Darwins' Schtuff

11718202223100

Comments

  • IceDragonArtIceDragonArt Posts: 12,548
    edited December 2016

    Have a great night, enjoy your evening!  Love the dripping from the skull tatoo as well. Very cool!

    Tights huh?  Those things are touch to get into and out of.  No wonder he is unhappy lol.

    Post edited by IceDragonArt on
  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770
    edited December 2016

    LOL- He's a terminally ill superhero. He gets a supersuit in the next book to keep him alive, and I'm making him try them on. He's not happy! Especially because the suit doesn't always work as advertised, and sometimes it works too well! (It's dark romantic comedy and urban fantasy.)

    He looks great in 3Delight, but can't quite get him right in Iray yet. I need to work on his lighting and play with the Anagenesis shaders some more (he's a G2M, so no out of the box Iray skins.) I'm going to page back through Darwin's lighting notes now that I have the Promo Catch Lights and a few others he uses and see if I can get the lighting looking better.

    Hugh Supersuit3.png
    2000 x 1600 - 2M
    Post edited by Llynara on
  • You've got a great start on him so far, I think. 

    When I use the Promo Lights, I generally do a test render with just those with the Scene Only option in rendering to see which light right looks just about right, but a little darker than what I want.  I have a couple of background props (basically two planes-floor and behind the figure, or the prop in Scintillent Lights to box them in) that I add after and render it again.  Then I will go through my various HDRI maps to see which adds the lighting details I want in the eyes, as well as which one lightens the scene to where I want it.  There are times I will add additional lights from other sets, or a distant light set low and at an angle for that little oomph.  I tend to Frankenstein my light sets, finding most individual sets alone aren't enough, or where I want them to be, to not.

    If I get time Monday, I'll put together a mini walk through of one of my promo scenes from Parker if you like to post and toy with.  

  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770
    edited December 2016

    Thanks, Darwin. I'd really appreciate a mini walk through. I still have so much to learn!

    I think part of the challenge with this character is not just the lighting, but how it's interacting with his skin. This is a tweaked out Sebastian HD, which is a beautiful FW character, but doesn't look right so far in Iray. The skin turns out red and there are dark shadows around his eyes when I use Iray shaders. I had to play with the lights a lot to minimize the dark circles and then reduced the saturation a little in Lightroom to take out some of the redness.

    Maybe something isn't reflecting right? I don't know. The NGS Anagenesis 2 shaders have been outstanding on all my other characters (M4s through G3s), but not him. I'm plowing through the Anagenesis thread trying to figure out why this only happens with him. I may have to try other Iray shaders. 

    Sorry, this is wayyy off topic for this thread and I don't mean to hijack it. The things we do to get these guys looking good! Sheesh! 

    EDIT: I may have answered my own question. I'm using shaders for G2, but this one has G1 UVs:

     

    Seb.JPG
    281 x 26 - 11K
    Post edited by Llynara on
  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770
    edited December 2016

    OMG, that was it. I needed to use the G1 script, not the G2 script for the shaders because of the UVs. I would not have guessed that. He's still a little red and there's still some darkness around the eyes, but the original promo pics have some of that too. Up close, it looks okay (full size is attached.) And his eyes in general look less freaky now. Always a win, win. It was so bad in the original pic that I had to desaturate the image. This one is without any postwork. It's interesting to see how the shaders interact with the light. May have to tweak a little more, then light him decently and fix poke through. Getting there.

    Now, back to our regularly scheduled program: Darwin's Upcoming Hotties.

    *taps foot impatiently* Where oh where, is Parker??? I'm saving him a spot under the Christmas tree!

    Hugh supersuit4.png
    2000 x 1600 - 2M
    Post edited by Llynara on
  • DarwinsMishapDarwinsMishap Posts: 4,071
    edited December 2016

    Definitely an improvement!  Hopefully I'll get that walkthrough with the lighting (and products I've used) by Monday.

    Parker will be out soon, but as for an exact date- can't provide...sorry! :(

    Here's a couple of Iain Insets, though.  They're actually going to be shrunk down for his Runtime Icons, so the slight noise still in them won't matter much.  Thankfully.

    Post edited by DarwinsMishap on
  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770

    Oh, those are very pretty eyes. The flying birds on his right arm look very cool too. He turned out so beautifully. Aibell is waiting for him whenever he shows up!

    No rush on the walkthrough. All of us have about a million things to do between now and Monday anyhow. I'm sure I'll be on the forums wayyyy more than I should. But just in case, Merry Christmas and hope you have a great one!

    Now, let the holiday insanity begin! 

     

  • You too!  This weekend I'll more than likely be gone visiting family all day, both days...lol  So it'll be Friday or Monday.

  • IceDragonArtIceDragonArt Posts: 12,548

    Yes Merry Christmas!  About to get even crazier than usual lol. I'm ready for a nice, slow January!

  • I am not even ready for Christmas!  Safe travels and have a Merry Christmas! 

  • I know, right???  Thank you, same for everyone!

    Teaser- close up of two skin settings, base and high gloss.  He had the overlay two settings and just the lips separated out.  I liked the idea of doing this with Damen and Parker and will continue to add a secondary skin gloss setting to add more to the skin for different light rigs.  I notice at times with outdoor lighting, or just HDRI, the skin doesn't have enough gloss--or the opposite, using a base with emitters and point/spot/distant lights it's too glossy.  This way, there is a skin gloss setting for both (for most rigs, at least).

    Base:  (Good for emitters/spot/point/distant light sets)

    High Gloss (Good for most HDRI enviroment map lighting only, or with minimal additional lighting)

    I know it's just the lips and doesn't give a great look at the difference so I'll post the full face as well with both gloss settings.

  • Overall base gloss setting:

    Overall High Gloss Setting:

     

  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770

    Pretty eyes, pretty lips, sigh. The gloss option is a nice detail that helps with the photorealism. Thanks for offering that option. Seems like a good "finishing touch" to take the renders to another level. 

  • I hope so.  Once the already done presets have icons it'll be onto more fun stuff!  Leg tat and other stuff.  ;)

  • Ohh he's coming along great. I also like that there's different gloss options. 

     

    Safe travels and Merry Christmas :) 

    P.s. Are you still working on Solange ? 

  • Thank you very much!

    I am- I had to ditch her skin, however, due to transforming issues with the UV changes between V4 and G3F.  SO, that has to be started over.  Haven't forgotten about her, however. :) 

    Merry Christmas Eve, everyone!

  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770

    Ooh, he looks a little snarly today. Is he feeling Scroogy? LOL

    Merry Christmas Darwin and everyone else on this thread. Hope you all have a wonderful one!

  • I think he is-he's not happy with the rest of the demon make up options so far, I think. lol  

    You too!

  • Ah, found one I like.  So we have the demon make up, the LIE eyeliner...maybe one more.  Gotta finish his tat options (there are a couple of mixes I may or may not save and need the calf finished), his dial cards, the icons for the morphs, character preset and off to promos and sending him to a tester. I'll post this one up, and be off for the day. LOTS to do!  Traveling!  .........I'm already tired. lol

  • Ok- so the one I didn't choose:

    Could not get certain things to look/act the way I wanted, so it got scrapped.  

    The one I chose:

    He will have the LIE eyeliner option, as well as this demon make up option-shown here with the high gloss setting for body/lips.  One more (there are three faces and no brow options that will have the make up as well) and it's onto his gens and finishing up.

  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770
    edited December 2016

    Ooh, wow, he's going to have a lot of options! I love the second one- that really goes well with his features and it's very consistent with the style on your other characters. He really is gorgeous, even as a demon guy.

    The first one reminds me of Daryl Hannah's makeup in Bladerunner. I think you could make it work if you narrowed the band across his eyes like she had hers: 

    Have a great Christmas and safe travels!

    daryl.jpg
    1600 x 761 - 99K
    Post edited by Llynara on
  • Ah, ok.  I'll see what I can do. :) Thank you!

  • IceDragonArtIceDragonArt Posts: 12,548

    I really like the second option.  It looks very natural in a scary demon kind of way lol

  • Thank you!  I actually tweaked the one I didn't like with the idea that Llynara had and am adding it for a second option.  I'll post the tester in a bit. MERRY CHRISTMAS!

  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770
    edited December 2016

    So happy that helped. That's the best Christmas gift! laugh

    Can't wait to see how it turned out! Merry Christmas!

    Post edited by Llynara on
  • IceDragonArtIceDragonArt Posts: 12,548

    Merry Christmas!

  • Here's the tester!

  • LinwellyLinwelly Posts: 5,778

    The problem with the black you use ( as well in the one where the front is all black) is that is sucks away too much of the light, so the features can not be seen anymore like eyelids, folds, etc. As the human brain is trained on face recognition this is something our brain doesn't like to work with. Maybe you could try with some specularity or fresnel ( or the relative equivalents for iray)

  • LlynaraLlynara Posts: 4,770
    edited December 2016

    Getting closer! I'm thinking maybe a straighter top edge (not totally straight) and a little lighter around the edges, then you'll have it. There's just too much darkness at the moment. Looks best concentrated right around the eyes, I think.

    I googled "goth makeup for guys" and there were some interesting ideas there. I'm sure you've already seen them. Tried to send a few through messaging, but doesn't look like you can attach images to a message, which is weird. But I was on my phone. And things don't want to work for me today. At all. I'm star-crossed! LOL

    I'm guarding my feet very carefully lest I step on Legos again!

    Post edited by Llynara on
This discussion has been closed.