bit of post-work fine tuning and I think I'l be all ready for the submission thread.
Mark
Excellent looking robot. rigging seems to be working fine. Good job. For M4 and V4, someone should be able to solve your expression issue. If no one chimes in with a solution here, it might be worth starting a new thread with M4/V4 Expression Problem as the subject line. Those figures are tried and true. Someone will have dealt with just about any issue before.
Thank you. I decided to go ahead and finish the image with the expressions as-is so I can have the rest of my weekend free, but I'll check back and if no one knows what's going on there then I'll take your advice and start a new thread about it.
Here's my final scene set-up in Carrara, the raw render and my post-worked final version, all ready for the submissions thread to open. :)
For post-work, I flattened and aged the coloring in Photoshop CS5 in a couple of steps, added some scratches, wrinkles and general wear, added a torn corner at the bottom and some tape to hold it together, fine tuned- the fraying on Michael's pants and of course added the text.
Mark
Final step
I made the render of the complete scene in Carrara
Using Gimp (filter option- artistic) I applied “cartoon filter” to the image. See image for parameters filter p.s. The language is Italian but the options are the same for all I think...
In Carrara I create a new scene using the converted image in Gimp as backdrop.
IMPORTANT
Remember to write in the “render room” - “ output” - “image size” the same dimensions of your image
After that, copy and past your text if you have done it before or create a new writing directly on the backdrop image.
Render the new scene and after that no post production is necessary.
I made in this way and here it is my final render ...
Wow! Very nicely done Pimpy! My only critique would be the shadows of the electrical arcs. I might have tried excluding them from the lights. It's a small issue though.
Thank you. I decided to go ahead and finish the image with the expressions as-is so I can have the rest of my weekend free, but I'll check back and if no one knows what's going on there then I'll take your advice and start a new thread about it.
Here's my final scene set-up in Carrara, the raw render and my post-worked final version, all ready for the submissions thread to open. :)
For post-work, I flattened and aged the coloring in Photoshop CS5 in a couple of steps, added some scratches, wrinkles and general wear, added a torn corner at the bottom and some tape to hold it together, fine tuned- the fraying on Michael's pants and of course added the text.
Mark
Mark, that is awesome! Very nice job on aging the final render.
I just usually apply poses and expressions from within Carrara and have had no issues. I load the figure, if an additional morph package such as morphs++ is required, I load that onto the figure from the Content browser and then either dial in my own expression, or if there is one I want to use, I apply it from the Content browser. I use Gen3 and Gen4 figures.
Diomede, I'm waiting for you to become a vendor! You do such a nice job on the clothing.
Getting my layout together, I may still end up framing it a bit differently as the scene is fleshed out.
Next on the agenda is to start painting distribution maps for the relpicators. I'm going to use some of the standard plant presets and mix them up a bit. Maybe edit the shaders to change them to be slightly alien. I also figure I'll design a couple weird plants for the foreground and maybe a tree or two.
I'm going to borrow some scene elements from Howie as well, because I'm falling behind on this one. I already used one of his ferns as well as one of mine.
Wow! Very nicely done Pimpy! My only critique would be the shadows of the electrical arcs. I might have tried excluding them from the lights. It's a small issue though.
Thanks Evil Is a good advice. But now
are three in the morning...and I think I'll go to sleep ...
Thanks for the nice thought, EP. I need to get a lot better at uvmapping. Tim and Roygee had started a thread somewhere on it, but the pinning and unwrap never seem to have the results I expect. Maybe it will be easier in C9 - someday.
My Maltese Falcon tribute has progressed to the point of making some hard decisions. The last major scene element is the revolver. Now, I need to make some decisions about the hair, unless I want the detective and the Femme Fatale to be bald. But that means I have to decide what I am going to do about the render - graphic novelish like Headwax, or comicish like Kashyyyk? My experience with dynamic hair is that it does not do well in either toon mode or non-photorealistic render mode. However, with some planning, a prop can be designed for toon and NPR. But if I use the photorealistic renderer, then I will use dynamic hair. Decisions, decisions.
In the attached,
- revolver modeled with a combination of primitives (with Boolean subtraction) and vertex objects.
- hat with dynamic hair - start, still needs to be styled
- hat with prop hair - start, still needs to be morphed and uvmapped
Do both and pick the one you like the most.
kashyyyk The hat is a great touch! I like the combined YAToon and NPR. It definitely has the graphic novel look. The metal and wood text is is perfect with the western theme.
Thank you. I decided to go ahead and finish the image with the expressions as-is so I can have the rest of my weekend free, but I'll check back and if no one knows what's going on there then I'll take your advice and start a new thread about it.
Here's my final scene set-up in Carrara, the raw render and my post-worked final version, all ready for the submissions thread to open. :)
For post-work, I flattened and aged the coloring in Photoshop CS5 in a couple of steps, added some scratches, wrinkles and general wear, added a torn corner at the bottom and some tape to hold it together, fine tuned- the fraying on Michael's pants and of course added the text.
Mark
MDO2010 That looks like the real deal! The addition of the wrinkles and tape repair is inspired. Sorry you had problems with the expression morphs from DS to Carrara. Did you try reloading morphs +++ after moving to Carrara? Anyway, I think their current expressions work.
The calendar of events nearly gave me a stroke to plan. Now, 10/18 for opening the submissions thread does seem a long way away. I wonder if there would be any objections if I would open it sooner, since several of you are done or near completion? I would hate for something to happen to your files between now and then.
pimpy Your cover is uber cool. I love the shadow of the man inside the gorilla. The mad scientist's hair is a great touch too. So many details!
I didn't notice the lightening shadows until evilproducer brought it up. Maybe it's the weird science bending the laws of physics. ;-)
I was attacked by an atomic super virus, which put me down for the past couple of days. Not 100%, but much better now I'm happy to report. Isn't it often the case, you take some time off work then get sick?
evilproducer So sorry you wrecked your fusilage. The scene is looking good and creepy now! I would brighten it up a bit though, it's reading pretty dark on my monitor.
diomede64 That's one hot tomatah! I love the dress and heels! Since the figures aren't photoreal, I think you should go with the toon look or at least a toon overlay. I like the shape of the dynamic hair. Will it work with a toon shader? [Edit Woops! I guess I should read better, your already said it could be problematic]
Hi Suky. I agree about the darkness. That's just a place holder light set up. It's a single sunlight and ambient light at the default 20%. I just use it to see where things are located because it renders fast. When I start adding vegetation it doesn't take long to turn a test render into a long render.
Wow, just briefly looked through the thread - yowza, lots of GREAT stuff here! I'm definitely out of my league with this pack of big dogs LOL!
I'm still futzing around, decided I needed a ray gun for the baddies. I found an image on the Internet to use as a guide to get started, but then altered it a bit: I just wasn't going to be happy unless I had COOLING FINS, and an electronic-button has got to be better than that clunky lever-style trigger. If I had a bit more time I'd texture/contour the grips better, but this piece isn't going to be used in any closeups so I'll just go with it as-is.
I'm still puttering with the rust shader too, not too happy with that yet. I've never messed with the plant editor, maybe I'll do something there too...
I think that was the issue - I had the ++ morphs in the .DUF scene but for some reason when Carrara opened it, they seemed to stay in there but where not doing anything. I just tried re-adding them in Carrara and they are working now.
I finally got around to starting PhilW's videos on realistic rendering in Carrara and it answered some questions I had about glass shaders, so I think I'm going to go back in and fix a couple little issues and do one more render. All my post-work is on separate layers in Photoshop, so I can literally just drop a new render into the same layer and all the effects are instantly applied. :)
In one of his videos he points out that using the Ambient lighting can flatten an image and make it look a little cartoony, which I never noticed because I always have it set to 0. Now I'm thinking about trying to use it to deliberately flatten the image a bit before applying my other effects.
A little more progress on my entry. Here is the model for the "mechanical" requirement, one of the made in Carrara requirements, and the rust shader. I modeled this flying drone/droid doohickey using the vertex modeler in Carrara. I did a real basic UV map so I could assign textures without crashing Carrara/Octane. I assigned some basic Carrara shaders, then assigned Octane shaders.
The material for the Cannon bracket has my rust shader submission as well (had to show the close up below so you could see the results of the shader). I used the Rusty Metal shader from the Octane LiveDB as my starting point. It was too dark, so I adjusted a few of the colors to give it a bit more shine and gray, and modified a couple of the turbulence values to get more of the effect I was looking for which was a patina similar to what you get a lightly oiled evenly rusted gun barrel (similar to a "browned" barrel). As you can see from the shader tree, it's a very complex shader, so I won't even pretend I understand it all, but I was able to get the look I wanted by guessing at what I needed to modify.Hope this will qualify for my rust shader.
Networthy Really like the ray gun. Yes, cooling fins are a must. Nice work.
dustrider That flying drone/droid doohickey is looking mighty nice. It renders well in Octane. I may have to save my pennies for Octane and the Carrara plugin.
Well, I had a small issue with my scene. I just couldn't get a pose for the hero and the queen that made me happy. I did come close, but I wasn't satisfied with the camera angles I was able to use with the pose. In the end, I scrapped the idea of my hero rescuing the 'queen' from some sort of creature. Instead, I'm turning my 'queen' evil and now the creature thing is doing her bidding in attempting to destroy our hero.
I that decision was the sticking point. Once I made up my mind on the change, everything just fell into place. Yay!
I modelled an evil plant creature in Silo as well as a giant mushroom/ tree and added them to my scene in Carrara.
I also dusted off DCG's Anything Grows and added some nice wiggly details to the evil plant.
I even ventured into Carrara's Vertex room and managed to get a fairy believable alien plant thingy. That was hard (for me). :)
Enjoying reading the content here for this months challenge... top stuff..
I haven't had time to do much so I have used mainly store content to whip something together..
The following two products I used and I used a sword I made last month for another render but thought it would fit in here.. I retextured it to get a rust look about it but it don't really look like it worked.. lol
Products used:
Dead Walker - Mr Happy HD by: RawArt
Cthulhu Rising by: Luthbel
I also used displacement on Mr Happy as I don't usually use that tool..
Ron's brushes were also used in post.
Lately, all I've been doing for my personal work has been pinups and portraits. Working on this contest has forced me to get to know some aspects of Carrara all over again. I actually had to stop and think for a minute about how to use the replicator. I've been playing with shaders a lot lately, but other things in Carrara not so much.
I didn't mention above, but I also used DCG's Anything Grows for the 'queen's hair. It doesn't style as well (at all really) Carrara's dynamic hair, but I liked the look. I've discovered that when using Anything Grows, it's best to have a patch of geometry to grow from instead of using an object's shading domain. When you chose a shading domain from an object, AG sort of takes over the entire object. It doesn't grow on the entire object, but it does sort of mess up all the other shaders on that object. So, I extract a piece of geometry that covers the area I want to grow from and go from there. You can hide the extracted geometry and every works and looks great.
I also like how you can add a tip object to the strands in AG. The tendrilly looking growths around the plant creatures 'head' include tip objects. It's really just a sphere modified in the Vertex room, buy you can use anything for a tip object. Makes for some unusual creations.
Meddling mother-in-laws. Now, that's horror. :lol: