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hehe Got me, manne! Like I said, right before posting the initial red version in my last post, I caught a problem, fixed it, then went to post again, caught another problem, and it went back and forth like that. I finally said I needed to post both of them otherwise I'd still be going back and forth with them.
But when I realized that in order to get him to blend with the mist I had to layer mask out most of his kilt. So I've been kicking at around while waiting to see what y'all thought of the latest creation.
Do I still think the kilt is needed? Well, let me clarify that. I should have said something denoting a Scottish plaid is needed. Now readers love the hero in a kilt even though it's not accurate to the time period my story is set in. In fact the hero doesn't wear one. He dresses like everyone else. The kilt is definitely a genre expectation for the cover.
I had a couple of thoughts about it. And the first is drawing it by hand - which I've done quite a bit in the past.
I'm so glad Cherp found those links for me and this kilt is working quite well considering it's for M4 and this is Gianni. But I think the subtleties would be best served if I drew it by hand..
OR I could forego the kilt and just go with the brat over the shoulder and that would do it right there.
I could also use the plaid in place of some of the mist behind the title. I don't want to get rid of all of it but it could help offset the title even better.
I'm glad the tag line is looking better but it is still bugging the crap out of me. The problem is, if I dump it, I've got another big void at the top of the image. But I could also drape a bit of a plad there to get rid of that.
I posted some stuff I did in photoshop earlier in the year as practice so you can get an idea. The practice was mostly for the skin which is why it looks terrible. But this particular model is covered in major body art. I mean a ridiculous amount. I've never seen a cover with him on it that did not have his tattoos. (Not saying they're not out there but boy I can understand why artists are hesitant to tackle something like that - I was pulling my hair out.) But during all that, I was also working on drawing the plaid and this is the image where I also created that buckle with the lion. Last but not least it was also great practice for hair and fur - the belt pouch is completely hand painted and so is his hair (the model has a hair cut that would make a Marine Corps sergeant jealous. ;)
I just draw the cloak or kilt or whatever then put the actual tartan pattern over it so it's relatively easy.
But the reason why I'm hesitating - I know I'm going to do something to screw it up somehow - just watch! lol!
Honestly though, I think I'm going to have to put something on there - Amazon's categories subdivide all the way down to Highlander in the romance genre, but Audible works their search stuff a little differently. So I'm leaning toward using everything at my disposal.
Thanks manne! I kick it around some more and see what I can do. I checked my deadline on ACX - luckily it's tomorrow. Uh... just checked the clock ... today I mean. *sigh*
What round are we on now? 9? Just a little punch drunk - one too many hits with the snake for poor Aladin. ;)
Hi Jaime! Welcome! So glad to have you join us. Get thee out of lurkdom and grab a chair. There's some snacks on the counter over there. Help yourself. ;)
Wow - you've got a interesting history from Law School to Film School. I've taken plenty of courses and written a few screenplays myself. And changing gears back to genre fiction is rough! But film school is quite a different story.
I'm glad you've found the thread helpful thus far. Those are some really nice renders! Do you have an idea where you want to go with the scifi book cover?
This thread has certainly been a huge help for me - thank you again everyone!
Cheers,
Kath
If you need some over the shoulder tartan this might help. Its made for Genesis, but it should autofit onto Gianni without major issues.
https://www.daz3d.com/highland-lad
We talked earlier about genre expectations, there are elements that trigger instant recognition and familiarity. And that's what your audience would be looking for. The tartan kilt or drape, the celtic knots, the distant keep on the hill, all suggest "Highlander". I agree with you, if the audio book department doesn't have sub category for Highlander, then your branding image needs to make the genre clear. I think the image is evolving well. Looking forward to the next version.
Thanks muchly for the kind words, Kath :)
While Optitex can fit V4 clothes to G2F, I've found there are limits: I had to make her proportions less zaftig so now she's curvy instead of rubenesque :-P
Regarding the scifi book cover I'm almost done; I ran into a brick wall for a bit then I reached out to a mate from my advertising days who has more than 20 years of experience as an Art Director/Graphic Designer and who's also a major geek :cheese: His help has been invaluable. Just this morning he did some fonty things for me to use and it totally amps up "the production values".
And speaking of geeky, whilst I'm a huge fan of Frazetta, Vallejo and Luis Royo, for comics I love the work of Adam Hughes, not just for cheescakey stuff but his work on the LSH 1994 team and Alex Ross :cheese: It was his comment on how he figured out how to do the Human Torch (Jim Hammond not Johnny Storm) that turned me into a fan for life: after having looked at a lot of references, including people on fire, and it just wasn't coming together Ross realized that the Torch wasn't on fire but giving off heat . That sequence from Marvels still gives me goosebumps ;-P
Hey First - I read this and immediately went to work. That tartan I have in my wish list, along with this one:
Celtic Fionn Outfit
But Cherp found those freebies for me - one of which is a great kilt. Except it doesn't have textures. Of course I had to make the attempt before purchasing something. ;)
So I pulled the great kilt obj into Photoshop. Photoshop's 3d capabilities are geared more to creating logos, some basic mockups, and 3d printing. But since the kilt was already UV mapped, half my work was done for me.
I have this little piece of clip art that I used to do the texturing on the images I posted above with the plaid. Just something nice and simple.
The kilt also has a brooch or cloak pin. I just happen to have a ton of Celtic vector art and images from the Book of Kells that I turned into transparent images for times just like this. The metal celtic cross began as black and white vector art.
So when I was done, I ended up with the next image. I thought that would do nicely. Exported the 3d layer as an OBJ an saved the textures as jpgs.
Well, saving the mesh as a new obj makes it not work as nicely as the original and while I'm sure I could figure it out, I don't have the time right now. So I just used the original great kilt mesh, hit it with the DAZ default iray base shader, then pulled my diffusion jpg from the Photoshop layer export onto the base layer of the iray shader. For the brooch, I hit it with a metal iray shader then did the same with that exported jpg from photoshop.
And the last two images are the latest two renders of the hero.
I tried the second angle in case the plaid was looking too much like a blanket. Unfortunately, I didn't have as good of luck with the brooch. Again, rather than spend time I don't have on it, I just covered it with his hair. I'll figure that one out later when I have time to tackle it.
So what do y'all think? Will that work? I'm going to try putting him into the cover images, but please let me know what y'all think!
Thanks again!
Cheers,
Kath
Jaime! That cover is absolutely awesome!!!! I love it! I'm crunched for time right now but I'll be back in a few and can respond in detail. :) But just had to say - damn that cover rocks! ;)
Ok just trying to work on some placement techniques. What I am noting is that things that look good in a full size render, look downright odd at thumbnail size. Additionally, if I plan on adding text, I need to leave white space for it. I've also been working on what my son lovingly critiques as my characters' propensity for having a lazy eye. :) gotta love kids.
I like the 2nd pose better with the plaid, interested to see what it will look like on the cover with your other elements though.
Okay, I'm going to post these then jump back and do the catch up thing with the responses. lol!
While I was at it, I made another alt version. So we have red with pose 1 tag line and no tag line, blue with pose 2 and also tag or no tag. I can swap out the poses but figured this was enough to give us a good indication.
Personally I'm leaning toward blue with pose 2 no tag.
I like blue with pose 2 with the tag because the picture has good flow, my eye starts with the hero, drifts down the tag line to the castle, then rounds out with the title. :) Although, you do have the hero fading out above the ground so that definitely looks better in the 2nd blue one.
You've done it! This one looks crisp and clean and professional. And the hero looks more relatable. I also like the details in the ruins.
Okay catch up time. Thank you First for reminding me about this because you're exactly right. When in doubt - nothing like the facts to clear things up. lol! But it's easy to get so wrapped up that the next thing I know I can't see the forest for the trees.
But all of this work has been absolutely fantastic for me not only with my book cover art, but learning DAZ and even a bit of the "Art of Promo" like you have going in your other thread.
I surprised myself by not only thinking of doing the textures on the free great kilt mesh, but actually doing it without batting an eye and having something halfway decent within a few minutes instead of fighting with it for hours on end. It wasn't until I posted the pics did I realize what I did. lol!
It's a good reminder for me to take note of my successes when I find them, especially the small ones. That way it doesn't always seem like I'm not making any progress at all. ;)
This is a great image Manne. Very dynamic, plus its has a great Game of Throne's Drogo feel to it.
And I'm back again! Now I'm getting confused on my sources but adjusting G2F to match V4 was something First Bastion suggested? I think? Or was it adjust M4 to V4 to get something to fit. lol! I've got this thread and tutorials all running through my head, it's easy to get confused on who said what. Sorry if I misquoted you, First!
Your comment about Ross's discovery is one of those treasures and a great example of what we were talking about when the "click" happens.
On the book cover I really like how the word "Lethano" is not only arced but has a very slight perspective angle to it - so it looks like your glowy wormhole is bowing the title slightly. That's really cool!
I also absolutely love the colors you used.
Thanks FirstBastion,
It's not my usual style at all, but this thread is really great for pushing me to explore the Iray render engine; and introduce as much realism as I can into the render before I take it into photoshop for post work. I am really loving the challenge since, unlike Kathryn, I have no deadlines to make. ;)
OMG! Your son nailed it on the head! Because I was fighting with the lazy eye thing through all of these renders. lol!
I don't know if this helps or hinders me but with Kindle, Audible, and some other etailer outlets, their cover art requirements are very specific in regard to size and aspect ratio.
So I have saved these sizes and aspect ratios in Photoshop. When I start work on one, I hit new document and select my Audible preset from the pull down so the document is automatically at the smallest acceptable size 2800x2800 pixels. I can make it bigger if I want but that's the minimum. I'm doing the same thing with the DAZ viewer and saving my presets but that seems to get in the way more because it limits my camera almost. Since I can adjust the render in photoshop as its own layer, I probably won't use my presets in DAZ.
But I really like how you're renders are coming. Are these straight out of DAZ or have you done some postwork? Two things stand out to me though, his hair line and his abs. lol! The top of the abs seem out of proportion to me - but that's probably just me. But the hairline, if you're using Julius hair and the OOT iray hair shaders - don't apply the OOT to the skull cap, if you adjust the sliders not only on the hairline but the temple adjustments that should fix it for you and make the hair look more natural. If you watch the image closely in the viewport, you'll see how it translates the shifts and you'll be able to figure out what it looks like in the viewport when you have it adjusted correctly for the render.
I like blue with pose 2 with the tag because the picture has good flow, my eye starts with the hero, drifts down the tag line to the castle, then rounds out with the title. :) Although, you do have the hero fading out above the ground so that definitely looks better in the 2nd blue one.
Actually, the second one is the mist you had me put in behind the title helping with the fade on the hero - I didn't have to adjust him at all on that second blue. lol! See what you did? ;)
Hi First! Yay! Yay! Yay! Thank you very much!
And the fact that this one looks cleaner is why I was leaning toward it rather than the one with the tag (sorry manne lol!)
Thank you again for your feedback on this.
Thanks FirstBastion,
It's not my usual style at all, but this thread is really great for pushing me to explore the Iray render engine; and introduce as much realism as I can into the render before I take it into photoshop for post work. I am really loving the challenge since, unlike Kathryn, I have no deadlines to make. ;)
And that's the best time to do stuff like this - when you don't have a deadline. I never expected my narrator to get everything posted so quickly. There's still a month to go before the deadline in the contract so that's what threw a monkey wrench into the whole thing and made me juggle my schedule.
But keep pushing because I think what you've got going rocks big time!
I am using the Kouros hair by SAV. It's an older model so it only has fits for up to genesis, but yeah, the forehead area looks a little weird. I didn't apply the shader to the cap, but I'll need to work on it a bit.
Hi First! Yay! Yay! Yay! Thank you very much!
And the fact that this one looks cleaner is why I was leaning toward it rather than the one with the tag (sorry manne lol!)
Thank you again for your feedback on this.
One small suggestion; If it's not too much of a hassle, I'm pretty sure you have each element on its own layer, you might want to consider reducing the ruined tower perhaps 10%, so it is not equal in height with the hero. Just dropping it down a bit will keep it present but not challenging the focus on the hero.
Yes! I agree! That will be perfect.
One small suggestion; If it's not too much of a hassle, I'm pretty sure you have each element on its own layer, you might want to consider reducing the ruined tower perhaps 10%, so it is not equal in height with the hero. Just dropping it down a bit will keep it present but not challenging the focus on the hero.
Uh . . . whoops . . . Now you tell me! :lol:
It's submitted and I done clicked the button. :red:
BUT all is not lost because while I have my presets in Photoshop there's one thing I can't set up and that's the 8mg file size limit when uploading to ACX. I have my defaults set for 300dpi because of the print covers. ACX wants 72dpi so I just change that without resampling - easy memory save. But that doesn't help a whole lot when the image tops out at over 400mb.
I can submit a JPG, PNG, or TIFF but the one thing I saw when posting my images here was that JPG really takes a bite out of the gold layer style of the font. So what you guys are seeing isn't near as nice as what's on my screen.
Because of that, I nixed the JPG compression option.
So now I have PNG and TIFF.
First I had to rasterize the smart objects. Photoshop has gotten a lot better in recent upgrades in rasterizing or merging groups and NOT changing the image. But sometimes it still has a problem. So when I rasterized the tower it was so bold that it really overwhelmed the hero. I made some quick layer adjustments and I was able to fog the tower just a bit more and tone down the overpowering red it threw in. So while it's still the same height it's not competing as much I don't think.
But after rasterizing all the smart object, and trying various compressions with TIF, I was at 16mb and couldn't really cut anymore corners. I rasterized the font, but rasterizing layer styles once again changes the look of everything - for the worse. So my gold layer styles I didn't want to muck with - the same with merging certain layers like the mist. I had merged all I could without changing the look.
Luckily PS 2015 still has the Save For Web option even though it's been demoted to legacy. But I was able to use that to change it to a PNG, no transparency, no color management, and no copyright metadata, to get it down to 7.667mb! :coolsmile:
Saved it, then reopened the PNG file just to double check. It looked reasonably good! So I was off to the races.
You're right, First, I should have caught that before uploading it. Normally I wait a day before hitting the final, no going back, are you sure you're sure, button. But I'm cutting it down to the wire here. I think the mist helps the problem you mentioned but doesn't get rid of it.
Now with my first audiobook, ACX mucked up a bunch of stuff and I had to email them a couple of times to get everything right. Needless to say I wasn't impressed with their handling of Demon Laird so I wouldn't be surprised if something happens with this one too. If I do end up emailing them for corrections, I can include new cover art. I'll make the fix to the master so if I get that opportunity, I won't forget.
Amazon's Kindle publishing access has me spoiled. I can jump up and change the cover and text file any time I feel like it and don't have to go through customer service. The same with Createspace for their print books. Only Audible doesn't allow me to make changes on the fly or even set my own price for the audiobook. But ACX has an exclusive deal with iTunes - if you want your audiobook on iTunes, you have to go through ACX. And right now, Amazon, Audible, and iTunes are the biggest game in town for the media.
But like I said, I'll upload the corrected version if I get the opportunity.
Now one last very important thing.
Since the size is too big for me to post the actual finished png here - y'all will have to settle for . . .
Okay manne now you're scaring me. I picked that one up not long ago too! Yeah, the fitting is wonky, but I'll take a look at it too.
And I noticed the mist! lol!
BTW - you all realize that this thread is just getting started even though I submitted that last cover right? ;)
One small suggestion; If it's not too much of a hassle, I'm pretty sure you have each element on its own layer, you might want to consider reducing the ruined tower perhaps 10%, so it is not equal in height with the hero. Just dropping it down a bit will keep it present but not challenging the focus on the hero.
Uh . . . whoops . . . Now you tell me! :lol:
It's submitted and I done clicked the button. :red:
Now with my first audiobook, ACX mucked up a bunch of stuff and I had to email them a couple of times to get everything right. Needless to say I wasn't impressed with their handling of Demon Laird so I wouldn't be surprised if something happens with this one too. If I do end up emailing them for corrections, I can include new cover art. I'll make the fix to the master so if I get that opportunity, I won't forget.
Amazon's Kindle publishing access has me spoiled. I can jump up and change the cover and text file any time I feel like it and don't have to go through customer service. The same with Createspace for their print books. Only Audible doesn't allow me to make changes on the fly or even set my own price for the audiobook. But ACX has an exclusive deal with iTunes - if you want your audiobook on iTunes, you have to go through ACX. And right now, Amazon, Audible, and iTunes are the biggest game in town for the media.
But like I said, I'll upload the corrected version if I get the opportunity.
Now one last very important thing.
Since the size is too big for me to post the actual finished png here - y'all will have to settle for . . .
Awesome! It looks great. I'll bet you're happy to have that finished.
As Leonardo DaVinci once said: " Art is never finished, merely abandoned"
...or submitted... ;-)
We will always see ways to improve. That's what makes us creative.
On to the next one!
I really like the new look of "Mist Warrior", looks a bit dangerous, a bit spooky and very masculine.
hehe - thanks guys!
@ First Bastion - yeah, one of my favorites is - "I always do my best proofreading after I hit send!" lol!
Thanks again for all the help, I really appreciate it.
I have some rearranging to do because I'll be using this image to replace the ebook cover and the print cover, so the correction will be on there.
@ manne, I don't know what's up with that Kourus hair but I can hardly get it to fit anything.
@cherp - thank you so much m'dear! I'm glad you like it.
One down - fifteen more to go (that's only the ebooks. ;) But up next will probably be Heart's Ransom because it's going into audiobook production shortly.
Oh and I'm also wanting to work on the newbie contest stuff I was having fun experimenting with the lighting - especially for the iray emissives.
Just for fun I did a little campfire scene lit only with a single emissive - but it was taking forever to render so I killed it about 20%. Still you can get the idea. But as I was working on this I remembered a scene from one of my novels that would probably work with the contest and for a cover as well. So I'm going to kick that idea around a little more.
Plus, I have to get some writing done of course. lol!
Hi guys!
I am also a book cover illustrator using DS, most of them are for my boss's sci-fi books on amazon and now I'm having a hard time making a realistic blood spill on the floor. Can anyone help me on the settings of the blood? I tried to manipulate the Iray water shader, but I can't make it work. I even tried the metal shaders, still can't make it look like a blood on my renders, tried to put a texture on my modelled blood spill from blender, it still not working. I know, I can just make the blood on my post work on GIMP, but we would like to it more on DS...
Thank you in advance guys...
Banditcameraman, we're kababayan... Mabuhay! :)
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Have you tried the http://www.daz3d.com/subsurface-goop-shaders? You'd need to render in 3delight for them to work.
Of course the vendor Deviney has blood layers and brushes for photoshop, But I don't know if they would work in gimp.
Also it looks like you might already have it, but http://www.daz3d.com/rigged-water