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Well I think I need to not open this image for a few days and then look at it.
I increased her face light and used the violet color again.
Diffuse on the leaves and left wall was reduced. Small changes. Not doing anything major at this point.
Default settings render. 7 minutes so it must be bad.
Ok here is what I have done. Only thing that I am not sure about is how to make UberEnvironment 2 Transprent (Invisible)
Your background needs tweaked. Is it a surface/plane? It is too bright for the foreground and I suspect reflection from it is causing the line of light on the edge of your ground surface.
Looking at what some of the PAs do, they often include a "stop" between background and modeled scene, a wall, a row of foliage, something to separate background.
this example shows that and also shows that you don't have to connect the backdrop to the edge of your scene. The farther off it is, the less affected by scene lights it becomes.
This is from the Dovecot prop.
When constructing a scene, you don't have to make a seamless world, only the illusion of one. For a great example of this, if you have the free "ready to render" Day at the Beach in DAZ tutorials, load it, pull out in perspective view, and see how much they controlled the image vs the actual scene with angles and camera.
Also, an angled back plane reflects less into the scene.
I think when people think of Lighting in this medium they think "lights". However, since we control surface light in DAZ, unlike nature, adjusting surface "light" becomes as important as actual lights are.
my 4.5 cents. Forgive me if I rambled on about things you already know, I just like to share my hard won experience. I was a dioramist and figure painter, and kept thinking 360 and "worlds in a box" and it hampered me in this medium.
Here´s the male version of the render.
Only took 5 hours. (Girl took 8).
Final lighting rig consisted of 9 lights. 3 Coming from the outside and the rest were various lights inside the room.
I think I´m going to take part with the female version though.
As for depth of field, maybe next time : )
Thanks a lot for the contest, I learned a lot and I think I can say that those are the best renders I´ve done with 3Delight yet! (not that I have done that many though : D ).
Can´t wait to see all the other final entries!
Wow...take a break for a couple of days and I end up having to read a book to catch up.
Everyone's renders have improved. I feel really sorry for the judges. If they thought they had a tough time picking winners last month they haven't seen anything yet.
Welcome marykb.
For what it is worth I really like your choice in hair style in the 2nd version. It allows the viewer to see her face. You have received some good advice from others and I am really looking forward to seeing your latest version.
Help! Greetings all, I have been working on two additional, entirely different images for this forum. One is quite whimsical, which is a bit out of character and the other is from the dark side, which I usually avoid with a passion. It's just not the way I see the world, even though I am well aware that evil exists. I also have a problem with stereotyping, so the second image breaks a stereotype, the main character is a good guy. He is from the Planet Hetra and is charged with the responsibility of bringing death to the evil ones. I would like a decision as to which one I should pursue further to be a "people's choice" decision. I like both for different reasons. Looking forward to your responses. :-)
Thanks Scott for your input once again, it feels good to put a "freebie" to good use. :roll:
I like your second one Giovanni.
Yes I must say that the thread has really taken off, which is a very good thing. And welcome marykb. Have enjoyed the discussion about your two images. I really like the concept of negative space.
You all are doing just great. Thanks for helping me out on giving good critiques and advice on fixing issues. Scott thank you for coming in and helping out. I got a chance to not be glued to the monitor for a day. I appreciate your help.
Scavenger, have you thought about capturing the pollys from the sign you want to have the light have more impact and assigning them to their own surface group? You don't lose the UV for it and with it separated you could maybe bump up the ambient on that one sign. Just a thought.
You all have really taken the learnings and used them effectively. I think we are in for another tough month of only selecting three images again.
I'm a little late getting in on this one but here's what I'm working with. I'm thinking it's sort of a post apocalyptic setting in an abandoned warehouse as the fog rolls in. He's searching for someone, or something....
Scavenger, why dont you use the method that makes your ufo glow so nicely on your traffic signs. I don't kow how you did it but it looks very neat, and I guess you could tone that glow up and down to your liking according to the amount of light that comes from the trucks headlights.
ps: and good luck finding a new job
The ufo is just ambient color settings. I can do that on the signs, but I was hoping to make each one separately reactive, but that doesn't seem to be possible with the software. I could achieve it in post with Photoshop, but I might just pass..or I have a thought of how to make things work with making individual planes as the signs, and fitting them over what's there.
I took a day off from looking at it, ..check back with fresh eyes later.
I prefer the Fireside Cats. With the firelight, and possibly lights from the drone thingy, there's a few interesting things you could do with the lighting.
The second one might be difficult to get across seriously, without drifting into camp. It could also be difficult to express your background story in the render.
Both could be great, of course :)
Giovvani.. I find the second picture, with the red stars and so on, incredibly striking.
I have put my other render on hold for a while, I want to use a different character as I don't really like the Bull in the render.
While I am waiting for some cash to buy a new character I have been learning about specularity. Do you think I have gone a bit overboard with it?
The ufo is just ambient color settings. I can do that on the signs, but I was hoping to make each one separately reactive, but that doesn't seem to be possible with the software. I could achieve it in post with Photoshop, but I might just pass..or I have a thought of how to make things work with making individual planes as the signs, and fitting them over what's there.
I took a day off from looking at it, ..check back with fresh eyes later.
The short answer is that you probably want to create either a reflection or a specular map. Ambient, in the old days of object based lighting, used to be how light was shown in scenes, but that was because there was not the ability to have objects interact with light, so whatever light they had, had to come from within, so to speak. Now ambient is more for how the base environment color interacts with the environment color.. and not even so much for that as the uberenvironments and HDRI spheres cover your lowlight areas and make objects of different colors all feel like they belong in the same scene. Ambient will not react to light at all... for that you need specular, reflection, or gloss/refraction. I think in this case you could easily get away with specular, which is the least render-intensive, but the older method and the less true to life. I dont know if you know how to make the various other kinds of maps from your diffuse, but there are lots of good tutorials out there.
I am working on a tut on how to back-design maps from diffuse..and ran out of time to give you that or links. I will look later if someone else doesn't beat me to it.
FWIW Making any kind of map from your diffuse is doing the work the person who made your content should have done for you... good quality content comes with maps. Besides the standard diffuse, at least bump, normals, specular, reflection, and sometimes opacity, and if relevent, SSS shader presets.. and if it claims to be a good quality item, displacement. I was so so so disheartened that v-6 did not come with displacement maps. And FWIW if a vendor doesnt list a map, its not there. Its good to know what you have to work with, and how invested the vendor is in making a quality product, before you buy. The number amd quality of maps is much more important than the number of poses.
Hey all, thought I would make another go of it this month as well...this time I'm rendering in Daz instead of blender cycles, which is good in some ways, but much more difficult to get naturalistic lighting. Any suggestions before I submit it?
The problem I'm seeing is that any change from the base settings seems to cause every sign to look the same.
In the 0% reflection, you can see how the light is hitting the 3 signs on the left side, with variable amount of light. the one on the edge in complete darkness, the next one barely visible, and the third somewhat lighted.
As soon as I apply, in those pics, reflection, all three act the same. And that's not what I'm after.
Street signs have a certian reflective property to them..the paint they use...that I'd like to duplicate if I can.
You can select polys on the individual street signs, create new material zones from those selections, and map them to your needs.
Hmm..I remember trying that once, with not great results, but this might work better being 3 flat easy objects, separated in space...
In theory...or at least how I'm thinking theory works...the same settings on the 3 different things should react to the environment differently, no?
Love the effect with the light. Feels spiritual to me.
Hmm..I remember trying that once, with not great results, but this might work better being 3 flat easy objects, separated in space...
In theory...or at least how I'm thinking theory works...the same settings on the 3 different things should react to the environment differently, no?
Eh..the resulting faces had some slashes thru them, so while I could set the reflection individualy, it didn't look great, and if I'm doing the setting, it doesn't add to the naturalness, so I might as well table the idea til I get to Photoshop or leave it.
It's pretty cool (of course, I'm a sucker for volumetrics...). You might want to try a tad stronger front lighting, though. As it is, the render is quite dark overall.
After considering your reply, I went into daz and made a simple primitive sign, and played with the settings on it. You are right about the "reflective" property of signs. I have been up close to road signs because they are used in my medieval re-enactment group by fighters as a cheap source of aluminum shield bases. Street signs are not painted, they have a sticker on the front that in the light areas acts like a thousand tiny mirrors. The dark parts do not have the mirrors effect, just a little bit of gloss. I played with how I would imitate that in Daz and here are the trial and error results. If you like it feel free to use the technique, if not, so be it. I have attached of a render of the sign primitive in a simple environment with the default moonlight stroll lights, link of a screenshot of my photoshop process regarding layers for making the maps and a screenshot of my open Daz showing the settings and where to apply them, as well as attached examples of the maps I made. They are not without mistakes, as I was trying to do this quickly. ;-)
Sooo.. the best answer I could come up with is that in order to get that super "lit' feel to the sign, you have to turn it into an Uber AreaLight (Uber AreaLights are a light shader that turns any geometry into a light). To do this, click on your sign, and go to the lights tab in the content pane. Find Uber Area Lights Base (as seen in my Daz window screenshot link, on the left, the top icon in the Smart Content pane). Then, select the object in the surfaces tab (on the right in my setup). Once you have the object selected in both places, MAKE SURE YOU ARE HOLDING DOWN CONTROL to keep your maps when you switch shaders, and then double click on the UberArea Light Basee to apply a light shader to your object. Such a cool thing to be able to do! Be forewarned, it will increase render time. ;-)
Now that there is a light shader instead of a surface shader on your sign, you need to find where your signs diffuse map is stored on your hard drive, which was a killer for me to figure out. Go to the surfaces pane and hover over the image in the little square box next to the place where you would choose the diffuse color. This will tell you the directory path to the file to where the image is stored on your hard drive. Most important to note is the vendor name since that is what usually changes... the default is c:/users/public/public documents/My Daz 3D Library/runtime/textures/vendorname/filename dot jpeg) Once you have taken note in Daz of where your maps are being stored, you can hop over to your 2-d program. In photoshop/Gimp, follow the folder pathway to locate and open the folder for your signs. Open the diffuse map to begin creating maps for the ambient color and ambient strength, which will control how your lit sign looks.
It is important that when creating maps, you must use the maps given to you as the base. (UV maps are cut and flattened 2-d versions of the 3-d geometry. It is essential to keep any maps you make the same proportions as the originals, and all the pieces exactly in the same spots)
Important note: I am using Photoshop Elements 12. What things are called may be different in the pro version of photoshop or Gimp, so bear with me.
Once you have the diffuse open, copy it to a new file so you dont risk messing up the original. (Been there, done that) Make a duplicate layer of the diffuse, and use the "convert to black and white" option in the enhance tab... do not convert the color profile to grayscale! I use the default "portrait" setting. This will be the base for your ambient strength map, as opposed to your ambient color map.
Make another duplicate of the diffuse layer. This will be the base for ambient color map.
Now... for the strength map, I wanted to capture 2 qualities of the sign. 1. The look of all those holographic reflectors. 2. The light gradient coming from right to left.
You can tell from my screenshot what I did to create the layers for the maps. I assume most people know how to do the basics of layers.. The texture for the ambient strength is created with a black to light gray gradient with the filter: texture/patchwork Setting: Square Size 10, Relief 25
Besides maps altered in photoshop, these settings were used in Daz as shown in the screenshot:
Diffuse color: 255 187 14
Diffuse Active: ON
Diffuse Strength:100
Ambient Active: ON
Ambient Color: 255 241 83
Ambient Strength: 200% (note greater than 100=light source)
Your colors will be different because your Diffuse colors are different. The color in the Ambient and Diffuse Channels will mix with, or wash out, the image colors. You have to be careful not to go too yellow on the Ambient color or you will lose the highlight the color map gives you. Also... shining too strong of a light on the sign will destroy its texture.
Screenshots:
My Daz: http://grabilla.com/05212-5d83f879-98e6-4da6-b558-4797e2c6275e.html#
My Photoshop: http://grabilla.com/05212-bb5cd69e-037d-4f64-9c7d-3eda50cf867a.html#
The sign base has a wikimedia creative commons license: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Singapore_Road_Signs_-_Warning_Sign_-_Sharp_Deviation_1.sv
I hope I didnt overstep my bounds with this little tutorial-like response.... hopefully someone finds this explanation useful. I hope you find the brightness you seek!
Excellent tutorial fiona but I think you forgot to include your screenshot of DAZ Studio showing where the UberSurfaceLights are located. Finding and applying these can be tricky and the screenshot could be very helpful to any future new users.
The helmet lights are just the thing to add interest and make you look across the entire image. Nicely done!
Meh, its more a name-game issue... what you need to apply is Uber AreaLight Base, which is the top thing in the content pane (on the left) in the screenshot... will edit to fix it! Thanks for the catch. I am seriously sleep deprived. ;-) I often get a mental itch that I need to scratch until it stops itching before I can sleep... I have been thinking about his signs for like 48 hours and have had maybe 3 to 4 hours sleep. OCD, much? Not even my work!
Speaking of my work, I saw on that CG freebie place that someone named Kismet had downloaded a fur shader. (FuzzyWuzzy) I am having issues with the fur poking through the glossy eyes and nose that came with it- I have made sure the eyes and nose are blacked out in the displacement map, even making sure the contrast is lower and the noise channel darker around seam lines on the map so the fur isnt as long....but for the life of me,I still have hairs coming out my bears eyes. Any thoughts? Since how popular a name could Kismet be? :-P
Also, taking everyone's feedback that they liked #2 better because of the lighting, but liked the pose better in #1, I tried to take the best of both. (Middle image is the new one) It is coming along okay except for the flame... I can't get rid of that hot highlight in # 1 at the base of the lantern. I am thinking maybe it has something to do with accidentally making the lantern longer when I changed the scale of other things, at some point? It does look skinnier. Also I have the same exact lights... I cant use the coordinates to position them because they are in different spots on the grid because of camera angle and proportions, but everything else about the2 sets of lights is absolutely identical. But the flame looks awful now and I dont know how to fix it. Maybe make the the lantern, the flame and the lights a subset and merge from the one to the other? I have been working on these 2 little things for days!
Also... I think I like how the light hits the hand better in #2... is there a way to isolate the pose of just the right colllar down, or should I just copy the positioning and input the numbers by hand?
I intend to take Dollygirls wisdom when I do the final render and have the second volume cone behind her head to add brightness andgive separation of the hair from the wall in that dark area, but I am waiting because of how much time it adds to my renders.... I am currently running at 5 hours, on minimal quality settings. :-( I would be looking at 13 with a second volume cone. SO I will save adding it til the very end when I am happy with everything else.
Here I'm back with some changes in my render. For one I changed the breast and chest region of my scientist and gave her shirt a different colour. I increased the light of one of the rim lights and the fill lights spot and i added one coming from the screen in front of her.
I like the difference between the warm golden-red light surrounding little nymphea and the rather cold analytical blue-white colour of the lights in the lab.
I guess I will stick with this for the entries, thanks to everyone for help and suggestions.
Thanks for the info Fiona! (I do got the upclose lessons on signs from medieval re-enactment :D )
hmmf, kids. All the shelves and cabinets in my garage are made from recycled "wooden" reflective hiway signs. The old farmer I bought this from was thifty, but its still a mass of reflections when I pull in at night :) I imagine there were piles of the old ones when they went to metal.
It is a very different color, reflecting almost a pale green off the white surfaces.
I played with the Fuzzy Wuzzy fur shader. I turned down the Displacement from 93.4% to 15% and I increased the Horizontal and Vertical Tiles to 10 each and I changed the Thickness to 0.10.
In the image the toy on the left is the original and the one on the right has the shader applied. I also tested a Geometry shell on the toy but that didn't seem to help much. You may need to play with the settings on the specific prop you are using.
Hope this helps.
I included an image of the shader at the default settings for comparison.
Latest version. I tweaked 1 of the lights and added some mist in the distance near the fence line.