David Brinnen's Looped Cube Thingie & DangerLad's Render

franontheedge

Hi all (and hopefully David!),
I've been wandering about the Bryce areas - which feel nice and homely thanks to the wonderful job the Community Volunteers do here - and in the Bryce Renders thread (one of them) I saw this elegant object that David was using to demonstrate some difficult lighting thingie or other and was fascinated by the lovely object.

This one: *See Image.
This is what DangerLad made of it - which I think is lovely.

1) So... David, how do I find the tutorial on how you made this object? (I've already looked at (and done a few of) your YouTube video Tuts - couldn't find it)

2) and DangerLad:
what materials did you use for this object? how did you make them or where did you get them from?

David Brinnen

This for that I think Wings 3D project - another twisted looped cube thing - by David Brinnen

franontheedge

David Brinnen said:

This for that I think Wings 3D project - another twisted looped cube thing - by David Brinnen

YES! That's the one David, great - thanks.

Now I just need DangerLad to pop in and tell me about his materials...
... if he will.

Dangerlad

FranOnTheEdge -

I don't exactly recall the materials I used in that render, I'm answering this on a different computer than the one I made the render on. I believe the ground plane and the ribbon (for lack of a better term) were pre-made materials. They were from one of two sets of materials, either "Bryce 7 Pro - 50 Metals - The Heating Room Set" or "Bryce Pro 50 Metals - The Treppenhalle Set" (both sets made by David with assistance from Horo and available for purchase from the Daz Shop). The cube itself was unsmoothed once I brought it into Bryce from Wings3d. That gave it the faceted appearance. The material for the cube was a transparent material with the refractive setting of glass to make it reflective but with a reflectiveness of 0, (see this tutorial for what I mean Bryce 7.1 Pro Advanced - Two minute remix of AOLS - by David Brinnen), that was was reflecting the sky with was an abstract HDRI image I made using Bryce via a tutorial made by David ( Bryce 5 minute scene - recursive abstract HDRI backdrops - a tutorial by David Brinnen.).

I may add more information when I get back to my other computer. I will have to see if I can find the scene file, I don't always save scene files that I work on.

franontheedge

Dangerlad said:

FranOnTheEdge -

I don't exactly recall the materials I used in that render, I'm answering this on a different computer than the one I made the render on. I believe the ground plane and the ribbon (for lack of a better term) were pre-made materials. They were from one of two sets of materials, either "Bryce 7 Pro - 50 Metals - The Heating Room Set" or "Bryce Pro 50 Metals - The Treppenhalle Set" (both sets made by David with assistance from Horo and available for purchase from the Daz Shop). The cube itself was unsmoothed once I brought it into Bryce from Wings3d. That gave it the faceted appearance. The material for the cube was a transparent material with the refractive setting of glass to make it reflective but with a reflectiveness of 0, (see this tutorial for what I mean Bryce 7.1 Pro Advanced - Two minute remix of AOLS - by David Brinnen), that was was reflecting the sky with was an abstract HDRI image I made using Bryce via a tutorial made by David ( Bryce 5 minute scene - recursive abstract HDRI backdrops - a tutorial by David Brinnen.).

I may add more information when I get back to my other computer. I will have to see if I can find the scene file, I don't always save scene files that I work on.

Oh thanks so much for replying - it's more the glass material on the cube-ish shape that I'm interested in, I was thinking of using an image material using one of my own made/Photo verdigris materials on the loopy bit - once I've made the object (- I've been experimenting with some other objects from David's WingsTuts in the meantime).

...but I just loved the look of that Purply Violet glass stuff you used on the cube, especially how it almost looks as if bits might be flaking off it...
So if you can find more info on that I'd be very interested.

(How on earth can you throw anything away? - if I throw anything or otherwise loose it - a crash or corrupted file - you can bet I'll want it again! This happened especially with a lovely accidental miasma material I had on a volumetric cloud thing - stuff got stolen and I lost that amongst many other things - I have often wanted to use it again - but to no avail.)

Dangerlad

It's not that I throw it away per say, it's that I don't save the file. I do a lot of playing around that doesn't turn out the way I like. Both of the machines I use to render are quite low powered and slow machines. I've followed and experimented with a lot of David's tutorials and where his render may take 15 minutes to complete, mine would take 2 or more hours. I most definitely need a new machine, but times are tight.

Chohole

I can totally empathise with you on that DangerLad. It took me a couple of years to put enough money by to buy a new computer, and even then I took David's advice, because I really needed a new cooker as well, so I am still struggling along with the old cooker, but do have a nice new PC.

David's advice was to use wire wool on the rust, and use a splint or match to light the rings where the automatic lighting system didn't work

franontheedge

Dangerlad said:

It's not that I throw it away per say, it's that I don't save the file. I do a lot of playing around that doesn't turn out the way I like. Both of the machines I use to render are quite low powered and slow machines. I've followed and experimented with a lot of David's tutorials and where his render may take 15 minutes to complete, mine would take 2 or more hours. I most definitely need a new machine, but times are tight.

Thrown or not saved - you still don't have it. Lol!

I used to throw away what I didn't like - but the reason for not liking something could just be that the lighting won't do what I want, but the arrangement of items in the scene may be unique and hard to replicate - or one of the materials was something I fiddled with - also hard to replicate if you don't take notes of what you are doing, and sometimes - especially if I've used a photo as part of a texture - dang hard to find that photo again! - I have a very great number of photo textures - thousands.

Yes my machine at the moment is a fair beast with an Intel core 2 quad CPU and 8GB of RAM, but that's fairly recent, I usually find myself waiting over-night even now, but in the past renders have taken days to complete, when I had a less powerful PC... (I love using glass and lights and crunchy textures)

Hey wait - 'machines'? Do you use Bryce Lightning then?

I've been out of things for quite a while (family) so I'm just now discovering what a hast hoard of tutorials David and Horo have accumulated - I'm in clover, I've just started doing some of them. (glee!)

I can totally empathise with you on that DangerLad. It took me a couple of years to put enough money by to buy a new computer, and even then I took David's advice, because I really needed a new cooker as well, so I am still struggling along with the old cooker, but do have a nice new PC.

David's advice was to use wire wool on the rust, and use a splint or match to light the rings where the automatic lighting system didn't work

Hey, I hope you took photos of the rust before following David's advice, Pam!

Lol @ Pam

I love rust, I have loads of photos of it.

David Brinnen

chohole said:

I can totally empathise with you on that DangerLad. It took me a couple of years to put enough money by to buy a new computer, and even then I took David's advice, because I really needed a new cooker as well, so I am still struggling along with the old cooker, but do have a nice new PC.

David's advice was to use wire wool on the rust, and use a splint or match to light the rings where the automatic lighting system didn't work

That's it, get your priorities right!

OK Wings 3D project - Octahedron twisted ported loop - by David Brinnen

More noodling in Wings 3D.

Dangerlad

Yes FranOnTheEdge, "machines". But not in the way you are thinking. I have a home computer and a computer at work. My work computer is slightly better than my home one. I also have a relatively quiet job, desktop support for a group of people that don't have many problems. So what I tend to do is, in the long stretches of quiet I have, play with Bryce and Wings3d. Then when I'm done or thoroughly bored I will close the program and not save the file. It gets hard trying to come up with file names that are not repetitive. It's a bad habit for a hobbyist in a graphical pursuit.

franontheedge

Dangerlad said:

Yes FranOnTheEdge, "machines". But not in the way you are thinking. I have a home computer and a computer at work. My work computer is slightly better than my home one. I also have a relatively quiet job, desktop support for a group of people that don't have many problems. So what I tend to do is, in the long stretches of quiet I have, play with Bryce and Wings3d. Then when I'm done or thoroughly bored I will close the program and not save the file. It gets hard trying to come up with file names that are not repetitive. It's a bad habit for a hobbyist in a graphical pursuit.

Yes, very bad. Consider yourself told off. Lol.
So does this mean there's no way to find out what that lilac/purple mat is that you used?
:roll:

Dangerlad

I'm sorry to say that I have been unable to locate a save file for that render. I truly believe that it was just a reflective material with a hint of purple in the diffuse setting. It then reflected a purple HDRI that I created.

Again sorry about not being able to help. :down:

franontheedge

Dangerlad said:

I'm sorry to say that I have been unable to locate a save file for that render. I truly believe that it was just a reflective material with a hint of purple in the diffuse setting. It then reflected a purple HDRI that I created.

Again sorry about not being able to help. :down:

You created an HDRI?
Does that mean you have one of those mirror balls and an expensive DSLR camera too?
Or did you do it another way?
Now if you did it another way, like in Bryce, I'd love to know how you did that.

I did think that Horo had a tut on how to do that, but if he does, I can't find it.

Horo

franontheedge said:

I did think that Horo had a tut on how to do that, but if he does, I can't find it.

Raytracing > Panorama? etc. Bryce Documents > Videos > Horo or simply those that came with Bryce 7.1 Pro: Content > Tutorials > Horo Wernli.

Dangerlad

Fran, I actual use Bryce to create a pseudo HDRI image. David has done a couple of videos on abstract backgrounds and he and Horo have a tool that also allows you to create pseudo HDRI images.

David videos:
Bryce 10 minute scene project - abstract space HDRI backdrop - a tutorial by David Brinnen.
Bryce 5 minute scene - recursive abstract HDRI backdrops - a tutorial by David Brinnen.
Bryce 5 minute scene - recursive abstract HDRI backdrops 2 - a tutorial by David Brinnen.
Bryce 10 minute skylab project - basic sunset effect - a tutorial by David Brinnen.
Bryce 25 minute skylab project - adding volume clouds to basic sunset effect - by David Brinnen.
Bryce 10 minute skylab project - sunset effect, with clouds and put in a scene - by David Brinnen

David and Horo tools:
Bryce 7 Pro Scene Converter

I hope some of the above links will help.

Dangerlad

@FranontheEdge - You are not gone to believe this but I just located the scene file for this particular image. I am attaching the material settings I used for the purple central cube.

Also I am include the Outer Sphere picture and material settings which were use for the reflections.

I hope this will help. And I am sorry that it took me such a long time to locate. (I wasn't even looking for it today.)