Phantoms II deskullified?
CypherFOX
Posts: 3,401
Greetings,
Is there any chance someone could post renders of the phantoms without the skulls attached? I'm just thinking that the effects could be useful as magic spells and the like, but I have less than zero interest in the skull mastheads. (Like, they actively turn me off from the product.) I'd love to see some Iray renders without those, if anybody picks it up...
-- Morgan

Comments
Hiya! Sorry Im late getting to this, but I just got up.
It can be used in that fashion. The only issue, is that its deformed to work with the skull. So it has bumps on the forefront of it. Even with it, I suppose it could be a sort of flaming ball. There is one small issue tho, in that the transmap has spacing on it... which is more prominent on Mystic and Tribal fire (not so bad on Dark fire) From a side view, its not a huge deal as it doesnt show, but head on it becomes more noticable.
The poses will work for this idea too, since they only pose the flames.
I could add a couple morphs to it, that make it more fireball-esque, and do an update. It would most likely have to wait til after the PA sale tho, coz QA is swamped and I hate to make it worse.
Heres some renders:
I don't blame you. Skulls turn me off from products too. Like that (otherwise) lovely bedroom suite that was released recently. Skulls on the sheets, the lamps. skull decor on the dresser, etc. I know I can take the time to do modifications to get rid of things like that, but when you spend your hard earned money on stuff you kind of want it to be useable out of the box. Skulls are a major turn off for me on products - seams a lot of people feel that way too.
Ohh those are cool!! I could totally see those as power/flames!
Well, in this case, the product was purposely built to be a scary skull creeper. Under normal circumstances, Id build the option to turn them off in, but since that was the entire premise here, I didnt. That said, it is its own figure, so it can always be left off.
If this iteration does well, I did have intent on doing an add-on for it. I suppose I could also build on the flames themselves as being a special effect layer. But Ill be honest in that, it would probably be even better if the set were built with that purpose in mind, so it was the whole focus (special effects included, so you could have maybe more sparkly or magicky effects as opposed to evil flames)
Here are shots from the forefront. As you can see, there is a space on 2 of the options.
That sounds awesome! :D I love the idea of the sparkly or magic type effects!
I hope this product is successful for you so that you will be encouraged to do more like this - I think there would be an interest in the magic effects.
Why all the nay-saying about skulls? Everybody has one.
LOL Im a skull junkie. Id prolly be the kind of freak who has em all over the house (if my old man let me)
Everyone has intestines too, but I'm not a fan of seeing those either. :P
LOL! Youre just not using the right shaders!
They can be quite decorative, thats for sure.
I'll wave my freak flag as a fellow skull lover. Each to their own. I think it's a very cool product, and I also love the decor in the Stonemason suite.
Ahh the squeamish type lol I have a tendency toward macabre and even things that make the squeamish go EWWWW (insert dark apocalypse wyrm here) Its like my 3D compass is pointed toward ick at times lol Venomous creatures always get me too.
I'm not a huge skull fan either but I these are perfect for what they are intended for. They look great! I would definitely be interested in a non skull version as well for sure.
I'm a big skull fan. I like that kind of stuff. I've just never included one in my packs.
Remind me never to tell you how sausage is made...
I'm neutral on the skull thing but tend to render scifi which doesn't tend to have much focus on occult imagery. Good to know this is customizable at least a little.
Greetings,
My apologies; I probably shouldn't have included the parenthetical in my post, but it was 1am and I wasn't thinking very clearly. :-/ I usually edit better than that...
I don't deeply dislike skulls, but the focus on them made me feel like it wasn't very reusable for lighter fare. What I've been looking for, essentially, is Shadowcaster Spellribbons but for the Iray and Genesis 3 world, with emissive textures. Conforming would be cool, but not strictly necessary. I think the trails of some of the Phantom II lights reminded me of the Spellribbons.
Anyway, Phantoms II looks very cool, and the renders without the skulls are good. I can see that if I included a different object, it could be attached pretty straightforwardly to the head of the fireballs. Thanks very much for responding, despite my off-putting phrasing!
-- Morgan
Morgan, I have a couple of products I am trying to finish up. They are poseable LightFX streamers. There is a long and short streamer. Poses for dance and magic.
No worries. I totally understand that not everyone is into skulls or dark stuff. Its kinna how this gig rolls. In a perfect world, vendors would be able to cater to everyone's tastes, but unfortunately, reality dictates differently lol
Cris's thing looks terrific, and I'll also have a new thing soonish. Sorry, no teaser pics as I am not at my work computer. For stuff already in the store, don't forget IDG Iray FX, and all the tremendous stuff by Jepe.
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Halloween is my fave holiday. And yeah, Im fond of darker stuff too. Ive said for ages I wanna put huge gargoyles outside of my house in my garden or something. My old man however is not so fond of that sort of thing lol So I just resign myself to wearing that stuff on my clothing instead (skulls, the reaper, and stuffs like that) BTW love your username too (I R a big Egyptian goob too)
That looks astonishing, Cris! Any chance those might come with optional hand-held sticks, to create cloth-like or glittering streamers for dancers? Also interested if we can apply fluid Iray shaders on those, such as blood.
Planning on getting the skulls, Ignis! was actually hope that you would do an Iray version of that product. :)
Uh, I meant to write ribbon-like, not cloth-like. Oops!
Yeah, once I started playing with iray, it was inevitable. I started thinking I should do shaders for it... then I was like nahhhh, lets kick this up a notch or 10. I was so excited over it, I paused clothing to get it done lol Plus, it was a good exercise in doing orig figures, as I have some of those I am wanting to get done as well.
Mine too. The wife really seems to like this stuff too (didn't know this when we met), but I do know she really likes Christmas a lot too, but she loves the fact of keeping our halloween stuff up as well, but I think she was already used to it before we met as she has 2 friends that like you and me, love halloween and keep their stuff up too, not that they don't pack "some" of their stuff up each year, me and the wife just don't. We have some stuff in the living room area, but not a lot, mostly everywhere else, nothing in the bathroom though. The gargoyles sound awesome, I'd do that too if I had any, especially large ones. Thanks about the user-name, I believe you mentioned that once before, I think. The first time I seen yours, I thought that was cool too. I've always liked Latin and studied it quite a bit way back in th early 80's. Let me return the compliment and say that you have been one of my fav PA's here, I think I mentioned that before too. Yeah, Egyptian stuff and the vibrant colors have always grabbed me my entire life. Anyway, almost time for work. Congradulations on the new product, looks really cool, not sure if I will be able to get it or not, but I do have the original.

Thank you, Xeno. These do not have what you are suggesting; it would require different rigging if I understand it correctly. For the dancers, I normally put the ends of the streamers as though coming from one of the hands, for instance.
Edit: Forgot to mention, there are hposes for the streamers for the shapes on the poses you see. Parameter dial pose controls to create your own shapes.
Aww ty! My name actually has Egyptian roots partly, despite it being in Latin (fire snake refers to the cobra - esp on the pharaohs crown ... the belief was it would come to life and spit fire at his enemies in the form of Wadjet)
Halloween is fun. I used to decorate big for it every year. But I lost all my decorations in a move. I havent done the gargoyle thing either... but I do keep a couple of skulls on my patio table.
Count me in as one who was excited about the phantoms, but decided not to get it because of the skulls. It's not that I don't like skulls, but it's a style thing that I just don't imagine working with stuff I would do. Chris' product does show great promise, though:)