Digital Art Zone

Hello,


one of the last tips in this WIP thread I wanted to share is how to move models in relation to each other.
Imagine you've posed two models which i.e. holds hands or dances close to each other.
After moving them around you either don't want to repose them or to do math and calculate
the exact position to rebuild the pose.

With grouping them into one null object you can translate/move, rotate and even scale them both together
at the same time. The pose won't change - the hands still holds and the dancers are still close to each other.

Another thing you can do with null objects is to organize and group lights, cameras, background objects, etc.

Either select the items before you group them in a null object or afterwards move them into it.
When you doing it afterwards it sometimes happens that the position of the moved models is reset to 0.
Just copy the parameters before moving the model into the null object and then paste them back to it.
Could be a bug in 4.0

See you all next month...

So can you use the last selection, "target null with with selected items," to target one hand from model A, to a null object parented to model B's hand? If so, that's similar to a Target Helper Object in Carrara.


I used one once [Target Helper] to have an animated model keep her hand parented to her hip during a walk cycle. I could work on the walk without having to worry where the hand was going to go. I also used that method to simulate twirling a model above V4s head. I made my model, parented a target helper to it, applied a spin and then had the hand of the V4 track the target, and posed the hand. looked pretty good.


In my two contest submissions I used Targets to assist in posing. This was especially useful for the human subject, as I could pose the feet and legs using the Targets, and then adjust the orientation of the hip and other areas without messing up the feet and legs.


For the dino picture, I used Targets on all the feet and the heads and tails to assist in the posing process. If there is a similar feature in your software of choice, I would suggest practicing with it. It won't solve all the issues, but it may simplify some processes.

Nice dinosaur render, evilproducer! I've bought a bunch of dinos (Predators and Prey Bundle and Dinosaur Bundle) and have been waiting to play with them, not quite sure how to build an appropriate environment for them to play in. Yours looks great.

Well, I'm going to sleep on it, but I think this is it. Feedback still appreciated, though. Thanks, everyone, for your suggestions and encouragement this far, and good luck to everyone in the contest!

Hello Scott-Livingston,

good work. I'd like to see more light in it. Two spot lights perhaps with which you highlight and emphasize your posing a little bit more.
I think it has atmosphere but it's a little bit dark, isn't it?


By the way, when exactly the contest will close for entries. What time and what time zone?

Thanks! I think you're probably right. Unfortunately, I don't think I'll have time to re-render with different lighting, but here's a quick attempt to "fix it in post:"

You have till the end of day today to upload.

Frank0314 - 30 July 2012 07:48 AM

You have till the end of day today to upload.

I'm not questioning the judges here, but surely July has 31 days?

YUP, but the contest thread says it ends on 30th July. Gives a day for judging, before the new contest starts.

Hello,

thats good to hear that we've got still time. I'm running for another entry which was on my mind since last week.
I wanted to pose something around parkour, traceur or free climbing. I chose the last one.
One guy here have been missing action scenes and he is right, there're missing here except for a few ones.

@scott-livingston: The lightning looks already better than the dark grim light before. Good luck
@evilproducer: I'm not sure if this is possible.

Free climbing, 3rd draft
What do you think about it?
Thanks in advance I appreciate every critical suggestion

I like that. And thanks for the action pose.

Decided it was time to stop messing with it.

My entry "GENESIS" has now been posted to the contest thread. As with my first entry, I wanted to provide a little commentary here:

First, on interpretation and meaning: it's probably best not to say too much about this, but I wanted this to have several possible interpretations in addition to the obvious one. It was also my intention from the beginning to leave "Adam" untextured. The rule on nudity was only part of the reason for this.

Some products I used in "Ambush on the High Peaks" made another appearance here: Michael 5, Stefan for M4 and Genesis, Medieval Male Peasant Clothing, Journeyer Scout (the sash), Parkside Point Ground, Light Dome Pro (once again I used one of the jpeg backgrounds, not the lighting itself). Others include Pure Hair Classic (on both figures; untextured and with some of the surfaces hidden on "Adam"), Manly Men M5 (one of the things I used to shape "Adam"), Michael 4 Long Beard (because I was too cheap to buy Unshaven for Genesis), and K4 Basicwear for Genesis (the briefs that come with DS4, used because I made the tunic partially transparent and didn't want to violate the nudity rule).

A few tricks in DS and GIMP I used: on the surfaces tab, turned up Ambient on the "God" figure's eyes to achieve that bright, glowing look. I did some things to the other character's eyes too, but in the end it's not really obvious. The glow near their hands was also achieved without the need for postwork; that's just a carefully-positioned point light. The halo affect started with an Uber Area sphere, and was enhanced by using the smudge tool in GIMP. The smudge tool also helped me smooth out some issues with the sash and with the beard.

The previously-mentioned transparent clothes are a handy thing to know how do: just go to the Surfaces tab and turn down the opacity of the item in question (even going to 90% can increase realism in some instances; this one was set to 70%, I think). I also made heavy use of the softglow filter and the brightness and contrast sliders. I used the cartoon filter on the previous version I posted above, which was one of the elements in the final version. One of the last things I did was to layer together postworked versions (like the one above) and raw renders, and adjusted the opacity of each layer until I got the look I wanted.

deloquencia I don't want to look down it makes me dizzy, to high for me really good job.
Scott you also do a really good job.

deloquencia - 30 July 2012 11:10 AM

Hello,

thats good to hear that we've got still time. I'm running for another entry which was on my mind since last week.
I wanted to pose something around parkour, traceur or free climbing. I chose the last one.
One guy here have been missing action scenes and he is right, there're missing here except for a few ones.

@scott-livingston: The lightning looks already better than the dark grim light before. Good luck
@evilproducer: I'm not sure if this is possible.

Free climbing, 3rd draft
What do you think about it?
Thanks in advance I appreciate every critical suggestion

Good job. I really like it.

Hello,

thank you, Frank0314, Sasje and Jaderail.

Another tip I've got when finishing things in a hurry is the progressive rendering.
Perhaps it's obvious what this setting in the rendering tab provides, but perhaps not.
The setting builds the render in continuous improvement.
This can give you a quick idea about how the final result'll look like already around 50%
without decreasing the render quality. When taking a look at shadows this can help.

Soon I should finish the free climbing

Thanks for that tip, deloquencia! I thought that was a Reality thing; didn't know it was possible in DS4 with 3Delight.

I like how your latest is coming along so far. The lighting and the pose both look really good. Biggest difference I see in the pose between the reference and the render is the extent to which the chest/torso is visible under his chin. But it took me a while before I noticed that!