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Just realized that this one might have made a better entry than the one I posted ;) Ah well. The hands pretty much happened liek that. They inevitably 'poke through' each other, but skin/flesh tends to give a little when holding hands like that, doesn't it?
Enjoying seeing everyone's work in here!
Dave, first of all, congrats on your first render! You took on quite a challenge.
In addition to testing a spot light on the face, if I were handed this and told "Go play!" here's what I'd do- (and keep in mind I'm a newbie too)
I would create a point light and lower it by the sitting person's face, and do either a pale orange or a pale yellow glow and test it to see how that does with your existing color. You should get a really neat pale reddish/orange glow. Or, use two point lights, and stack one above the other- and let's say your first point light is A/B/C in color, the second point light would be A-10/ B-10/C-10 to create a more diluted effect on the body- so the face would be the highlight. I love point lights!
As for spot lights, I like them coming from the side best- due to the dramatic shadows they create.
Something you might not know- I certainly didn't- that blue cube out in the viewport- if you create a spotlight (let's say spotlight 1) then select Spotlight 1 in the "view" (where normally you have Perspective view) so you have Spotlight 1 view- WHEN YOU MOVE AROUND IN THE VIEWPORT YOU ARE NOT MOVING THE VIEW, you are MOVING THE LIGHT! You might try that and see if it helps you home in on what you want to light up.
TIP: But first, to create the spotlight- In the viewport, use the Perspective view like you ARE the spotlight. Then go up to Create>New Spotlight> and when the popup comes up, select the option that says to use the Perspective view, and VOILA, now that IS where spotlight one is shining. :) and it's called Spotlight 1. Once you create it, remember again- If you move around from Spotlight 1 view- remember you ARE MOVING THE LIGHT.
And you can go back to Perspective view which is just a view to see the effects and do your render from..
I know you didn't ask for a tutorial and may know all this, but others may not. :) I covered it in my art studio thread and got some PMs from a couple folks saying "I didn't know that!" (Glad I wasn't the only one, lol!)
BTW- Don't remember if someone covered this, and I'm headed out the door, so sorry to repeat if they did- you can also go into Surfaces and piddle with the diffuse color, specular, and ambient too. Don't just rely on the lights.
Cathie
Thanks for the great suggestions. I put a few spotlights in, I can't quite get the hang of point lights. Nice tips on the mechanics of manipulating lights, that saves a lot of time!
Yes, good point. I changed the color of the Point Light behind the effect, and added a Point Light in front of the effect; this seems to get the greenish glow going quite nice.
Is there another way of doing this? Can I make the effect itself give off light?
dave and t.gohrbandt: both of you are off to a good start, and the lighting is much improved in the most recent image you posted!
The hand pose is very nicely done! Just so you know, the rules do allow you to submit two images to the contest. I think it's been a few months since anyone did that.
*waves hand* I did in the May contest (posted two entries I mean)
Ah, didn't catch that when reading the rules the first time. Too bad I went along and posted the image elsewhere already, but I might get inspired and toss up something entirely different. There's a bit of june left, after all ;)
Glad you like the hand pose! Rather pleased with it, myself, if I may arrogantly state so :D
Okay...so I left this alone for a while. I tend to do that with creative projects I think are finished. Good thing to because I did some ( I hope ) final tweaking.
Yes, good point. I changed the color of the Point Light behind the effect, and added a Point Light in front of the effect; this seems to get the greenish glow going quite nice.
Is there another way of doing this? Can I make the effect itself give off light?
Looks very nice. I don't use D/S, but if it was Carrara I could give detailed directions on how to get the glow effect to emit light. ;-)
I must say that this is a much better image. It's amazing but these little extra touches of light really do take one's art to higher level.
To answer your question, the answer is yes. However... I am not as well versed in doing this and so I'd need to bone up on how best to answer this. I know that it has something to do with using the uberArea Lights and setting up a plane to be your light emitter. I've seen it done and can attest to how good the effect is.
Wish I had a more precise answer than this for your question. Maybe someone else knows the answer while I look into it?
I was going to Show how to do the Uber Area Base on the effect but it seems that (for me) I've lost the Diffuse Maps on Area in DS4.6 I only get a grey scale and no color except base color. Darn it all.
Yes, good point. I changed the color of the Point Light behind the effect, and added a Point Light in front of the effect; this seems to get the greenish glow going quite nice.
Is there another way of doing this? Can I make the effect itself give off light?
It can be done with Uber Area Lights as in the render below. What makes it a bit more difficult is Area Lights only emit light in one direction so you will need to have two of the props in the scene very close (but not touching) facing opposite directions.
To start select the prop using the surface selection tool and in the content library find the Uber Area Lights(Light Presets - Omnifreaker - Uber Area Lights) hold down the control key and double click on Area Light Base. In the dialogue box select ignore for the surfaces and click OK, the prop is now a light.
Back in the Surfaces Tab load the Diffuse Map into the Ambient Color, Ambient Strength, Color Channels and make sure Ambient Active is set to on. To start with you could try the settings I used mabey with the samples set to 16 or 32 (the higher the samples the better the quality and the longer the render). Another setting to be aware of is the Falloff, if you leave this set to off the light will go on forever. When setting the falloff 100 is approx. One Meter so in my example I have mine set to 4M.
Usually when I get to this point I turn off all the other lights in the scene and do a test render to see if it is working as expected. Don't worry if the render is very grainy, it's because the samples are set low. Now you should see the effect the light is having on your scene and if everything is OK you can put the next one in the scene.
I did it by creating a single node instance of the prop, select it and on the Menu Bar, Create - New Node Instance. It will probably load at world centre but that is easy to fix, select the original and click Edit - Copy - Copy Selected Items, then select the Node and click on Edit - Paste - Paste Pose To Selected Items.
Now the tricky bit, the props can't occupy the exact same place as the transperany maps will create some problems. To fix this work out which way the node needs to move by giving it a nudge along each axis using the plus and minus icons until you get the right one. Once you work that out click on the gear wheel icon on the axis that needs to move and click on Parameter settings and change the nudge setting to 0.1 and click Accept. I put a distance of 0.2 between them and rotate the node 180 degrees so that the faces point in opposite directions.
When doing the parameters for the light you only need to change settings on the original prop, the node will automatically update.
I hope this helps you and that you explore area lights some more they give give effects that you can't achieve with other lights. If you want to get some more info Szark has a great thread devoted to Area Lights http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/14536/
It can be done with Uber Area Lights as in the render below. What makes it a bit more difficult is Area Lights only emit light in one direction so you will need to have two of the props in the scene very close (but not touching) facing opposite directions.
To start select the prop using the surface selection tool and in the content library find the Uber Area Lights(Light Presets - Omnifreaker - Uber Area Lights) hold down the control key and double click on Area Light Base. In the dialogue box select ignore for the surfaces and click OK, the prop is now a light.
Back in the Surfaces Tab load the Diffuse Map into the Ambient Color, Ambient Strength, Color Channels and make sure Ambient Active is set to on. To start with you could try the settings I used mabey with the samples set to 16 or 32 (the higher the samples the better the quality and the longer the render). Another setting to be aware of is the Falloff, if you leave this set to off the light will go on forever. When setting the falloff 100 is approx. One Meter so in my example I have mine set to 4M.
Usually when I get to this point I turn off all the other lights in the scene and do a test render to see if it is working as expected. Don't worry if the render is very grainy, it's because the samples are set low. Now you should see the effect the light is having on your scene and if everything is OK you can put the next one in the scene.
I did it by creating a single node instance of the prop, select it and on the Menu Bar, Create - New Node Instance. It will probably load at world centre but that is easy to fix, select the original and click Edit - Copy - Copy Selected Items, then select the Node and click on Edit - Paste - Paste Pose To Selected Items.
Now the tricky bit, the props can't occupy the exact same place as the transperany maps will create some problems. To fix this work out which way the node needs to move by giving it a nudge along each axis using the plus and minus icons until you get the right one. Once you work that out click on the gear wheel icon on the axis that needs to move and click on Parameter settings and change the nudge setting to 0.1 and click Accept. I put a distance of 0.2 between them and rotate the node 180 degrees so that the faces point in opposite directions.
When doing the parameters for the light you only need to change settings on the original prop, the node will automatically update.
I hope this helps you and that you explore area lights some more they give give effects that you can't achieve with other lights. If you want to get some more info Szark has a great thread devoted to Area Lights http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/14536/
Wow. That's a lot more complicated to do in Studio than I thought it would be. There's no way to use the glow in the shader of the magical effect object thingy emit the light?
Wow, thank you! That's a lot of information. I'll definitely try this tomorrow.
After finding a thread on Lighting Tricks by Szark ( thank you Szark :) ) I decided to give it a try since I know the lighting I had was not the best. Yesterday I tried to follow the tips, totally messed up and scrapped the whole thing. Mostly because it was getting late, I was getting tired and I had to work the next day.
But I wasn't going to give up and I have tried again. Good thing there is still some time left before this contest ends. :-)
Speak his name and he shall appear.... my pleasure. I can see it helped..nice. Though his shiney pants are a little too shiney. Drop the glossiness or spec strength down a touch more and you should be there. Just drop one setting and test render, that way you will know what does what.
Thanks. Those shiny pants have been bugging me.
Thanks for the tips Szark. I played with the glossiness and spec settings as well as looking for pictures of leather pants online to get an idea of just how "shiny" they should be.
What are your Glossiness and Specular strength settings as it still seems to glossy for leather.
At a guess I would say 90% Glossiness and maybe 60% Strength but I am guessing.
I currently have them set at 85% glossiness and 40% specular strength.
Hello, this one it's representing the time where mankind will find it's place in the universe, it's part of a graphic novel I'm about to finish, Thanks!
Here's another one of the same project. Thanks in advance for any feedback!
Hey, gang, here's my entry.
"Dude, the Other left, 2"
I used two Blank Boi's, each with a different texture, 3-D-C's free Scifi Corridor set, the Hero FX special effects set, and three lights. Please let me know what you think.
Your friend
Oracle
Nice posing- the affection can certainly be seen! I would personally like to see her face illuminated softly- either with a spotlight or point light (lower it down about the the cheek, move it away until you get the glow you want.) She seems a bit "out" of the scene as she's not lit. That's just my personal preference though.
Can you folks clarify what exactly a new user is? I have been a member since last September, so not a year. I'm still fiddling with the basic lights (point, spot, distant) and will start with area lights next week, but everything so far is just the basics. However, I don't want to enter if I'm not a newbie. (I do post a LOT, lol- as you well know, and help other folks with the basics.) You know what I can do so far as renders, so is that newbie?
EDIT: FYI I entered last month.
That water/reflection is pretty cool. How did you do it?
Since you can enter two renders in the contest, I thought I'd try something else. What do you think?
Yes you still count as a newbie
That water/reflection is pretty cool. How did you do it?
Since you can enter two renders in the contest, I thought I'd try something else. What do you think?I really like this except I see all the flaws in the defenders technique. Your posing and interaction is fine, lighting looks good, textures are fine but....
The Elbow strike to the face looks good, the hand (right) would only be turned flat to the neck for a pull throw or drop. When facing a Armed foe pulling them close is a BAD idea. I would turn the right hand flat to the shoulders for a fast follow through neck chop. The left arm is good also but striking the inner Elbow just allows the Knife to get closer. A punch out, flat handed at the wrist would force both the arm up and away and keep that nasty knife away from the defenders body. It would also then be a true form taught to me in Kempo for defending against a knife attack.
I used a photograph from the net as a reference tool... :) Guess I should have been more critical. My own Ju Jutsu days are 15 years in the past.
So, you think the defender's left hand should strike at the attacker's right forearm, and the defender's right forearm needs to be twisted so the right hand is more parallel to the ground? Just making sure I understand your suggestions before I twist it all up.