WINNERS ANNOUNCED: Carrara Challenge 3: PARADISE LOST AND FOUND.

AntaraAntara Posts: 444
edited September 2013 in Carrara Discussion

Thank you all for the awesome Carrara Challenge #3!

Theme: PARADISE LOST AND FOUND

WINNERS:
1st Place: #10 “Lost World” by Fractal Dimensia
2nd Place: #11 “The Teddy Bear Collector” by Headwax
3rd Place: #14 “Paradise Found” by Antara
Honourable Mention: #3 "Valley of dreams" by Gareth.

Thank you, Age of Armour, for sponsoring this challenge and for selecting the honourable mention winner!

PRIZES:

DAZ has been very generous in encouraging these Carrara Challenges and has offered to support us once a month!
DAZ is donating:

1st Place: a $50 coupon
2nd Place will win a $30 coupon
3rd Place wins a $15 coupon
In addition the Honourable Mention will receive a $5 coupon code.

Please note that the coupons are for DAZ3D items.

We also have a great and very generous sponsor this month: Age of Armour, who is kindly donating the following prizes:

The winners will get to choose items from Age of Armour store at DAZ
1st Place: 3 items
2nd Place: 2 items
3rd Place: 1 item

Some background information about the challenge:

Challenge RULES:
- All renders must be done in Carrara. *
- Artists can post up to 2 (two) entries.
- At least 1 (one) WIP image must be posted in this WIP thread. (Could be a pre-render screen grab of the scene set-up.)
- Content use is allowed and welcome, but MUST be credited.
- Restriction: At least 3 (three) items in the scene must be created OR significantly modified in Carrara. **
- Postwork is allowed, but if you use postwork, the raw render(s) that went into your postworked image MUST be posted in the WIP thread.
- The final entry must be submitted with proper description into this "Challenge Entries" thread, which is now open for entry posting. ***
- All entries must be submitted before 11:59 PM UTAH Time on September 7th 2013
- The voting will run from September 8th to the end of the day (Utah time) September 14th, and winners will be decided on September 15th. ****
- The images must be specially created for this challenge and previously unpublished.

To learn more about the rules and to learn what all the * 's are about, please head over to the WIP thread and read the first post there.

Voting RULES:
- Each voter has 3 votes to cast.
- You may choose up to 3 images for your votes. Please provide entry numbers for your choices.
If you choose 3 images, each image gets 1 of your votes. If you choose only 2 images, you have to assign 2 of your votes for one of them. If you choose only one, all 3 of your votes will go to that image.
- Votes may NOT be divided (no 0.5 vote, 1.5 votes or any other fractions)
- It would be very nice if you provide some comments about your selections and your thoughts about the images.
- You have 2 ways to cast your vote:
a) post a comment into this thread.
b) cast the vote anonymously* by sending me a PM or an email: [my Forum name] followed by '.nn' at Gmail. I will not make your name public, but I will post your comments and your vote into this thread. However, this method has additional restrictions:

* Anonymous voting rules:
- You must provide me with either your Forum name here, or at another well known 3D community and provide a bit of information about yourself (like how are you known in the forums or community) - so I would know you are a real person and not someone who has already voted.
- You MUST provide comments about your selections. (Providing comments is optional if you just vote by posting in this thread, but if you vote anonymously, the comments are mandatory.)
- You may NOT vote for my images (Artist name: Antara).

If there is a tie, I will ask our great sponsor Age of Armour to break it.
The final word on the Honourable Mention also belongs to our sponsor, Age of Armour.
Also, as per challenge rules, I may not get the 1st Place in this challenge.
The person who wins this challenge will host the next one.


LINKS of INTEREST

WIP thread: http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/

Current Sponsor Age of Armour's store: http://www.daz3d.com/age-of-armour

Previous Sponsor DimensionTheory’s store: http://www.daz3d.com/dimensiontheory

Previous Sponsor Dartanbeck’s store: http://www.daz3d.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=dartanbeck&x=0&y=0

DAZ Time UTAH: http://www.worldtimeserver.com/current_time_in_US-UT.aspx

Post edited by Antara on
«13

Comments

  • evilproducerevilproducer Posts: 9,040
    edited September 2013

    I guess I'll go first!

    Entry #1

    evilproducer

    The Apple

    The apple and it's shader were built by me in Carrara. The shader is all procedural. I also built the terrain and the hair for the Homo Erectus.

    The content is V4 Homo Erectus available from DAZ3D.

    I wanted to do a Darwinian take on Adam and Eve and paradise lost. When I got into it, the apeman holding the bone reminded me of 2001: A Space Odyssey and I felt it held with the deconstruction of the Adam and Eve myth, of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or something equally pretentious. ;-) In point of fact, I just wanted a Twilight Zone like element, so I added the obelisk.

    I did use postwork to brighten the image. I must have screwed up my light rig somehow when adding hair to the apemen, so I used Photoshop to brighten it up and also add a DOF. Here's the link to the untouched WIP image:
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P330/#420624

    Eating-apple-w-hair.jpg
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    Post edited by evilproducer on
  • evilproducerevilproducer Posts: 9,040
    edited September 2013

    Entry #2

    evilproducer

    Sunday Evening at the Border

    I created the signs, the textures on the signs, the sign posts, the highway and it's shaders, except for the asphalt shader.

    I used Dystopia City Blocks (1 thru 20) I also used mesh vehicles from Carrara's Object browser under mesh models.

    The scene is something that I used to see quite a bit when going to visit relatives in Illinois. Wisconsin is a big vacation spot for Illinoyances ;-) and when I would head down there on Friday, there would be a continuous stream of cars in the north bound lane and the southbound lane into Illinois would be practically deserted. The reverse was true on Sunday evening when I would head back north.

    So the theme then is Paradise Lost, because the relaxation of the weekend is over, and now it's time to head back to the city and the drudgery of work until the next weekend.
    Some postwork. See edit.
    The WIP:
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P195/#410135

    Edited to add: My mind was on the levels and gamma correction that I did for my first entry, so I forgot that I used a depth layer pass in Photoshop to add a depth of field. I edited the brightness and contrast to exaggerate the effect and I added a gradient to foreground, also to exaggerate the effect. My apologies.

    Sunday-at-the-border05.jpg
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    Post edited by evilproducer on
  • GarethGareth Posts: 0
    edited September 2013

    Entry #3

    Gareth.

    Valley of dreams.

    All objects made in Carrara's vertex modeling room by yours truly, concrete and fabric textures from http://www.cgtextures.com and other textures made in GIMP 2 http://www.gimp.org and shaders are using Zgock's YAToon plugin http://carraracafe.com/downloads/?did=28

    I wanted to create an image with a anime art style and have a variety of characters, so the first step was to write down a list of the workflow i was going to use to get me to A-Z, the second step was to create files i was going to use so my work wasn't going to get lost within the bowels of my hard drive, the third step was to fire up the music player, i find that music is very inspiring, so my workflow was-

    1:Research on animes and scenery.
    2:Sketching a basic scene and character concepts.
    3:Modeling the scene, characters, and props.
    4:Model cleanup and uv unwrapping.
    5:Texturing and creating shaders.
    6:Creating bones and weight painting.
    7:Setting up the scene and shaders.
    8:Lighting and rendering.

    The link to the WIP image http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P300/#417080 :)

    Valley_of_dreams.jpg
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    Post edited by Gareth on
  • StezzaStezza Posts: 7,757
    edited September 2013

    Entry #4
    Title - Crossroads

    Artist - Stezza

    WIP - http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/403428/

    I modelled the segway, the sign post, the telegraph poles and wire and also photographed the Norfolk Pine.

    Content credits - LisaB - Indian Grass, SBRM pelican and flock formations


    General process description - I used the wide angle camera, positioning and lighting processes for sunlight, GI and full raytracing for render. No postwork was used.

    Interpretation - open to the viewers own imagination… but I reckon if you stay under that post to long trying to decide you will be shat upon

    Paradise_Lost_found.jpg
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    Post edited by Stezza on
  • StezzaStezza Posts: 7,757
    edited September 2013

    Entry #5

    Title - Paradise almost Lost

    Artist - Stezza
    WIP -
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/412674/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/415097/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/416032/

    Final Modifications - (i) Created new materials for fire truck front and door - ( ii ) raised the fireman at rear of truck up a little

    Software - Carrara 8.5pro no postwork apart from signature and Carrara logo

    Items used

    M4 no textures
    M4 Fire Fighter - retextured
    Dartanbeck’s Environ Kit
    Dimension Theory’s EcoMantics
    Val’s chainsaw
    Fenric’s Tree Duplicator
    Carrara’s Fire
    Carrara’s clouds

    freeware
    Isuzu blank untextured 3ds model - from DMI models
    13 items modelled creating 32 addons for Isuzu to try and create a firetruck
    firetruck retextured

    ShareCG
    Firehose by keithm - retextured
    Easy pose Rope by BionicRooster - retextured

    Production Notes - Normal 50mm camera was used to hopefully give the impression of a bystander that may of been there with his/her camera. The scene is a bushfire using Carrara's fire, lighting & clouds for effect.. The firemen are hopefully giving some emotion, whether it be exhaustion, hopelessness or organised with maybe a hint of either getting away with it or here we go again, I leave the impressions to the viewer to get what emotions they may see. Transforming a basic truck into a fire fighting unit was a challenge, by adding specific parts hopefully represents what I wanted to achieve.

    BushFire_Entry.jpg
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    Post edited by Stezza on
  • VarselVarsel Posts: 574
    edited December 1969

    Entry no.06

    Artist : Varsel

    Title : Shangri-La

    WIP :
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/400397/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/400776/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/403137/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/404947/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/408935/

    Content :
    Predatron :
    Lorenzo Lorez with my own created freebie clothing. Both for soldiers and natives.
    LoRez Donkey
    LoRez Monk (with custom shaders)
    LoRez Cow
    LoRez Crow

    Trees are some of Howie’s from Arboretum Vol 01 and Maple Meadows.

    Hdri from Cloud Nine by DimensionTheory

    Carrara Items
    Front and middle terrain (created separately) converted to vertex objects and remodeled and adjusted.
    Then painted distribution maps, and texture mixer maps.
    Back terrain is a very large mountain terrain.

    Buildings created with ArchiTools.
    Fence to keep the cows in the picture is created in the vertex modeler.

    All textures are own creation or modified beyond recognition.

    I started this picture with the vision of 1900 centuries explorers discovering the mythical Emerald City of Shangri-La.
    Somewhere in the process, when experimenting with ArchiTools, I realized that the idea of having a concept sketch should not be underestimated.
    Having a vision is fine, but sketch it first…..

    But I did learn how to use ArchiTools.

    There are 385 objects, 107 shaders, 3 lights and 1 hdri.
    Render time is 1h and 26 min at 1920x1080

    ShangriLa01.jpg
    1920 x 1080 - 412K
  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,027
    edited September 2013

    Entry #7

    Title - Homage to St Michael Wounds the Devil - this is my final entry

    Artist - Diomede64

    - 3 original or modified items with notes on creation/modification process,
    1) Clouds
    2) armor for M3, helmets and weapons for M3 and M4, and shield for M4. Modeled and uvmapped in vertex modeling room (devil’s pitchfork is a spline). Shaders are procedural.
    3) used vertex grids to construct the terrain foreground and the ocean. Procedural textures.
    (also made a custom brush used in the some of the renders)

    - Content credits
    DAZ Michael 3, Daz Michael 4, and a brush from the carrara brush set from GKDantas and deviney - available in the Daz store.
    Wings are the winter queen wings from Poser 6.
    - General process description
    Found a classic painting related to Paradise Lost. Edited the mesh of M3 in vertex modeling room to make his arms and legs more muscular and face more aquiline. Modeled and fit armor to morphed M3, and attached to hip in animation tab. Posed M3 similar to image, and used the weightmap brush in the vertex modeling room to fix minor poke through. Posed M4 similar to devil in image (modeled helmet, robe, discarded shield). Modeled clouds from vertex sphere, reshaped using magnet tool, then smaller distorted vertex spheres were replicated on surface of larger sphere. Once grouped, those objects were then replicated on a long arched cloud dome to try to give some depth. Used spot lights in the far corner to try to get a yellow tinge to far middle clouds and purple/bluish tinge further out to the sides. Used combination of glow channel, bump channel, and difuse to try to make look cloudlike.
    Rendered several images in non-photorealistic render room. Chose a few images that had some elements that I liked (these included one that used a scratch brush available in the DAZ store and one custom brush that I made per Antara’s instructions). Brought the chosen images in Photoshop and copied them over each other. Sequentially used the erase tool to choose the elements that I liked from each image. Did some minor touch ups with the pen tool.

    Here are some links to the WIP thread.
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P30
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P135
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P180
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P225

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    Post edited by Diomede on
  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,027
    edited September 2013

    Entry #8

    Title - Two tickets to paradise - final entry (number 2 for me)

    Artist - Diomede64

    - 3 original or modified items with notes on creation/modification process,
    1) computer monitor - modeled and uvmapped in vertex modeler - screen shot buying tickets saved to uvmap in photoshop elements
    2) computer keyboard - modeled in vertex modeler. Started with grid with enough polygons for keys, etc. Added thickness. Selected keys area on top and extruded without linking. Repeated for space bar, etc. For grins, uvmapped and painted the letters on the keys.
    3) printer - modeled and uvmapped in vertex modeling room. Added bones so that the top could be opened and closed.
    (everything else was also made using Carrara’s modelers).
    - Content credits
    no content

    - General process description
    Made and uvmapped some office equipment in C8.1. Added 3 point lighting and a softer central bulb light. Took a screen shot of a list of upcoming Eddie Money appearances. Used Photoshop to apply the screen shot to the uvmap of the computer monitor screen. I hope that is not a violation of some sort. Rendered using Toon effect.

    Link to WIP Thread
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P240

    toon_version.jpg
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    Post edited by Diomede on
  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 37,713
    edited September 2013

    me noes goods wid rulzes
    http://youtu.be/Uw44EkrHTcw

    ok entry #9 (edited number for stupid inabilty to count!)
    wendy♥catz
    Carrara serial lost and found
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/423944/
    modeled cereal box
    inner bag
    table

    used Daz content Genesis Female Girl 6, Paige dress
    Carrara splashscreen edited in Carrara with text objects
    browser objects jug, bowl and spoon
    added milk, text replicated cereal
    metaball drool
    postwork irfanview panorama image stitch

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    Post edited by WendyLuvsCatz on
  • FractalDimensiaFractalDimensia Posts: 0
    edited December 1969

    Entry Number: #10 (I assume Wendy's is #9....)

    Artist’s name: Fractal Dimensia

    Entry Title: "Lost World"

    List of the 3 required created or modified items.
    I modeled and shaded the following objects in Carrara.
    1) Ocean
    2) Land
    3) Mayan Pyramid
    4) Dolphins
    5) Seagulls
    6) Palm trees

    Content credits:
    1) Ship was downloaded from ShareCG (“Bryce model Prince William” by Jed) and significantly enhanced for Carrara.
    2) Clouds originally from the file “Sunbeams” by Tim Payne, tailored significantly.
    3) Island underbrush was from Lisa's Botanicals – Tropicals.

    Production notes
    Originally rendered @2880x1620 and then reduced to sharpen the image. No other post work was done on this image.

    Link to WIP thread‘s comment where you have posted the latest WIP image for this entry.
    Full image: http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/405003/
    Detail work: http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/413051/

    Lost_World_V1_(med_logo).jpg
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  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,921
    edited September 2013

    Entry Number: #11

    Artist’s name: Headwax

    Entry Title: “The Teddy Bear Collector”

    List of the 3 required created or modified items.

    All the signs are vertex planes with custom textures.
    The Teddy bears have custom textures. Some of the meshes are modded.
    The train uses anything goos to break up the texture.
    The soldiers textures are grimed up.
    The dogs heads are daz dog freed from the skeleton and sans body.
    The Cheyenne outfit on the kid is retextured.
    Most of the other textures are customized or use commercial shaders made for Carrara.
    Cardboard boxes retexturedd


    Content credits:

    K4, with Danyel hair, Rascals textures?, Cheyenne outfit.
    PHIL W's Bright Eyes shaders (great stuff phil)

    M4 has working mans clothes.
    Trains are from Daz's Toy dept.
    Toy Soldiers from Daz.
    Teddy Bears from RCC zero daz toy shop.
    Plinth and Cage and weight machine from Magic shoppe
    Lighting setup tweakd from PhilW's portrait studio
    Age of Armour's Paris Studio provides tea cup and books
    Cardboard Boxes from Stone mason's Alley
    Cobwebs and spiders webs in post from Ron's Brushes
    Albert Bear from SkipsFreebies
    HouseMouse Daz
    Toonanimals Lamb
    Carrara Shaders: MCC pro master shaders
    Woodland Pack shaders

    I probably left something out?


    Rendered at 2000 pixesl wide
    I isolated the background with a plane with and alpha of 80 percent
    5/% ambient. 1.8 gamma, just ordinary rendering in render room (no skylights etc)
    the gamma picks up the shadows while not washing out the highlights

    A BIG thank you to Fenric's plugins - esp Shader Doctor and Tree duplicate and the shader plugin that lets you reduce/increase saturation and tonal value of a texture

    Thanks for looking! :) Great job Antara!

    And a REALLY big thank you to our sponsor Age of Armour :)


    Link to WIP thread where I have posted the latest WIP image for this entry.
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P345/

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    Post edited by Headwax on
  • AntaraAntara Posts: 444
    edited December 1969

    Entry Number: # 12

    Artist’s name: Antara

    Entry Title: Paradise Found (While Reading "Paradise Lost")

    List of the 3 required created or modified items:
    - All shaders except the cottage and books are either my own, or heavily modified from original content texture maps. The armchair was completely reshaded. The shader uses Shader Ops Fake Fresnel as one of the mixers.
    - Both draped dresses were morphed to alter exported OBJ drapes in order to fit the changed pose and the character morphs I added.
    - The books were extracted from Bookshelf object of DM Chronicle's set, and the extracted object's shading domains were changed.
    - V4 is wearing a crazy mix shader that uses several different character maps (Elite Laba, Reby Sky, Danae London) in different channels to create a more realistic multi-layered skin effect.
    - The cushion was morphed to fit the reclining figure's shape.

    Content credits:
    - V4 with Danae's London morph and my own body morph. The crazy texture mix is listed above.
    - Hair is Trixie Hair by Lady Littlefox.
    - Dresses are 2 dynamic items from Neoclassical Gown and Robe, draped over each other in DS, exported in their messed up state (the collision didn't want to work properly) and then fixed manually in Carrara to fit the character (with the pose and body shape altered later, I was too lazy to re-drape) and to play nice with each other.
    - The room and the open book (I morphed it to fit the figure's pose) are from "IN Fantasy RiverCottage" by winnston1984 (sold at Renderosity) with one of HolyForest's painted surfaces shaders (colour-modified) from one of his packs he used to sell at Renderosity (I don't see the sample pack in his products here, but I think Painted Surfaces will include a variation of it)
    - The armchair is from Faveral's excellent, Carrara-supporting, Kelly Lodge. I love that product!
    - The books are from DM's Chronicles. (Extracted from bookshelf, which comes as a single prop in the package with a few extra things attached.)
    - Millennium Cat with Livia Zita's Real Fur for the Millennium Cat, and textures from the cat bundle driving the hair shader colours.
    - HDRI background is from DimensionTheory's Skies Of Terra.

    Hope this is it...

    Production notes This was fairly straightforward. Pose and drape created in DS, exported. Then the scene was built in Carrara: added hair, changed pose, draped dresses, added room, chair, book. Added HDRI, as background, and a simple GI-faking light rig with reduced shadow intensities. Then added another light that does not affect any object in the scene and is only there to show flare in the camera. Added cat and books after helpful feedback in the WIP thread, changed armchair shaders again.
    Postwork is really minimal. Some compositing, some messing about with layer opacities for various passes, removed the small round flare circle and then reused the flare with changed colours and added blur to add the sunset glow.

    Link to WIP:
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/411981/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/423759/

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  • Philemo_CarraraPhilemo_Carrara Posts: 1,175
    edited December 1969

    Entry #13

    Title – Eased off Eden
    A tribute to Gustave Doré

    Artist - Philemo

    WIP
    Final image
    Heck, I'm late !
    initial idea

    Software - Carrara 8.5pro, GIMP

    Items used
    Simon, Messy hair, James, Sidney, Long hair from Poser 9 content
    freeware
    Virus angle wings by Virus from ShareCG

    List of the 3 required created or modified items:
    Plants are made with the plant editor and converted to vertex
    Rocks are made with the vertex editor
    Wings are altered in the vertex editor
    Every object reshaded

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  • AntaraAntara Posts: 444
    edited September 2013

    Entry Number: # 14

    Artist’s name: Antara

    Entry Title: Paradise Found

    List of the 3 required created or modified items:
    - Stonemason's The Enchanted Forest trees and tree groups (4 individual items: 2 trees and 2 tree groups) were morphed, shading domains changed (added new ones) and used as base for surface replication of HowieFarkes' Country Lane 2 Oak branches.
    - A bunch of custom replicators and surface replicators for rocks, branches, pebbles, shrubs, trees, ferns. All distribution shaders for surface replicators are my own procedurals created for this scene.
    - Custom shaders on everything except rocks/pebbles, horizontal log and ground - these were left unchanged from HowieFarkes' Stone Creek presets, but everything esle, including HowieFarkes' trees, branches and plants shaders were changed.
    - V4 is wearing a crazy mix shader that uses several different character maps (Elite Lana, Reby Sky, Silver's Fawne and Surreality's Ashe) in different channels to create a more realistic multi-layered skin effect. The Fawne maps were hand repainted by me.

    Content credits:
    - V4 with Silver's Fawne morph. The crazy texture mix is listed above.
    - Hair is Esidor Hair by 3Dream and Mairy.
    - Horns are from Creature Creator Bundle
    - Terrain, water, pebbles, rocks, log, ferns and shrubs are from HowieFarkes' Stone Creek
    - Pin Oaks and Pin Oak branches for replication are from HowieFarkes' Country Lane 2
    - Big trees, tree bridge and tree groups are from Stonemason's The Enchanted Forest.
    - Butterflies are a freebie by our wonderful sponsor this month: Age of Armour.

    Am I forgetting anything?

    Production notes:
    I had a very specific composition in my mind and I know Stonemason's Forest package will be helpful in creating it because of the interestingly shaped trees and the tree bridge. So I started with them and then discovered that their branches are a major bottleneck for any sort of lighting I might want to do, so I had to replace the transparency-heavy branches. Thus Pin Oak branches and Pin Oak trees became part of the image and got arranged how I wanted them. I spent a lot of time optimizing things for render speed. Making sure that only necessary things are showing, that all the shaders are not using anything rendering-heavy, that I could get away without using Light Through Transparency settings (and I did) for my background layer. And that all the lights are a) minimal b) are faking radiosity well enough.
    For the front layer I changed the lights to cast slightly blurred shadows, added the character and rendered at hight precision level.
    The butterflies were rendered pretty much wherever. just with the same lighting rig and I just positioned them where I wanted them in the image in post.
    Postwork: layer compositing of all layers, added atmospheric effects like lens blur, distance fog, water sparkles and sun rays using the Distance pass. The distance passes from all layers were manipulated using Curves to combine into a single coherent distance pass. And the pass of the background layer was first blurred a bit to remove rough edges from poor-quality render settings.

    Link to WIP:
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/424242/ - final WIP with layer tree
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/423314/ - postwork variations
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/423068/ - base renders and first postwork attempt
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/420792/ - first render-sketch

    ParadiseFound_ForestWonder_SMALL.jpg
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    Post edited by Antara on
  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,921
    edited September 2013

    Entry Number: # 15
    Artist’s name: Headwax
    Entry Title: "Big Yellow Taxi"

    List of the 3 required created or modified items:

    Vertex Signs and textures.
    Big Yellow Taxi textures. Text in glow channel.
    Used Crossdresser to fit M4 clothes to K4
    Retextured Jacket.
    Modelled Specimen Glass Thingy.
    Retextured Gate

    Content

    K4, Homo Erecrus Morph
    Dartanbeck's Environ Kit - especially the CrabApple Tree
    Dimension Theory Ecomantics
    Predatron Grass and Poppys
    Shanty Town
    Various Fenric plugins
    36 Am Chevy P4
    Enchanted Forest - stonemason
    NeverClear
    Neverwas
    Teddy from DAZ Toyshop
    Gate from Curious passageway
    Tosca Happy Kids face texture
    PhilW Bright eyes
    Working Man 1930's clothes
    Words from Joni Mitchell''s Big Yellow Taxi


    Production Notes

    Well this started off as illustrating the whole Big Yellow Taxi Song - which is why there are so many elements from it but not all.
    To darken the distant elements I added a series of planes with block colour and 20percent alpha to cut out the light. No shadows on these planes etc.
    The text is added to the glow channel in the taxi texture.
    I did three different r enders and combined parts of them in post.
    The big eye opener for me was using Caustics. Without Caustics the taxi door was very poorly lit. With Caustics the light seemed to bend through the specimen "jar" and lit up the taxi door.
    The stars and light effects were added in post in an attempt to give a feeling of atmosphere.


    Thanks for looking :)


    Link to WIP:
    early concepts

    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P150
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P210

    finals

    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P360
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P390/

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    Post edited by Headwax on
  • AntaraAntara Posts: 444
    edited September 2013

    I am posting this entry for ManStan, who currently is unable to do so.

    Entry Number: #16
    Artist’s name: ManStan
    Entry Title: “Boatswain Harden, not so lost at sea"

    Modified or created items:
    The island, drift wood, coconut and barrels were made in carrara, textures done with Genetica.
    On the castaway is the M4 beard by Ravenhair morphed in the assembly room to fit the expression.
    The skeleton is the old P4 skeleton the clothes; boots, pants, shirt, have been modified/morphed in the assembly room.

    Other content credits:
    All plants, Palm trees, palm bushes, cinnamon fern and grass are Lisa's botaniaclas.
    That's 3 M4's wearing various parts of M4 pirate by Ravenhair.
    The boat is the pirate essentials.
    The treasure chests are Valandar's set.
    That is Dreamscape creation's HMS victory in the back ground.
    The sea gulls are a low poly model I have had for quite some time, they are a static .obj with no way to credit.
    Excluding the plants and 2 of the M4 skins most all the textures in scene were made in Genetica.

    Production notes:
    I have made some extensive morphs to the skeltons cloths. Reminded me how easy it is to work with the mil 4 content. I added a flock of gulls around the ship last night, working on some boxes and barrels for a bit flotsome on the beach.

    Link to WIP:
    early concepts
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/401163/
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/401461/

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    Post edited by Antara on
  • SockrateaseSockratease Posts: 813
    edited September 2013

    Moo.

    Entry #17

    Artist's Name - I Forget

    ...

    Hold on.

    Give me a minute...

    Oh yeah - Sockratease!

    Artist's Name - Sockratease

    Entry Title - Pair-A-Dice.

    Modified or created items - The Pillar is from the preset objects, just converted to vertex and extruded a bit. The sofa was UV Mapped and textured. And Kitty's arm had to be custom morphed to stretch long enough under the sofa for the render.

    Other content credits - Millennium Kitty Kat - and since the pedastal looked empty, I put V4's Brain on it. It looked better under a partial sphere/dome with fun shader play, so that's in there too. Backdrop is a fractal.

    Had to layer 3 versions with masks. The wood frame reflected too strongly in the sphere over the brain and I only wanted the 3D Aura on the outer rim of the sphere, so I rendered it both ways and hid the unwanted bits.

    WIP Linkies:

    Early Concept:
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P105/#405577

    The Layers:
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P390/#425200

    Production Notes:
    If it were on cheezeburger.com the caption might read:

    Stoopy hooman lost dis pair-a-dice.

    Kitteh found dem!

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    Post edited by Sockratease on
  • SockrateaseSockratease Posts: 813
    edited September 2013

    Will anybody be later than...

    Entry #18

    Title - In The Office Of The Grand High Such-And-Such

    Artist Name - Sockratease

    Modified or created items - A Sphere (The Crazy Ball Thing kind of centered) ; A Cone (the thing in the rear left from which a Mini Grand High Such-And-Such is emerging ; and a Cylinder in the foreground looking all high tech and as if it actually serves some sort of purpose). The Grand High Such-And-Such was modeled from a fractal. Well, actually a picture of a fractal rendered in Mutatorkammer and turned into The Grand High Such-And-Such in an old program called 3D Me Now - sadly no longer available. The big abstracty pointy thing in the center is a fractal exported from Incendia as an obj file. The backdrop is yet another fractal, made in Mandelbulb 3D.

    Other content credits - The Pre-Cursor to The Millennium Cow (AKA The Daz Cow) and a plane for the ground (nobody ever credits those!) and the effect around the mini Grand High Such-And-Suches rising out of the floor was done with "a "Fat Torus" from the advanced objects, the same fractal shader as the floor. and "Cellular" in the alpha channel.

    Post Work as before - layers to help out the 3D Aura effect..

    WIP Linkies:

    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P195/#410166
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P270/#415767
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P270/#415818
    http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/26828/P405/#425257


    Story:
    Special Operative Bessy of The InterDimensional House of Pancakes always enjoyed returning to The Momma Ship and reporting her latest observations of The Farm to her Supreme Leader - The Grand High Such-And-Such - despite the fact that he was a floating head due to having lost his entire body during a freak accident involving autoerotic asphyxiation. But mostly because he has so many Cool Toys cluttering his office.

    "This Must Be Paradise," she thought to herself and aspired to one day have an office just like this one.

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  • AntaraAntara Posts: 444
    edited September 2013

    The Challenge is now CLOSED.

    And the VOTING is OPEN! :)

    Head over to the first post of this thread: http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/28208/ , take a look at voting rules and cast your votes! :)

    Post edited by Antara on
  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,921
    edited December 1969

    Antara! Thanks so much for doing such a marvellous professional job!
    I'm sorry I wasn't around to post ManStan's work yesterday, so thank you for doing that too.!
    Now for the hard part - voting. :)

  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,921
    edited September 2013

    Entry Number: #10
    Artist’s name: Fractal Dimensia
    Entry Title: “Lost World”

    Entry Number: #16
    Artist’s name: ManStan
    Entry Title: “Boatswain Harden, not so lost at sea”

    Entry #5
    Title - Paradise almost Lost
    Artist - Stezza

    This challenge everybody was so close, amazing work everyone!

    For my votes I decided to pick the artists that got the message across most directly.
    In Fractal Dimensia's image the glow of the temple and the beauty of the ocean, the general feeling of discovery spoke to me.

    ManStan;s work for me grasps both the concept of Paradise Lost and Paradise found in a way that I can relate to. The pursuit of money over the pursuit of happiness has always amazed me. The stupidity of humans, the irony of the Pirate discovering his treasure, yet dying in the process. Manstan did a wonderful job on this.

    Stezza's image also speaks to me. Bushfires are something we have here every summer. At first I thought the image was a photograph.


    As far as beauty of image, both of Antara's win hands down. There's that feminine touch and the well balanced joy of nature in the forest scene with that radical placement of the focal point. In both the play of light is magical.

    Wendy's image as well as Socratease' both made me gaffaw.
    Wendy's image hitting too close to the poignant funny bone and almost won my vote.

    I loved Evil Producer's approach with the Space Odyssey twist. A clever use of the Eden 'myth' combined with a movie that has
    become more than a cult.

    Both Diomede64 and Philemo's experiments opened my eyes to new ways of working with Carrrar shaders/renders - thank you for showing us your experiments.

    Wonderful what Varsel did with Architools - and I will heed his advice on the concept sketch.

    And a big congratulations goes to Gareth Davies for the excellent wotk in the modelling room and the Toon effect. Who ever would have thought that was done in Carrara?

    But as they say in reality shows. There can only be one winner ... well in this case three :)

    Thank you Antara you did a fantasmagorical job!


    And many thanks to Age of Armour and Daz for their generosity as sponsors.

    Post edited by Headwax on
  • 3dOutlaw3dOutlaw Posts: 2,470
    edited September 2013

    ...and I felt it held with the deconstruction of the Adam and Eve myth, of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or something equally pretentious. ;-)

    Wow, I could see that coming off very offensive to some people...especially when folks may be coming to "visit" and vote :(

    Anyway, on with the voting! (hope I do this correctly)

    1 Point: Entry Number: #10, by Fractal Dimensia - “Lost World”
    - I thought this was a good all around render of a lot of the aspects that Carrara has to offer, from details, to water, to skies, trees, posing, etc.. Good job!

    1 point: Entry #3, by Gareth - Valley of dreams.
    - Wonderful detail and use of tooning and figure creation! This competes with some of the best of Anime Studio, or other toon focused programs, imo! Good showcase of Carrara's tooning ability and zgock's YaToon plugin. Wonderful job!

    1 point: Entry Number: #11 by Headwax - “The Teddy Bear Collector”
    - This at first appeared to be a very innocent pic to me, then I made it bigger, and the dog heads, roach, warning signs, etc...made it much more sinister, like the kid walked into the wrong store. For composition, and idea versus the challenge title, this is a winner! Kudos, Headwax!

    (thank you Antara for hosting. I did not take part, but I've been watching. Maybe next challenge :) )

    Post edited by 3dOutlaw on
  • Philemo_CarraraPhilemo_Carrara Posts: 1,175
    edited December 1969

    Hi all,

    Here are my votes:

    1st place:

    Entry - # 14
    Artist - Antara
    Title - Paradise Found
    I believe this picture is the very good surprise of this challenge. It fits perfectly the subject of the challenge and every detail is well thought and well placed.
    I’ve seen professional illustrations on a similar subject that weren’t half as good as this one. Antara, you’re not only a very good challenge organizer, you’re also a very good artist.

    2nd place:
    Entry #4
    Title - Crossroads
    Artist - Stezza
    Don’t ask me why I’ve chosen this one… I just don’t know. I saw it and immediately thought: Ok, this one is a winner. I’m seldom very analytic on artistic matters, I trust my instincts.

    3rd place:
    Entry #1
    Artist - evilproducer
    Title - The Apple
    Ok, I’m a long term fan of sir Arthur :-) and partial. But I wouldn’t have voted for it if it weren’t a good picture.

  • DUDUDUDU Posts: 1,945
    edited December 1969

    I am a follower of made ultra-realistic as well as artistic atmospheres.
    The must for me, it is when one cannot make the difference between a synthesized image and a true photograph.
    The contents have also much importance this is why I place in

    1st place: “Paradise Found (While Reading “Paradise Lost”)” (#12), even if I do not see well the relationship with the topic of this year…

    2nd place: “Big Yellow Taxi” (#15), for its message (found paradise) and its atmosphere rendered extremely well.

    3rd place: “Crossroads” (#4), in spite of the lack of finission of the electric poles and the lack of reflection of blue metal.

    I like also much “Paradise Found” (#14) but, it is necessary to leave its chance to everyone!

  • evilproducerevilproducer Posts: 9,040
    edited September 2013

    3doutlaw said:
    ...and I felt it held with the deconstruction of the Adam and Eve myth, of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or something equally pretentious. ;-)

    Wow, I could see that coming off very offensive to some people...especially when folks may be coming to "visit" and vote :(

    Anyway, on with the voting! (hope I do this correctly)

    Your view is certainly yours to have and no less valid than mine, just as my view is no less valid than yours. If everybody saw everything the same way, it would be a much duller existence, and far less creative.

    Post edited by evilproducer on
  • FractalDimensiaFractalDimensia Posts: 0
    edited December 1969

    Okay, waiting any longer is not going to make this any easier to decide. But I must say this is a *REALLY* hard choice because every one of these images are amazing in their own special way!

    Given that I may change my mind tomorrow, here are my 3 picks (1 vote each):

    #14: Artist’s name: Antara; Entry Title: Paradise Found - (Envy Factor) The detail is amazing and I really like the feel of the forest. I want to make wooded scenes like this!

    #11: Artist’s name: Headwax; Entry Title: “The Teddy Bear Collector” - The amount of detail (e.g., the webs), the objects, the angle of the shot, the signs... Very nicely done!

    #5: Artist: Stezza; Entry Title - Paradise almost Lost - The light gives the feel of intensity; the flames look great; and the position of the truck (blocking the destruction) was perfect!

    Honorable Mention: #15 - Makes me want to go find the tree museum! I'd call the "Big Yellow Taxi" service, but that number isn't in THIS country! ;)

    Special Mentions:
    #1: Artist: evilproducer; The Apple - A nice mix of movie concepts rolled into one!
    #3: Gareth's scene is wonderful!
    #6: Varsel's Shangri-La (though admittedly, I think I liked your early "walled city").
    #8 I really like Diomede's twist on "Paradise" and the artistic rendering.
    #9 Wendy's cereal (I was trying to make out what the nutritional info was on the side of the box!), and of course, dealing with C8.5 would turn anyone into a serial killer!
    #12 Antara's Paradise Lost - I can't think of a book interesting enough to keep me from a good nap in the sun next to a cat! ;)
    #13 Phil, man, you gotta post more on how you did that imaging! That is very creative!
    #16 ManStan, I think the captain is considering whether to just shoot the other two and take all THREE chests. MWUAHAHAHAHA!
    #18 Sock, you prove a COW can go into any picture!

    Again, they are ALL wonderful!

    To everyone, I learned a great deal this month, and thank you all for making the challenge so difficult. It really does make me work harder!

    Good luck!
    FD

  • evilproducerevilproducer Posts: 9,040
    edited December 1969

    I am so glad that there are so many different styles of renders, from photo-real, to NPR and many in-between. I'm also glad that the interpretations of the theme cover such a wide range of subjects. The creativity is amazing!

    All that being said, It's going to be super difficult to decide! I'll have to take some time, you infernal, creative, bastards! :lol:

  • 3dOutlaw3dOutlaw Posts: 2,470
    edited December 1969

    3doutlaw said:
    ...and I felt it held with the deconstruction of the Adam and Eve myth, of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil or something equally pretentious. ;-)

    Wow, I could see that coming off very offensive to some people...especially when folks may be coming to "visit" and vote :(

    Anyway, on with the voting! (hope I do this correctly)

    Your view is certainly yours to have and no less valid than mine, just as my view is no less valid than yours. If everybody saw everything the same way, it would be a much duller existence, and far less creative.

    NP, I didn't say I agree or disagree, just that guests are invited to vote, and they may find it offensive. I try to be sensitive to other peoples feelings or beliefs, whether I agree with them or not. In any case, you made a neat picture! :)

  • kakmankakman Posts: 225
    edited December 1969

    Well, all the entries are wonderful and the envy factor, for me, is extremely high.

    As others have said, I could look at and study all of the entries over and over again and change my mind how to vote depending on which one is in currently front of me.

    So, here are my votes (voting format stolen from head wax and Philemo):

    Entry #: 10
    Artist’s Name: Fractal Dimensia
    Entry Title: “Lost World”

    Of course the water is stunning! The whole mood just grabs me.

    Entry #: 11
    Artist’s Name: head wax
    Entry Title: “The Teddy Bear Collection”

    I enjoy all the elements in this as well as the overall mood that, for me, strikes chords of innocence, curiosity, and amazement.

    Entry #: 14
    Artist’s Name: Antara
    Entry Title: “Paradise Found”

    I just like everything that this image evokes.

    Honorable Mentions:

    Entry #: 1
    Artist’s Name: Evilproducer
    Entry Title: “The Apple”

    I find the overall composition to be very well done and I appreciate the nod to Space Odyssey.

    Entry #: 4
    Artist’s Name: Stezza
    Entry Title: “Crossroads”

    I find this image to be beautiful in it’s mood and simplicity.

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,027
    edited December 1969

    1 FD Lost World entry 10. 2 Philemo Tribute to Dore entry 13. 3 wendycatz serial lost and found entry 9. I can't justify ommitting any of the others. EP take on the apple, Gareth modeling and toon style, stezzas fire atmosphere, headwax detail, Antara mood, manstans use of softbody, shangri La, pair of dice - amazing all. But we can only vote for three so I pick FD, Philemo and Wendy.

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