There are so many patterns on there, it makes me a little dizzy. My eyes don't really know where to look. I really liked your plain white version. But, even with this version, you have nice lighting and I love that you can see the reflections in her mask. Her eyes really seem to pop out at you. There are lots of really good qualities to the render.
I agree with Knittingmommy about the patterns. Perhaps something a little more subtle would work. Or if the gun was white against her patterned armored?
Looks much easier on the eyes. I do love how you added something to the mask to make it look like it is fogging up while she breathes. I would definitely try to keep that in future versions.
Looks much easier on the eyes. I do love how you added something to the mask to make it look like it is fogging up while she breathes. I would definitely try to keep that in future versions.
Possibly final version of this - the woman has a different jacket, and I added some more light so she was not totally in shadow - also changed up the bump map and opacity on the 'strewn snow' on the ruined courtyard, adding a bit more splatter under their feet as well, like they'd tracked in snow from the area behind them.
Possibly final version of this - the woman has a different jacket, and I added some more light so she was not totally in shadow - also changed up the bump map and opacity on the 'strewn snow' on the ruined courtyard, adding a bit more splatter under their feet as well, like they'd tracked in snow from the area behind them.
The elf has been repositioned a bit, and I changed her dress, and re-shaded it. I tried to use a dformer on her to make the dress twist and flare a bit more but for some reason it never worked. Back to the drawing board on that.
Here is my latest and, I hope, final version of my winter scene. I have 3 uploads. The pictures all look better at full size so click on the pictures for the full effect.
My final render. (I actually stopped it at 17 hours in, saved last render, and then resumed render to see if it gets any better. I actually think it looks pretty good now.) I changed my camera aspect some and the frame size. I moved the moose closer to the front. You can't see him, but the is actually a figure inside the cabin looking out the window, blocking the fire some. Added the wreath on the door and put a dog sled on the porch. Alessandro helped me figure out why I couldn't get my textures applied to the roof of the cabin. Turns out there was no UV map because it is procedural in 3Delight. I believe the cabin came out prior to Iray. Anyway, I'm trying to add a texture and nothing is happening because there is actually no UV map to apply it to. AM was nice enough to make a quick UV map for both the roof snow and the chimney snow for me. The link for this is in his Log Cabin thread should anyone have the cabin and want to render in Iray. You'll need it.
My render with snow and frost added in Gimp. I have about five different types of snow throughout the render, each on their own layer. I wanted falling snow, a little blowing snow, and some snow that looked like it had just fallen out of a tree. I hope I did it well. I may have gone overboard with the snow again.
Then I was playing around with Ron's Grunge and added an edge just for fun. Let me know what you think.
The elf has been repositioned a bit, and I changed her dress, and re-shaded it. I tried to use a dformer on her to make the dress twist and flare a bit more but for some reason it never worked. Back to the drawing board on that.
I really like how this is coming along. I like the change in clothing. I like the lighting, too.
@HitmanWA I like what you are doing, experimenting with colours and the textures. I feel that the gun should not be camouflaged. If any textures, maybe something like in CallofDuty where it is bold and proud, but it could be bold, proud and Nordic. Something is off with the face in your final render. The pose??? not certain it will win the hearts and minds of everyone... a taste thing.
@Ati there is no foliage visible. And no buildings, most outdoor images have one or the other. The hills on the far left are very rendered looking, maybe add slight detail there, if only textural. Good place to put some bushes or something if you like? To keep with the desolate feeling a destroyed husk or a blast crater may add something. Also there are some sharp points in the rendering of the hills that you could smooth down with the smudge tool in photoshop or gimp...
Here is my latest and, I hope, final version of my winter scene. I have 3 uploads. The pictures all look better at full size so click on the pictures for the full effect.
I like the middle one. The edges look interesting, but it distracts me, and makes me think this is not an actual picture. I personally think it's better without those edges. Great work!
I just wanted to thank the people who have offered advice, and also thank all those who organise these contests.
Although I don't enter the contests every month, I do always find them useful as a starting point for a render, even if I don't get around to actually posting anything, It's also interesting to see the comments about other peoples work.
So, thanks again, and "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year" to all.
Thanks again for the feedback. Something along these lines?
These textures are much easier on the eye and no so distracting. I like the addition of the "foliage" camoflage on her uniform. Since she is trying to blend in with trees it makes sense to me.
Possibly final version of this - the woman has a different jacket, and I added some more light so she was not totally in shadow - also changed up the bump map and opacity on the 'strewn snow' on the ruined courtyard, adding a bit more splatter under their feet as well, like they'd tracked in snow from the area behind them.
The elf has been repositioned a bit, and I changed her dress, and re-shaded it. I tried to use a dformer on her to make the dress twist and flare a bit more but for some reason it never worked. Back to the drawing board on that.
Here is my latest and, I hope, final version of my winter scene. I have 3 uploads. The pictures all look better at full size so click on the pictures for the full effect.
I like the middle one. The edges look interesting, but it distracts me, and makes me think this is not an actual picture. I personally think it's better without those edges. Great work!
Ati and Kimset - Yeah, I'm going with the middle one. I just did the last one to see what it looked like. I figured since I was playing with Ron's brushes, I would just add that to see what the brushes looked like. While it might be fun to use for some things, I think it detracts from the scene a bit. I really like how the middle one turned out and I'll be entering that one in the contest.
I left the original render running all day yesterday and all night and, to me, it looks the same as the raw image I posted. I see no difference. It just hit 5007 iterations and says it is still only 50% complete and has now been rendering for 34 hours. So, I'm stopping it, saving it and moving on. I did, however, learn a lot with these last two month's contests. It has been fun trying to improve my Iray skills as well as postwork skills. I think I might actually try using 3Delight for next month's contest to see if I can improve my skills there. So far, Iray has been easier for me to learn how to to use to get nice renders. 3Delight has been a nightmare for me, but I think I will need to just bite the 3Delight bullet and try to figure it out.
I've gone ahead and uploaded my entry to the contest thread. I could probably be nit picky with the snow and either add to it or redo it or tone it down, but I'm finished. It is time to say good-bye to the render and move on to other things. I do like how it turned out. I'm getting better with postwork so that is good. And I was able to do quite a bit inside DS.
Now that it is posted, can I post the render to Marhsian's Above the Fog thread to show off what I did to his product or is it best to link to the entry thread? I usually don't even post my entry to my gallery until after the contest is over so I'm not sure what the rules are for that.
Ati and Kimset - Yeah, I'm going with the middle one. I just did the last one to see what it looked like. I figured since I was playing with Ron's brushes, I would just add that to see what the brushes looked like. While it might be fun to use for some things, I think it detracts from the scene a bit. I really like how the middle one turned out and I'll be entering that one in the contest.
I left the original render running all day yesterday and all night and, to me, it looks the same as the raw image I posted. I see no difference. It just hit 5007 iterations and says it is still only 50% complete and has now been rendering for 34 hours. So, I'm stopping it, saving it and moving on. I did, however, learn a lot with these last two month's contests. It has been fun trying to improve my Iray skills as well as postwork skills. I think I might actually try using 3Delight for next month's contest to see if I can improve my skills there. So far, Iray has been easier for me to learn how to to use to get nice renders. 3Delight has been a nightmare for me, but I think I will need to just bite the 3Delight bullet and try to figure it out.
lol this is exaclty how I feel about Iray. Just decided that I needed to suck it up and learn how to use it. I am also working on learning to use Reality as well
Comments
I agree with Knittingmommy about the patterns. Perhaps something a little more subtle would work. Or if the gun was white against her patterned armored?
Thanks again for the feedback. Something along these lines?
Thanks again for the feedback. Something along these lines?
Sorry, this was a double post.
Looks much easier on the eyes. I do love how you added something to the mask to make it look like it is fogging up while she breathes. I would definitely try to keep that in future versions.
Thanks Knittingmommy
I really do apprecaite the response, hope you have a merry christmas.
Yeah, that is much much better than the cammo. Can't decide if it looks best with the smooth gleaming white, or that.
Possibly final version of this - the woman has a different jacket, and I added some more light so she was not totally in shadow - also changed up the bump map and opacity on the 'strewn snow' on the ruined courtyard, adding a bit more splatter under their feet as well, like they'd tracked in snow from the area behind them.
Let me know what you think?
I like it! I think it turned out very good!
The elf has been repositioned a bit, and I changed her dress, and re-shaded it. I tried to use a dformer on her to make the dress twist and flare a bit more but for some reason it never worked. Back to the drawing board on that.
Here is my latest and, I hope, final version of my winter scene. I have 3 uploads. The pictures all look better at full size so click on the pictures for the full effect.
My final render. (I actually stopped it at 17 hours in, saved last render, and then resumed render to see if it gets any better. I actually think it looks pretty good now.) I changed my camera aspect some and the frame size. I moved the moose closer to the front. You can't see him, but the is actually a figure inside the cabin looking out the window, blocking the fire some. Added the wreath on the door and put a dog sled on the porch. Alessandro helped me figure out why I couldn't get my textures applied to the roof of the cabin. Turns out there was no UV map because it is procedural in 3Delight. I believe the cabin came out prior to Iray. Anyway, I'm trying to add a texture and nothing is happening because there is actually no UV map to apply it to. AM was nice enough to make a quick UV map for both the roof snow and the chimney snow for me. The link for this is in his Log Cabin thread should anyone have the cabin and want to render in Iray. You'll need it.
My render with snow and frost added in Gimp. I have about five different types of snow throughout the render, each on their own layer. I wanted falling snow, a little blowing snow, and some snow that looked like it had just fallen out of a tree. I hope I did it well. I may have gone overboard with the snow again.
Then I was playing around with Ron's Grunge and added an edge just for fun. Let me know what you think.
I really like how this is coming along. I like the change in clothing. I like the lighting, too.
@HitmanWA I like what you are doing, experimenting with colours and the textures. I feel that the gun should not be camouflaged. If any textures, maybe something like in CallofDuty where it is bold and proud, but it could be bold, proud and Nordic. Something is off with the face in your final render. The pose??? not certain it will win the hearts and minds of everyone... a taste thing.
@Ati there is no foliage visible. And no buildings, most outdoor images have one or the other. The hills on the far left are very rendered looking, maybe add slight detail there, if only textural. Good place to put some bushes or something if you like? To keep with the desolate feeling a destroyed husk or a blast crater may add something. Also there are some sharp points in the rendering of the hills that you could smooth down with the smudge tool in photoshop or gimp...
I do like how both images are progressing.
Ron's brushes and arabella7
I like the middle one. The edges look interesting, but it distracts me, and makes me think this is not an actual picture. I personally think it's better without those edges. Great work!
I just wanted to thank the people who have offered advice, and also thank all those who organise these contests.
Although I don't enter the contests every month, I do always find them useful as a starting point for a render, even if I don't get around to actually posting anything, It's also interesting to see the comments about other peoples work.
So, thanks again, and "Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year" to all.
These textures are much easier on the eye and no so distracting. I like the addition of the "foliage" camoflage on her uniform. Since she is trying to blend in with trees it makes sense to me.
This is looking much better.
I like the changes you have made in this image.
I tend to agree with Ati.
I find the background in this image a little disconnected somehow with Arabella. Have you considered using DOF?
Ati and Kimset - Yeah, I'm going with the middle one. I just did the last one to see what it looked like. I figured since I was playing with Ron's brushes, I would just add that to see what the brushes looked like. While it might be fun to use for some things, I think it detracts from the scene a bit. I really like how the middle one turned out and I'll be entering that one in the contest.
I left the original render running all day yesterday and all night and, to me, it looks the same as the raw image I posted. I see no difference. It just hit 5007 iterations and says it is still only 50% complete and has now been rendering for 34 hours. So, I'm stopping it, saving it and moving on. I did, however, learn a lot with these last two month's contests. It has been fun trying to improve my Iray skills as well as postwork skills. I think I might actually try using 3Delight for next month's contest to see if I can improve my skills there. So far, Iray has been easier for me to learn how to to use to get nice renders. 3Delight has been a nightmare for me, but I think I will need to just bite the 3Delight bullet and try to figure it out.
I played around with the brushes some more. Gave here another skincolor. Seems better now, thx
I think I like her better in this latest version. Blue seems to match the frigid feel to the picture. Nice.
I've gone ahead and uploaded my entry to the contest thread. I could probably be nit picky with the snow and either add to it or redo it or tone it down, but I'm finished. It is time to say good-bye to the render and move on to other things. I do like how it turned out. I'm getting better with postwork so that is good. And I was able to do quite a bit inside DS.
Now that it is posted, can I post the render to Marhsian's Above the Fog thread to show off what I did to his product or is it best to link to the entry thread? I usually don't even post my entry to my gallery until after the contest is over so I'm not sure what the rules are for that.
I agree with Knittingmommy. The blue cast to her skin suits her.
Played around with it some more.
I like the head pose...she has a "don't mess with me" look to her, and that gun definitely means business now.
I definitly would not mess with this lady wow amazing render
lol this is exaclty how I feel about Iray. Just decided that I needed to suck it up and learn how to use it. I am also working on learning to use Reality as well