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Hey guys... I am really enjoying learning 3D rendering and would love to improve. This is the first time I thought I was progressing enough to even consider entering one of these. Looking to learn, so I am open to any and all feedback. Brutal honesty is welcome. thanks in advance for your expertise.
This is quite a bit closer to the look I'm shooting for. I've got the blur of the background sorted out enough to kind of set the model apart, and tie it together. This is kind of over the top as far as the old photo look goes, but it's in the right direction, and I can dial it back. I think I figured out why the hair was looking so bad(shading rate was way too high) And I've got what I think is a better pose rendering big. Current progress 1hr 20min, 7%
Background is this photo from BigFoto.com
Given the presumed attitude of the the teenager, maybe put a hand up as if trying to block the photo from being taken (would add an element of realism). Nice character.
I do not have morphs so I can not create any new charactors I only have ones like raw dwarfs and such like that. I wish I did but alas I have to go with deformers and I do not have a good enough knowledge of them to do anything with them yet unless someone can direct me to a good tutorial that deals with changing the human face.
I am going to work on the hat for sure thanks for your input Evilded.
Yeah I do like your idea of having the hat falling off her head I tink I am goig to run with that smiles thanks for your feedback Ice Dragon Art!!!
Anytime! Have you looked over on Sharecg for some free characters and morphs? Which base model are you using? I can probably point you toward some freebies to mix up your gene pool a bit more if you like.
Her eyes are pointed to the camera
, I'll work on her Eye surfaces, Thanks evilded.
And regarding the dress, I'll recheck the light and render settings.
It's probably the dress IRay shader texture caused this, I'll try your idea. Thanks Ice Dragon.
Thats actually a great tip I picked up on Novica's thread but I am happy I was able to pass it on.
Well it was 5hr 10min for a 1024x768 render. Lots of tweaking still to do. I do know it's not "really" a portrait, but I also know I'm not "really" going to win anyway. :)
Nice start, and welcome aboard. I've been trying these for some time and while I haven't been in any top threes the feedback helps me improve my work. Hope you at least get that kind of feedback, and I wish you luck this month.
Here's version f. I rendered the dang thig last night and ment to have it posted sooner then this.
Did a little geomitry editting outside the frame to use something that I felt should be glowing on him do so.
Well I'll make this the final render with thanks to Kismet for the weapon links. It is only an obj file but from a distance it works well.
Just a few added changes to try and tighten the picture up a little but might as well finish as (according to the newcomer contest rules) I have already won and took a 2nd on previous renders and that eliminates me from the entry part.
I've been calling this render the Don's Daughter while I was working on it and that seems to add to the narrative I think and gives a better description of where I was going with the story.
But mainly any project for me is just a great way of experimenting with the Daz tools and to get great feedback. The final product is not as important to me as what new things can be learned and to try and make amazing projects like what I see every month on this forum. Thanks for the advice and tips along the way:)
This is a small file so I wouldn't be spending to much time with the render.
I like it.
I'm hoping there's only one more update before she goes gold.
I got the hair figured out. I thought it was render settings, but Haley only has iray materials, and I messed it up when I originally translated it to 3Delight.
I think I figured out a method for getting decent feedback, on my slow pc, as I pose the face.(I'm using DS 32bit on Linux, and everything, even OpenGL is slow.) If I shut off the hair then the spot render tool should give pretty decent results for seeing what's actually going on.
Trying to iron out the compositing process. I know in this one she's a little too sepia, but I'm curious what others think about color balance? In fact any input is appreciated.
Hello Veeters2002,
I'm not sure I can be brutal here as you have a really nice image going. I would suggest that you experiment a little with a few different things.
1. I know I continue to struggle with lighting, so experimentation helps me. Your actor is well lit from one side but has a lot of shadow on the other. Maybe try to balance that out just a little. You can try a low lumen fill light possibly.
2. Another lighting experiment could be to add a rim light behind your actor to try and highlight her from behind. This can have the effect of creating a slight outline of light that really separates the character from their background. I like to turn off the other lights in the scene when I move a rim light around to help me see what is getting highlighted. The effect is subtle, but can be very impactful.
3. Try adding DOF (Depth of Field) to your camera. If you haven't done this before, it will take a little playing with (even if you have done it before, it takes some playing with
). The effect will be to blur out some of the background which emphasizes the actor in the foreground (or whatever you want to actually pop from the picture). Playing with it, you will find that you can get a wide range of blurring. This can be a really powerful tool and whether you like the final effect or not in this image, it's a great technique for your future rendering as well.
Best Regards,
Eric
I lke the slightly vintage feel to the coloring on this. It doesn't take you back to the 20's but it does very strongly remind me of growing up and going to the fair as a teenager (and I'm not THAT old lol). I like it.
The title and the gun make a huge difference in the telling of the story. Now it makes much more sense. I really struggle with that part of it, how to convey what i'm trying to convey without taking away from the person viewing the picture's imagination. You've balanced that nicely here with the title and the weapons change. Still lots left for the viewer to imagine but with a definite story line to point them down the right path.
This has come along quite nicely since you started it. I don't have any advice to give but I really liked this one.
What I noticed right away is that her headpiece on the left (my left her right) that is supposed to be on the shadow side of her head is too bright. Because it stands out so much I'm drawn to that before I'm drawn to her face. The suggestion for the rim light is a good one (and you can actually look through the light itself to help you get it in position, not sure if you knew that or not but I have found it to be quite helpful when trying to line the light up. I tend to get confused as to which direction the light is actually pointing in when I move it normally lol)
I decided to try something with a bit more sophisticated expression.
Thank You tubbyfalls1. This is the annoyed portrait with the hand in the camera edit.
I did bump my render settings down to 2.5 so it was a little quicker, but lacked quality. at this stage i think it doesn't matter.
What do you mean "lacked quality"? That's kind of a subjective phrase. Perhaps you need, instead, to adjust the samples upward, and increase the timeout period. I don't think I've ever gone over 2 with Render Quality, and I don't even always use that.
What are you using for lights? Everything is very grainy and muted and she could really use some light on her face.
There's a strange sort of balance here, but I'm finding I want more light on the subject. I like the cropping of the figure, but I also want to turn her to face the other direction for some reason...
I've adjusted the pose to not have any hands going into the body or the clothes and moved him up to stand on the floor instead of in it. So I think the pose is set now. Now to decide on background and lighting.
I agree with turning her to face the other way, or move her to the other side of the image if that's her "good side." A rule I learned from photo editing as a journalist: Don't have your subject facing off the page; it draws the reader's eye away from the story (or the rest of the image in this cae).
My Base is Gen 1 female if you can direct me to some good free links would be great thanks Ice Dragon
Thanks for the feedback Eric.
1) I was kind of going for a deep shadow/darker noir type of black and white image, so maybe I over did it a bit. I'll tweak a little.
2) Love the rim light idea.
3) I have used DOF before, but did not consider it on this image. Seemed the background may have been a little too close for that to work well. But might just work.
Thanks a bunch for all of your suggestions. Let me play around a bit and see the difference.
Thanks!!
I finally managed to make some of the corrections that were suggested. I've:
1. Changed her eyes so they are looking at the rose. It was suggested that they may be a little crossed, but they were aligned to factory specs. So I crossed them a bit and that seems to have helped.
2. I moved the rose closer to her nose.
3. Played with the glossiness on her skin and knocked it down a bit.
4. I removed some of the artificial reflections from her eyes - the bright white reflections just didn't look right to me.
Also, Wonderland made a general suggestion that many of the images should be zoomed in. So I tried a cropped version to see what it looks like. I think it looks pretty good. I may need to add to the height so you can tell she's holding the sword and not that someone is holding it to her throat. Just an interesting thought.
Sapphire I sent you a private message....
I start giggling every time I see this. sorry but its just fabulous!