- - Spyro's Render Thread and Projects - -

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  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited December 1969

    Tribal Warrior - Kyde

    I got Inspired from my render battle with Jaderail, and was compelled to create (and recreate in this case) some of my tribal characters. I've revised 'Kyde' heaps of times since my last posted render of him way back. Kyde (Spyro's brother, an original character) belongs to my novel, although this isn't a canon depiction of him, It was fun recreating his fantasy tribal alternative. He's came a long way since my last render of him.

    This work also features a new prop I made, the Halberd, among other bits and pieces I've made for tribal stuff.

    Tibal_Kyde_Halberd2.png
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    Tibal_Kyde_Halberd1.png
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  • bighbigh Posts: 8,147
    edited December 1969

    Spyro said:
    Tribal Warrior - Kyde

    I got Inspired from my render battle with Jaderail, and was compelled to create (and recreate in this case) some of my tribal characters. I've revised 'Kyde' heaps of times since my last posted render of him way back. Kyde (Spyro's brother, an original character) belongs to my novel, although this isn't a canon depiction of him, It was fun recreating his fantasy tribal alternative. He's came a long way since my last render of him.

    This work also features a new prop I made, the Halberd, among other bits and pieces I've made for tribal stuff.

    well done - looks bad

  • RogerbeeRogerbee Posts: 4,460
    edited December 1969

    Just spent a few minutes getting up to speed with this thread, there's some superb stuff going on here.

    I really like the way your skin textures look, some of which use Interjection. Any chance of a skin tutorial!? I'm using DS now so I can follow it to the letter.

    CHEERS!

  • MBuschMBusch Posts: 547
    edited December 1969

    Rogerbee said:

    Just spent a few minutes getting up to speed with this thread, there's some superb stuff going on here.

    I really like the way your skin textures look, some of which use Interjection. Any chance of a skin tutorial!? I'm using DS now so I can follow it to the letter.

    CHEERS!

    Maybe this: Making skins from scratch Tutorial Thread

  • RogerbeeRogerbee Posts: 4,460
    edited December 1969

    That's very interesting, and one I'll certainly peruse. I was more wondering what Spyro's settings were for existing textures/shaders and Interjection.

    CHEERS!

  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited December 1969

    Rogerbee said:

    That's very interesting, and one I'll certainly peruse. I was more wondering what Spyro's settings were for existing textures/shaders and Interjection.

    CHEERS!

    Hey Rogerbee, long time no see :)

    In all honesty, I pretty much just built off Gia's settings. I Use AoA SSS shader (which doesn't need SSS textures) And allot of the textures I use are custom, in that some you wouldn't even be able to pick out which character set they belong to. Specular settings really do vary immensely depending on what the specular map looks like. I have stuck with the Dark specular maps, tho many character sets use pretty much a light grey-scale diffuse. I like to toy with levels of the Spec Texture to balance the dark and light areas to smooth it out so to speak. Giving a more even specular on the skin surface in the render. I keep Diffuse strength at roughly 50-60% as SSS will brighten it so it needs to balance it out, this also helps add the translucency effect. I also add a soft touch of pink to the Subsurface colour. With SSS material Type, I favor "Skin A" settings. And use a soft blue Velvet of 15%. To lift the quality a bit I set a shading rate of 2.00 and Shading Scale of 0.50. With diffuse textures I always make sure it is the colour I want it to be, adding colour to the Diffuse in the shader is literally a full fake tan and doesn't look all that convincing.

    One thing to note is It's very important to know the render settings. Adamr001 made an excellent set of presets he made available here http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/16085/
    And Likewise the AoA SSS has and excellent PDF Manual, available here http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/read_me/index/16324/start

  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited December 1969

    A Moment Alone

    An entry render to the PC Sale Render Challenge.

    Felt like doing a peaceful romantic render, having focused on action for the last month or so. Initially I was using Creature Creator for Genesis2 Female(s), but I changed my mind as I wasn’t happy with my efforts to make the male match her, but nonetheless was wowed by the creature morphs I trialled on the girl.

    I rendered In layers of png’s, custom sky texture on backdrop, Mid ground and Foreground. Image layers combined in post work, added lens flare and Light Rays. The only fix I had to do was clean up distortion of the pants at the hip. Various close-to-cam trees and Plants I applied subdivision to reduce the jagged edges.

    HResAMomentAlone_SpyB.png
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  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited December 1969

    Tribal Warrior - Spyro

    The revised Tribal depiction of Spyro and his newly crafted bow, quiver and arrows, from which his last set was destroyed and lost during his confrontation with Evil Drow Jaderail (This ones blessed by the High Elves to counter the destructive forms of dark magic).

    I improved the characters shape as well as his custom textures and shaders. He stands at roughly 4'10", shorter than my previous creations and true to the character in my creative writings.

    This Is a Daz Studio render, minor post work in Photoshop.

    Tibal_Spyro_Bow1b.png
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    Tibal_Spyro_Knife1b.png
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  • bighbigh Posts: 8,147
    edited December 1969

    what a peaceful romantic render,

  • RogerbeeRogerbee Posts: 4,460
    edited December 1969

    Spyro said:

    Hey Rogerbee, long time no see :)

    In all honesty, I pretty much just built off Gia's settings. I Use AoA SSS shader (which doesn't need SSS textures) And allot of the textures I use are custom, in that some you wouldn't even be able to pick out which character set they belong to. Specular settings really do vary immensely depending on what the specular map looks like. I have stuck with the Dark specular maps, tho many character sets use pretty much a light grey-scale diffuse. I like to toy with levels of the Spec Texture to balance the dark and light areas to smooth it out so to speak. Giving a more even specular on the skin surface in the render. I keep Diffuse strength at roughly 50-60% as SSS will brighten it so it needs to balance it out, this also helps add the translucency effect. I also add a soft touch of pink to the Subsurface colour. With SSS material Type, I favor "Skin A" settings. And use a soft blue Velvet of 15%. To lift the quality a bit I set a shading rate of 2.00 and Shading Scale of 0.50. With diffuse textures I always make sure it is the colour I want it to be, adding colour to the Diffuse in the shader is literally a full fake tan and doesn't look all that convincing.

    One thing to note is It's very important to know the render settings. Adamr001 made an excellent set of presets he made available here http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/16085/
    And Likewise the AoA SSS has and excellent PDF Manual, available here http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/read_me/index/16324/start

    Thanks for that, so, you use the AoA SSS on all your figures now then? I PM'ed Dimension Theory to see what he was doing with Genesis 2 and he said he has a new set of presets coming out that are based on the AoA shader too, so, I'll definitely get those when they come out.

    Won't turning the shading rate up that high cause texture seams to be visible!? I always thought that lower settings gave better quality. I never set mine above 0.10. Anyway I'm still not back into 3D full time yet and will have a much more in depth delve when I am. I do like to keep on top of new releases though and pick them up whenever I can.

    Thanks for the tips and I'll try and incorporate them, those render presets could be interesting too

    CHEERS!

  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited November 2013

    Rogerbee said:
    Spyro said:

    Hey Rogerbee, long time no see :)

    In all honesty, I pretty much just built off Gia's settings. I Use AoA SSS shader (which doesn't need SSS textures) And allot of the textures I use are custom, in that some you wouldn't even be able to pick out which character set they belong to. Specular settings really do vary immensely depending on what the specular map looks like. I have stuck with the Dark specular maps, tho many character sets use pretty much a light grey-scale diffuse. I like to toy with levels of the Spec Texture to balance the dark and light areas to smooth it out so to speak. Giving a more even specular on the skin surface in the render. I keep Diffuse strength at roughly 50-60% as SSS will brighten it so it needs to balance it out, this also helps add the translucency effect. I also add a soft touch of pink to the Subsurface colour. With SSS material Type, I favor "Skin A" settings. And use a soft blue Velvet of 15%. To lift the quality a bit I set a shading rate of 2.00 and Shading Scale of 0.50. With diffuse textures I always make sure it is the colour I want it to be, adding colour to the Diffuse in the shader is literally a full fake tan and doesn't look all that convincing.

    One thing to note is It's very important to know the render settings. Adamr001 made an excellent set of presets he made available here http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/16085/
    And Likewise the AoA SSS has and excellent PDF Manual, available here http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/read_me/index/16324/start

    Thanks for that, so, you use the AoA SSS on all your figures now then? I PM'ed Dimension Theory to see what he was doing with Genesis 2 and he said he has a new set of presets coming out that are based on the AoA shader too, so, I'll definitely get those when they come out.

    Won't turning the shading rate up that high cause texture seams to be visible!? I always thought that lower settings gave better quality. I never set mine above 0.10. Anyway I'm still not back into 3D full time yet and will have a much more in depth delve when I am. I do like to keep on top of new releases though and pick them up whenever I can.

    Thanks for the tips and I'll try and incorporate them, those render presets could be interesting too

    CHEERS!

    Yes Indeed all my characters now use AoA SSS shader. I still use HSS and UberSurface however not on characters skin. I do use UberSurface for things like Eyelashes (If using trans mapped lashes (Rare for me as I use Garibaldi)) and cornea and eye surface on Genesis2. All my props and clothing use Uber.

    The reason my shading rate on skin isnt as low as it would have been on my previous characters shaders is that I use higher quality render settings which makes such high values in the skin shader overkill. theoretically, Shading rate of 2.00 is far better quality then 'out of the box' characters that use AoA SSS such as Gia, V6, Josie etc. Out of the box shading rate is 6.00 on those characters.

    I did a little experiment with a character of mine in the same conditions with shading rate of 6.00, 2.00, and 0.10, both in DOF quality render settings and in Default Factory render settings. To my surprise, they were near identical renders, of course they are clearly different between render settings. (I was going to compose a comparison image between all three shading rates of the same render settings but I cant see the difference in all honesty) So attached is the comparison of render settings, both in same scene and both with skin surface Shading rate of 2.00.

    I do indeed know what youre talking about, HSS was very picky with shading rate, especially with the SSS degradation you'd see commonly on limbs. And bad seams appearing. Ive found AoA SSS to be quite an improvement.

    Note that depending on textures used, some PA's allocate more seam bleed then others, therefore some character sets may have a more prominent seam depending on settings and the texture.

    EDIT to add: A few things to note about SSS in general is it doesn't play nice with Deep Shadow Map lights, Raytrace is the way to go with all lights in scene.

    AoA SSS can commonly have 'white outs' when you modify something in the surfaces tab and undo it, or if you load another character into scene that uses AoA SSS. Saving scene and reopening it often corrects the issue.

    Another thing to note is the GroupID number in the AoA SSS shader. Characters out of the box have the same GroupID, at thats a no no. Each character in a scene should have their own unique GroupID #, the reason is that it tells Renderman/3Delight to calculate it as ONE surface, If you have 4 characters in the render with the same GroupID set on their skin you may find they'll bleed together in the render, inconsistent skin colours and possible degradation. My character in the image attached has a GroupID of 22 set on all his skin surfaces. Spyro for instance has a groupID of 20 and his girlfriend in my recent render has groupID of 21.

    Anyways thats what Ive found in my experience with SSS. Hope it helps for when you get into 3D again Rogerbee, or anyone else who passes through here :)

    Temp_Comparison.png
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    Post edited by SpyroRue on
  • RogerbeeRogerbee Posts: 4,460
    edited December 1969

    Hmm, very interesting,

    You see, this is why you should do a tutorial as there are things you've pointed out here that nobody would ever think about. For example, to do a high quality render, nobody would ever think of actually raising the shading rate. The usual reply when anyone complains about their renders is, lower the shading rate. However, when they see the results you get, a lot of people will think differently and be the better for it. That's what good artists should always do, challenge convention and inspire.

    Go for it!

    CHEERS!

  • Yonas AngYonas Ang Posts: 108
    edited December 1969

    What an inspiring thread Spyro, well done, and hoping to see some of your product in the future, I hope ^^.

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675
    edited December 1969

    so, the shading rate makes a difference in seams?

    thanks Spyro

  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,034
    edited December 1969

    and more renders please

  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited February 2014

    Generation 6 Spyro
    'The Rising Warrior, Reborn'

    No post work other than the text and the light caustics of the crystal (which would have been overkill for a render like this). Brought Spy to generation 6, long overdue but G2M is plausibly set up with acquired morphs for my custom character creations now. Made use of AoA Advanced lights. 1x AdvAmbient and 6x AdvSpots. Render time was roughly 8-12 mins. My production time was 4 solid nights... Believe it or not this was initially a simple scene I made to test render his new textures and skin shader.

    Spy6_Debut.png
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    Post edited by SpyroRue on
  • SylvanSylvan Posts: 2,698
    edited December 1969

    Oooh, I like it!
    Great atmosphere!

  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,034
    edited December 1969

    good work there Spyro

  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited December 1969

    Estroyer said:
    Oooh, I like it!
    Great atmosphere!

    Thanks man, was kind of a spontaneous decision, Ive not attempted a dark lit render in a long time, it was a nice deviation from the usually well lit renders I do.

    Thanks Wendy too :D

  • bighbigh Posts: 8,147
    edited December 1969

    good to see :-)

  • JaderailJaderail Posts: 0
    edited December 1969

    So, the little Viper moves up a generation. Hmm... looks like him, but can he fight like him yet?

    Good work my friend. Love the detail in this one.

  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited December 1969

    The Missing Drow
    "I'm looking for this man, have you seen him?" Spyro has traveled half way across the world and is venturing the warm sands of Elsweyr in search for the Dark Elf. Unfortunately, the Khajiit have turned up no leads, though they all seem keen on purchasing the pot plant with legs...

    This is a render going out to my dear friend Jaderail, who has been absent from the forums for a while due to the stormy weather in his region. I hope your doing ok Jade, we miss you! :) The whole scenario inspired me to create a render for his return.

    SR_MissingDrow.png
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  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,034
    edited December 1969

    we hope you find him soon Spyro {hugs} we all miss him

  • JaderailJaderail Posts: 0
    edited December 1969

    Awesome Render Spyro. As you know from other forms of digital magic the Night Walker has returned safe and sound.

  • IvyIvy Posts: 7,164
    edited December 1969

    Spyro said:
    The Missing Drow
    "I'm looking for this man, have you seen him?" Spyro has traveled half way across the world and is venturing the warm sands of Elsweyr in search for the Dark Elf. Unfortunately, the Khajiit have turned up no leads, though they all seem keen on purchasing the pot plant with legs...

    This is a render going out to my dear friend Jaderail, who has been absent from the forums for a while due to the stormy weather in his region. I hope your doing ok Jade, we miss you! :) The whole scenario inspired me to create a render for his return.


    love this render :)
    They say every now and then you can see this shadow lurking in and out of the threads . But said to be very elusive for sure. :D

  • bighbigh Posts: 8,147
    edited December 1969

    Spyro said:
    The Missing Drow
    "I'm looking for this man, have you seen him?" Spyro has traveled half way across the world and is venturing the warm sands of Elsweyr in search for the Dark Elf. Unfortunately, the Khajiit have turned up no leads, though they all seem keen on purchasing the pot plant with legs...

    This is a render going out to my dear friend Jaderail, who has been absent from the forums for a while due to the stormy weather in his region. I hope your doing ok Jade, we miss you! :) The whole scenario inspired me to create a render for his return.

    super work

  • SpyroRueSpyroRue Posts: 5,020
    edited May 2014

    Many thanks to all! Makes it all the more worthwhile, cheers :cheese:

    Vannix Vycan
    The Vengeful Spirit

    A special character I developed, which I started some time in January, she was initially intended for a collaborative project but blossomed beyond her role and specifications, and was put aside. She was suitably different from my 'usual', and rather grew on me the more I tweaked her characteristics.

    Vannix is a rogue drow, with a sour hate for the underground dominions. She's very intelligent and with excessively high standards, she's deliberate and always objective, but at the same time is Egocentric and Arrogant.
    She was once a highly established noble of her kin, and served as a senior officer of a legion. Vannix disobeyed direct orders from her 'living goddess' during a war where her legion was expected to face certain death as pawns. Due to her actions, the legion survived, however she was dismissed from rank and title and sentenced to death for her betrayal to the monarchy.

    When the time had arrived, she escaped her public execution and fled to the surface. She has since then been cursed by Lolth, and no longer retains much of 'Lolths touch', while additionally suffering from a constant need to replenish her life energy by sacrificing the lives of others. Vannix has taken up the profession as a mercenary, in order to sustain her constant hunger, while controversially on a journey for Corellon's aid.

    Vannix_VengefulSpirit_SpyroRue.png
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    VannixVycan_SpyroRue.png
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    Post edited by SpyroRue on
  • mori_mannmori_mann Posts: 1,152
    edited December 1969

    Cool character. Very drow :)

    (New) characters that get out of control after/during creation are usually the best ones. The ones that stay and have or develop the most potential.

  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 38,034
    edited December 1969

    watch that one young Spyro
    She is a bitch!
    nice tender

  • Tako YakidaTako Yakida Posts: 548
    edited December 1969

    Nice DOF on that bottom one. Always liked nice DOF....

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