April 2015 New User Contest - Free Render Month (WIP Thread)
Chohole
Posts: 33,604
New User's Contest - April 2015
Sponsored by DAZ 3D and Zev0
Are you new to the 3D World? Are you at the beginning stages of learning 3D rendering? Have you been around for a little bit but feel you could benefit from some feedback or instruction? Have you been around awhile and would like to help other members start their creative journey? Well then come and join the fun as we host our newest contest...
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"Free Render Thread"
The first of the free-for-all contests of 2015. For this month, render at least two figures in any setting of your choosing while being sure to pay special attention to the topics previously covered the last three months which were Composition, Lighting, and Posing.
For a list of the current contest rules, please see this thread : Contest Rules.
To enter the contest, please post your completed image to the Entries Thread.
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For those veterans of the forums that would like to help, because this contest is designed for the beginner to learn from, we will be randomly selecting posts offering helpful tips and/or critiques to receive a special voucher as well so whether you are a seasoned artist or an aspiring one, there is fun for everyone!
Zev0 has graciously agreed to award:
Choice of 2 packs, including bundles, from his store to all the winners
Closing Date: April 30, 2015
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Comments
Thanks chohole for running it this month!
WOW, those are some great prizes, good motivation, I LOVE Zev0's stuff... lol I already have breast/glute control, one of the aging morphs for Gen 2 (I think its the female), the skin builder... there are few things I have spent money on, I am very very tight with my cash input to the Daz store, but things to build characters with are always good investments, in my book! Dude I would love to have the teeth one, the vascularity.... *gets to work*.
THANK YOU SO MUCH Zev0.... VERY generous prize!
<3 <3 <3 One of your biggest fans!</p>
Here's what I thought up so far. The lighting looks a little darker then I'd like, but it still fits what I'm trying for.
This is a render/project I've been thinking about for a while. I have been using Daz since I found it in December for a few things on my blog and may eventually use it for illustrations in a book of short stories I am working on. The following is one I hope fits one of the stories.
This render is called "Hanging with 'Squach" and was done with Iray in Daz Studio.
Any suggestions on improvements appreciated. I have a huge learning curve ahead of me and little time to spend fiddling.
Yes I would agree 3ch0_419. It is a little dark. Remember too that we will be judging the image based upon what we have discussed in the pat three months. So consider composition as well as lighting when you work on this image. We need to "see" your story.
I would suggest, thenotoriousjed, that you might considered a bit more demonstrative interaction. That is Squach could talk with his body. You have him pretty passive in this pose and I think a more fun and interesting view would be the two subjects to have some hand gestures that portray the type of conversation they are having. Is it casual, have they broken bread together, is it an exciting story, etc. Those kind of things would give your image some additional interest. This image is a good start, the poses look natural, the lighting is believable and we can see the beginnings of your story. Your composition is also pleasing. What you need to look at is what would take your image to the next level. How do you want these two to interact with each other. What is the story of "Hanging with 'Squach".
Very cool!
Of course, now I have to think of something since we have freedom to choose this time around.
(I remember the Simpsons episode when Homer goes into space, and smashes the ant colony, releasing all the ants. And the ants say, "FREEDOM! HORRIBLE FREEDOM!")
I am trying to mess around with Iray shaders, so I think that's what I'll be working on. Since I'm kind of locked into Fantasy stuff in the Random thing, I will do something in the Sci Fi realm for this.
Hehe, my thoughts. When I saw that there is no specific topic, I was paniking what to to with all that freedom, where to go. Well after a sleepless night I have an idea, Now I have to look how to realise it
Yes I would agree 3ch0_419. It is a little dark. Remember too that we will be judging the image based upon what we have discussed in the pat three months. So consider composition as well as lighting when you work on this image. We need to "see" your story.
I tried to mess around with the lighting a bit, increasing the intensity on the main light source for one thing.
I would suggest, thenotoriousjed, that you might considered a bit more demonstrative interaction. That is Squach could talk with his body. You have him pretty passive in this pose and I think a more fun and interesting view would be the two subjects to have some hand gestures that portray the type of conversation they are having. Is it casual, have they broken bread together, is it an exciting story, etc. Those kind of things would give your image some additional interest. This image is a good start, the poses look natural, the lighting is believable and we can see the beginnings of your story. Your composition is also pleasing. What you need to look at is what would take your image to the next level. How do you want these two to interact with each other. What is the story of "Hanging with 'Squach".
I agree with Dollygirl, thenotoriousjed, that there needs to be some interaction between the two of them, to give us a better idea of what is happening. You do have a decant start to work with though in my humble opinion.
I tried to mess around with the lighting a bit, increasing the intensity on the main light source for one thing.
Yes that is better 3ch0_419. What might be cool is to turn the key pad into an Uberarea light. You can increase the ambient color channel to above 100% to make the screen glow because the area light does not create a light source. It just casts light.
Hello,
For this contest, i will try to render with no light ... there is emissive shader on figures ... there is still a lot to do but ....
A good beginning lord.siotrad.
Thank's.
That's the "studio" of http://www.daz3d.com/boudoir-photo-studio-and-lights and i put it an Iray painted shader.
Here is my updated render using suggestions for more interaction. I also added a couple little things like the watch on the male's arm just for a little extra touch.
I imagine Squach saying something like "No, seriously it was a ghost. I saw it myself" with the man's reply "I don't know about all that."
I am trying to think of themes, and I keep coming back to father daughter... I think its my go-to thing. But perhaps even more so this month because April always was filled with a lot of "dad" type things. April 1st was his favorite day of the year, I think, after Christmas, he absolutely loved to play pranks. And April 1st is also the start of fishing season here in NY, his favorite season! Plus tomorrow, April 3rd, would be his birthday if he were still with us. Not to mention the beginning spring training for his Yankees... he had been a star pitcher in highschool and inspired me to practice my fast pitch for lots of hours. I might do dad helping daughter put the worm on the hook. Poserworld happens to have this nice short lived freebie , while I am thinking of it, if anyone wants it! A rod and reel with a nice little lure. https://poserworld.com/3d-model-sample-download And I already have the boat, dock, and pond. Plus, I think it was Kismet who did the pond scene in January with the beautiful reflective water? And Linwelly also did a cool water reflection image. Maybe water reflection will be this months "reflective surface"...my theme within a theme of late. Although I haven't gotten glass right, I think I need to set that down for a bit. Light, interaction, and composition.. with a little reflection study just for my own interest. Plus I really need to work on facial expressions...I think I am on my way towards an idea! :-)
I tried to mess around with the lighting a bit, increasing the intensity on the main light source for one thing.
Yes that is better 3ch0_419. What might be cool is to turn the key pad into an Uberarea light. You can increase the ambient color channel to above 100% to make the screen glow because the area light does not create a light source. It just casts light.
How's this look Dollygirl, somewhat what you were thinking of?
Yes that is better 3ch0_419. What might be cool is to turn the key pad into an Uberarea light. You can increase the ambient color channel to above 100% to make the screen glow because the area light does not create a light source. It just casts light.
How's this look Dollygirl, somewhat what you were thinking of?
Yes much better. I can see the hand now and the pad has become an added point of interest. I think you need to up the shading rate either in the uber lights or in render options when you get ready to do your final version. You are a little too specklely and dropping the shading rate to a lower number will help that.
Here is my first render scene, and it's also my first post to the forum.
After a quick thinking to what I can participate in to this contest, I've brought this scene to implement my techniques I've been learning for the last 4 months in DAZ Studio.
I hope you'll like it, I'll be glade to receive any opinion to my posting.
The name of the render is " Barn with Horses" and I have used DAZ Studio 4.7 to create the scene, and DAZ Studio 4.8 for rendering.
Here is my first render scene, and it's also my first post to the forum.
After a quick thinking to what I can participate in to this contest, I've brought this scene to implement my techniques I've been learning for the last 4 months in DAZ Studio.
I hope you'll like it, I'll be glade to receive any opinion to my posting.
The name of the render is " Barn with Horses" and I have used DAZ Studio 4.7 to create the scene, and DAZ Studio 4.8 for rendering.
---------------{ UPDATED }----------------
I've managed to update the scene according to the comments and suggestions received for the first render, I hope this time I've done it properly. :coolhmm:
Welcome to the forum h-habash,
You have made a nice start with your barn scene. I escecially like the pose of the greyish horse, and the building looks very good
Here are some ideas you might want to conside for the further process.
In the moment your scene seems to float in the air. There are two options to solve that problem. the easy one is to focus your camera position closer to the person and the horses, so that the end of your flor is not seen.
The other version is to look for a backdrop that has a landscape bottom alternatively some skydomes have that.
For those with limits on their buying options there ight eb some freebies around for that, I even pinted one myself once using the Gimp.
For you human figure I suggest turning it around facing the horses and/or the camera from deeper in the barn.
I'm not sure about the surfaces you use, to me they look flat and cartoony. but maybe you want to keep that as your style for this image.
Welcome h_habash. You have come to the right place for comments. As Linwelly has pointed out there are some things you can do to bring out your story a little better. She pointed out that it looks like your scene is floating in the air. Here are a couple of environments that I use a lot:
Free
Dystopia City Blocks 001-010
Shifting Images - Free Stuff - Mountain Scene
and of coarse there are many wonderful pay for packages here in the store.
Linwelly also mentioned that your surfaces may need a bit of tweeking. I have the same barn as you are using. When it loads into a DAZ Studio scene it comes in with the default surfaces. Which is what we are seeing in your scene. If you look under the Pose/ART_BarnYard directory you will find some Material settings for the barn, hay, ground. You want to apply these files to your barn, hay and ground. This will set up your surfaces for DAZ Studio and you will not get the plastic looking results you see in your current render. And lastly I noticed that your poor grey has a milky eye. If this is on purpose that is fine but I know that when I apply the mats to the DAZ 2 horse that sometimes my eye textures get missed place and I have to re-apply them to get my pony's eyes to look like eyes.
Looking forward to seeing what you do.
Welcome to the forum h-habash,
You have made a nice start with your barn scene. I escecially like the pose of the greyish horse, and the building looks very good
Here are some ideas you might want to conside for the further process.
In the moment your scene seems to float in the air. There are two options to solve that problem. the easy one is to focus your camera position closer to the person and the horses, so that the end of your flor is not seen.
The other version is to look for a backdrop that has a landscape bottom alternatively some skydomes have that.
For those with limits on their buying options there ight eb some freebies around for that, I even pinted one myself once using the Gimp.
For you human figure I suggest turning it around facing the horses and/or the camera from deeper in the barn.
I'm not sure about the surfaces you use, to me they look flat and cartoony. but maybe you want to keep that as your style for this image.
Thanx Linwelly for your Ideas and suggestions, I appreciate that, and right now I'm working on enhancing the scene as suggested.
Welcome h_habash. You have come to the right place for comments. As Linwelly has pointed out there are some things you can do to bring out your story a little better. She pointed out that it looks like your scene is floating in the air. Here are a couple of environments that I use a lot:
Free
Dystopia City Blocks 001-010
Shifting Images - Free Stuff - Mountain Scene
and of coarse there are many wonderful pay for packages here in the store.
Linwelly also mentioned that your surfaces may need a bit of tweeking. I have the same barn as you are using. When it loads into a DAZ Studio scene it comes in with the default surfaces. Which is what we are seeing in your scene. If you look under the Pose/ART_BarnYard directory you will find some Material settings for the barn, hay, ground. You want to apply these files to your barn, hay and ground. This will set up your surfaces for DAZ Studio and you will not get the plastic looking results you see in your current render. And lastly I noticed that your poor grey has a milky eye. If this is on purpose that is fine but I know that when I apply the mats to the DAZ 2 horse that sometimes my eye textures get missed place and I have to re-apply them to get my pony's eyes to look like eyes.
Looking forward to seeing what you do.
Thanx Dollygirl for your remarks and suggestions and also for the downloads, I certenly will try them in the scene, as I mentioned to Linwelly, I'm working in enhancing the scene and your suggestions are going to give extra improvements.
Here's mine so far. It's at a really rough stage, there's still pokethrough & no real lights other than the Iray emitters (the lightsabers)... plus the default camera light for the no-light setup.
Star Trek was not working because the poses tend to be boring in most situations, so I went with Star Wars.
I also had an idea to take something from Professional Wrasslin' (in the Sith Warrior's pose). The Jedi poses, I am still thinking about.
Lots of promising renders so far. I am looking forward to seeing how they progress.
My first attempt.
Nice action and pleasing composition, Times, I would say the only thing I would do is maybe make the guy with the pyramid a little more oblivious of what is going on around him. Maybe bend and turn his head more towards the pyramid and make him smile. This is me trying to tell your story by the way. What you have done works as well.
Looking forward to seeing what you do
Like where you are going, Kismet. Love the play of light on her and the colors of the foreground, mid-ground and background. I have just one question, what is that cat doing over there?
I think you have handles turned on on her outfit. Looks cool but don't know if you want to have that or not.
Looking forward to seeing what you do.
Your most welcome h_habash.
Yes that is better 3ch0_419. What might be cool is to turn the key pad into an Uberarea light. You can increase the ambient color channel to above 100% to make the screen glow because the area light does not create a light source. It just casts light.
How's this look Dollygirl, somewhat what you were thinking of?
Yes much better. I can see the hand now and the pad has become an added point of interest. I think you need to up the shading rate either in the uber lights or in render options when you get ready to do your final version. You are a little too specklely and dropping the shading rate to a lower number will help that.
I tried to mess with uber lights this morning Dolygirl, and it looks like I got rid of some of that 'specklely' look in the last one. Thanks again for all the feedback you've been giving me on this.