off topic thread

Bunyip02

Hello Silene, I am currently doing two things that are helping my creative side.

No.1 - Am trying to do a render a day. Sometimes I will pick between 2 to 6 items at random out of my library and create a scene with them. Other times I will pick a subject and look for items that I can make a scene out of.

No.2 - One of my aims is to do some 3D modelling myself. Part of that modelling will be critters of all shapes and sizes. I have a sketchpad next to me to do sketches of critters as I peruse the internet/read/daydream etc

It was a bit hard doing it at the start, but comes naturally now.

Torquinox

SileneUK said:

Hi Torq & Buny,  Any advice on getting the juices going again would be welcomed.  I am a voracious reader which is my escapism. I try to read what my interests for illustrating are, but also just for fun.  I play with my 5j year old granddaughter when she comes a full day each week now that school is out.  After she goes home, husband and me have this 'glow'.  It took a while to understand why as we are older first time grandparents and I'm the step mum to her dad, but she and her little brother 'bring the love with them' and it's contagious... in a lovely virus-way.

So I am open to ideas.  Having spent the last 6 years learning Carrara stuff, getting my certificate/diploma in archaeology and going to lectures, I want to get on with my prehistoric art and story-telling for museum and education materials.  Just need to get eyes sorted and I wonder if my discomfort after long screen sessions is a problem.  Also, I have had to reload all my 3D stuff 3x now due to crash and a rebuild. A bit of nervousness maybe that it will happen again.

  Silene

Hi Silene, Prehistoric art sounds interesting and fun! Are you working with prehistoric creatures, their fossils, or very old art, like cave paintings?

Playing with your granddaughter sounds wonderful, too! That's not what I meant, though. Maybe I can explain?

When I play in 3D, I plop a primitive or two on the screen and start doing things to them, tug at the faces and vertices, apply various tools. I don't have a goal. I play around with the geometry to see where it goes. The forms are usually weird and impractical. 3D sculpting software is great for playing! You can also play in paint software and physical media. The idea is the same, to put something down, respond to that, and see where it goes.

I did mention meditation. You'd be surprised how images pour in when you calm yourself, close your eyes, and breathe. It doesn't have to be a long-lasting or intrusive thing. Even three to five minutes can yield results.

Reference helps, too. You probably have pictures and other materials collected from various sources. Spinning through that often provides a start point. There are people who will randomly select 2 or 3 pictures from a pile of reference and put the elements together in a composition. The stuff may not go together, and that's ok. Sometimes, that makes it more interesting.

Screentime kills the eyes. Too much screentime gives me an awful headache. It's like my optic nerves are throbbing and my eyes hurt. I sometimes have to stay off the computer for half a day or longer to recover. It feels like technology poisoning. I try not to spend too much time on the computer without a break, but sometimes, that's hard to do.

Crashes waste a lot of time! Sorry that happened to you. I hope you had everything backed up.

I hope something in here helps you. Looks like Bunyip also has good suggestions.

SileneUK

Thanks Buny and Torq!  I guess it is like writer's block, you just have to get stuck in and start working with things to kickstart the motor in my brain (hoping it's still there!)   Will give things a go. I still have some more stuff to reload.  I did save my artwork done so far, but it is re-linking the textures, etc to them.  I relied on local settings for texture settings for content purchased.  I think I might start making companion files for the textures to go right in the project's folders on the external hard drive where they will live.  Don't want that stuff lost on the Carrara programme drive to be lost, that would be worse!

OK, head down this weekend... will try to post something next week.  I have not worked on the people in some time, have mostly been working on animals. 

  Silene

Dartanbeck

Bring up your interests to your granddaughter! 5? Perfect! She'll get your creative juices flowing again!

Don't spare the glitter!

I was not in a hurry to get glitter for my little granddaughter. Now, I adopted the younger two siblings of her mother - making me not actually related at all to her - and she knows all of this. Neither of us care about the details. She's blood to me and I to her. We are So related!!! LOL ...and that goes for all four of my grandkids!

Anyway... glitter. I was buying glitter and I said to the checkout lady: "Feel sorry for me!"

She said: "Glitter? Let her get it all over. Don't worry about the mess. Every time you see glitter around, you'll remember the great time you had with her"

She couldn't have been more right! In fact, I had a hard time keeping Rosie from vacuuming it all up! Brought a bit of a tear to my eye! That little Livy (Olivia) is So Imaginative and is always concocting the most amazing ideas!

(Image - Olivia with my dog, Ms. Celie)

Dartanbeck

On the COVID-19 side of things, it looks like evilproducer might have it. He's been tested and is awaiting the results - but by the way he feels, he thinks he's got it  He and I are pretty darned good pals. I don't really know what to say 

evilproducer, I love ya man! Kick this thing!!! 

SileneUK

Dartanbeck said:

Bring up your interests to your granddaughter! 5? Perfect! She'll get your creative juices flowing again!

Don't spare the glitter!

I was not in a hurry to get glitter for my little granddaughter. Now, I adopted the younger two siblings of her mother - making me not actually related at all to her - and she knows all of this. Neither of us care about the details. She's blood to me and I to her. We are So related!!! LOL ...and that goes for all four of my grandkids!

Anyway... glitter. I was buying glitter and I said to the checkout lady: "Feel sorry for me!"

She said: "Glitter? Let her get it all over. Don't worry about the mess. Every time you see glitter around, you'll remember the great time you had with her"

She couldn't have been more right! In fact, I had a hard time keeping Rosie from vacuuming it all up! Brought a bit of a tear to my eye! That little Livy (Olivia) is So Imaginative and is always concocting the most amazing ideas!

(Image - Olivia with my dog, Ms. Celie)

Oh we know all about glitter... Peppa Pig!!  Madame Gazelle keeps it under lock and key.     Silene

SileneUK

Sending get well wishes to EvilProducer... you can beat this!!!     SIlene

WendyLuvsCatz

keep breathing mate 

Dartanbeck

Very cool, Wendy! Check that out!

I had forgotten to look for my Sky Pillars EnvironKit. I'll find it, tweak it, pack it up and make it available. Here's a test spherical map I did with it back when I started working on it. Extremely low rez. In fact, the image in this post is full size! LOL Oh the woes of working on an under-powered laptop! LOL

Dartanbeck

Wow. That looks So Cool!

Officially added to my wishlist! The Lost World - by Alessandro

WendyLuvsCatz

I have failed a few times to properly vegetate it in Carrara,

much crashing

this was a Twinmotion render with brushed on foliage,

I probably could do in in UE4 too,

For Carrara I might take a different approach and do painted on foliage with much fog and clouds 

WendyLuvsCatz

I won't try vegetating your set either, but maybe too can paint a layer

Dartanbeck

WendyLuvsCatz said:

I won't try vegetating your set either, but maybe too can paint a layer

I'll get a preset together that's already vegetated for you! ;)

Plus I'll make more of those spire-like cliffs to plunk around. Sky Pillars was a work-in-progress so if I find it I'll still have to finish it. In that spherical, I see that it still has a lot of tweaking to do.

For vegetation on things like this I prefer to take one of the individual cliffs and place by hand, using duplicates as much as I can to keep resources in check. For something with that much vegetation, I also like to set it up so that not all of the plants are visible in 3D working view, but do appear in the render - which can always be switched in the Instances Tray.

Then make these individual cliffs into presets in the browser.

Diomede

SileneUK said:

Sending get well wishes to EvilProducer... you can beat this!!!     SIlene

Oh no!  Please give my best wishes to EvilProducer.  He is a treasure.  And the Three Amigos going to Madison was among the best Off Topic posts.

Be well.

SileneUK

Dartanbeck said:

WendyLuvsCatz said:

I won't try vegetating your set either, but maybe too can paint a layer

I'll get a preset together that's already vegetated for you! ;)

Plus I'll make more of those spire-like cliffs to plunk around. Sky Pillars was a work-in-progress so if I find it I'll still have to finish it. In that spherical, I see that it still has a lot of tweaking to do.

For vegetation on things like this I prefer to take one of the individual cliffs and place by hand, using duplicates as much as I can to keep resources in check. For something with that much vegetation, I also like to set it up so that not all of the plants are visible in 3D working view, but do appear in the render - which can always be switched in the Instances Tray.

Then make these individual cliffs into presets in the browser.

Dart, would you repost that landform thingy you did recently from your Environ Kit?  Or post the link to that post with a bit more about it?

I think you were showing a lot of granite/stone/boulder stuff protruding from the ground in a fairly open area that was similar to a place near your home?  I can't find it...  stilly me.  I want to know what bits you used to create it from your kit. 

  Silene

Bunyip02

Diomede said:

SileneUK said:

Sending get well wishes to EvilProducer... you can beat this!!!     SIlene

Oh no!  Please give my best wishes to EvilProducer.  He is a treasure.  And the Three Amigos going to Madison was among the best Off Topic posts.

Be well.

May Evil kick Covid's butt !

Stezza

he was pretty crook the other day.. couldn't even smell a dead skunk he went past...

he's in recovery mode now, but it does seem like the symptoms could linger on for quite a while..

hang in there Evil one 

I guess the coffee morning we had planned is now off!!.... was your shout as well.... 

WendyLuvsCatz

oh he can smell the skunk spray on his dog quite well so a good sign

Dartanbeck

SileneUK said:

Dartanbeck said:

WendyLuvsCatz said:

I won't try vegetating your set either, but maybe too can paint a layer

I'll get a preset together that's already vegetated for you! ;)

Plus I'll make more of those spire-like cliffs to plunk around. Sky Pillars was a work-in-progress so if I find it I'll still have to finish it. In that spherical, I see that it still has a lot of tweaking to do.

For vegetation on things like this I prefer to take one of the individual cliffs and place by hand, using duplicates as much as I can to keep resources in check. For something with that much vegetation, I also like to set it up so that not all of the plants are visible in 3D working view, but do appear in the render - which can always be switched in the Instances Tray.

Then make these individual cliffs into presets in the browser.

Dart, would you repost that landform thingy you did recently from your Environ Kit?  Or post the link to that post with a bit more about it?

I think you were showing a lot of granite/stone/boulder stuff protruding from the ground in a fairly open area that was similar to a place near your home?  I can't find it...  stilly me.  I want to know what bits you used to create it from your kit. 

  Silene

Hmmm... I do a lot of posts, but so few and far between! LOL

Ummm... was it this post?

So here's what I did:

1. Bring in the smaller preset from Objects > Nature (Terrain?) > Dartanbeck 
2. Place that wherever I need it
3. Open the group from that preset and duplicate the top thing in the group, which is the terrain piece
4. Drag that piece out of the group after it's been duplicated
5. Now position it into the terrain to form rock prutruding from the earth
6. Duplicate, reposition, rotate, scale, etc.,
7. repeat

SileneUK

Thanks, Dart, that's the one!  

Hoping EP improves rapidly. I had an awful lingering cough last year that went on for three months. In addition to the whole area being inflamed and sensitive, I'd coughed all the hairs off my trachea and any change in temperature would set it off till they grew back.  Had to hug a lot of pillows to keep my ribs from bruising or cracking. But... it got better!!!  

​  Silene

WendyLuvsCatz

watching all that chinese CGI I need a Ghuzeng Zither

3D at least doubt I could play a real one

(would settle for an autoharp thats easy to play! but not cheap and a bugger to tune)

thedoctor

mindsong said:

thedoctor said:

I love how WendyLuvsCatz has integrated TwinMotion into her creative process. Really a great example of how these are all just tools for an artist to use.

I've jumped on the TwinMotion bandwagon myself and I'm using it to develop a comic-look style. Being able to do everything real-time with no rendering is mind boggling. This is Stonemason's Urban Future 5 with the Daz Cyborg Model 4 and a cape from Marvelous Designer. No post work whatsoever -- realtime render inside TwinMotion:

brilliant - Urban Future 5 exported/imported very nicely - what sort of energy does it take to finesse the materials to twinmotion (iray/3dl/?)

thanks for the sample - very cool result.

--ms

Those textures are almost untouched except for adding some Twinmotion NEON textures. In most instances you get great results by simply exporting your Daz model as an OBJ file and then importing into TwinMotion.

WendyLuvsCatz

if you want transmapping you need png with alpha though

I use Gimp

import diffuse and opacity as layers, select black on latter by colour

swap the layers and merge/ flatten image with it still selected

add transparency to the layer and chose cut

export as png

mindsong

WendyLuvsCatz said:

if you want transmapping you need png with alpha though

I use Gimp

import diffuse and opacity as layers, select black on latter by colour

swap the layers and merge/ flatten image with it still selected

add transparency to the layer and chose cut

export as png

Ok - if I read this correctly, you are generating an alpha mask from a clever mix of the diffuse+opacity layers from the original, and saving that mask, along with the original diffuse as an RGB+A png file?

I use a variety of tools, so the 'big idea' is usually the best starting point for me.

tnx,

--ms

WendyLuvsCatz

mindsong said:

WendyLuvsCatz said:

if you want transmapping you need png with alpha though

I use Gimp

import diffuse and opacity as layers, select black on latter by colour

swap the layers and merge/ flatten image with it still selected

add transparency to the layer and chose cut

export as png

Ok - if I read this correctly, you are generating an alpha mask from a clever mix of the diffuse+opacity layers from the original, and saving that mask, along with the original diffuse as an RGB+A png file?

I use a variety of tools, so the 'big idea' is usually the best starting point for me.

tnx,

--ms

thats the general idea until DIM update on that product overwrites my folder  (Twinmotion references the original parhs)

if you know an easier way by all means share  just the fastest way I know

mindsong

WendyLuvsCatz said:

mindsong said:

WendyLuvsCatz said:

if you want transmapping you need png with alpha though

I use Gimp

import diffuse and opacity as layers, select black on latter by colour

swap the layers and merge/ flatten image with it still selected

add transparency to the layer and chose cut

export as png

Ok - if I read this correctly, you are generating an alpha mask from a clever mix of the diffuse+opacity layers from the original, and saving that mask, along with the original diffuse as an RGB+A png file?

I use a variety of tools, so the 'big idea' is usually the best starting point for me.

tnx,

--ms

thats the general idea until DIM update on that product overwrites my folder  

that's just evil. does it repalce the whole folder, I wonder, or just overwrite the contents? (see below for one option).

WendyLuvsCatz said:

(Twinmotion references the original parhs)

editable load file - like uncompressed dufs?

WendyLuvsCatz said:

if you know an easier way by all means share  just the fastest way I know

no better suggestions for the masking - didn't mean to sound like a critic as I confirmed my understanding of the idea. I wonder if this action/sequence could be automated w/ an ImageMagick script.

re: DIM updates - Maybe saving the newly created mask-files two-fold: the new ones that would be used-but-overwritten, and a copy of the new ones (named something similar) that would be ignored and could be re-copied after the DIM update. Kind of a pain tho'.

It's a bit ahead of me right now, but these little 'mental post-its' often prove handy later.

--ms

WendyLuvsCatz

yes DIM overwrites everything in the folder with an update

I have had crossdresser and duf autofits save as resource assets overwritten if saved with the originals

Dartanbeck

When I had to downsize all of my texture maps (not suggesting you downsize, btw - just making a point :)) I made a new folder within the texture folder of the product - and put the original texture maps into that folder. I called mine "Orig", but the name doesn't matter. Uninstallers generally only remove folders that they put into play - so in my case, even if DIM would want to remove the entire product, the entire address leading to that "Orig" folder would remain intact as to not remove that one folder - if you follow me.

Not ideal at all. I haven't actually seen such issues on my end, but....

Must be somewhat rare for DIM to actually change the address of a ifle. Update, sure. But change the address? Product changes come from the artist, and then it goes through Daz QA. One wouldn't think that many artists want to completely change the address of something. Just tweak something to make it better.

This whole thing seems odd.

WendyLuvsCatz

I just know it has happened to me, I know it shouldn't but it has

on another topic

I am trying to import an FBX into Effekseer, you can under render sprite change to model

but I cannot see it loaded

apparently animated ones import

https://effekseer.github.io/Help_Tool/en/ToolTutorial/11.html

https://effekseer.github.io/en/releasenote.html

I am also rendering my cloud tunnel

gave up on volumetric clouds and made a model in Zbrush 
added a morph target with itself rotated to animate it

using Octane it is incredibly slow, am now wishing I had tried the Carrara engine

lots of surface replications on a hidden cone

 

Dartanbeck

That is So Cool, Wendy! Love it!