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Carrara Challenge #47: Structured/Unstructured...or "Unstructured Structure"

DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
edited May 2019 in Carrara Discussion

Carrara Challenge #47: Structured/Unstructured...or “Unstructured Structure”

Create a render the contains anything Structured or Unstructured, or a combination of the two. What does this even mean? Pretty much anything and everything has some underlying structure, even things which at first glance appear unstructured.

Some examples of “Structured” would be architecture, a carefully designed garden, vehicles - cars, planes or spaceships, a computer chip, a skeleton, or a beehive.

“Unstructured” could be ruins, a fallen rotting tree in a tangled forest, scattered pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, a crumbling statue, a weed choked lot, or a nebula in deep space. Going further, one can see images in nature’s infinite and beautiful abstractions, and patterns. Gazing at clouds, or seeing figures or animals emerging from the randomness of a stucco wall, or the splotches on the floor.

“Unstructured Structure” could be: micro organisms in a petri dish, a detail of coral under the sea, falling snowflakes, or ‘The Big Bang’.

These terms could also be applied to the composition. Is it a calming structured scene? Or haphazard and wild and crazy - seemingly unstructured?

Your Structured or Unstructured element(s) can be the focus of the scene, but don't have to be to the exclusion of any other elements that help create your scene.

Let your imagination go wild! Hoping the theme is open to broad interpretation.

 

To help stimulate the brain here are some synonyms.

Structured: analytical, careful, deliberate, disciplined, efficient, exact, fixed, framed, logical, ordered, planned, regular, systematic, together

Unstructured: formless, chaotic, hazy, irregular, nebulous, shapeless, unformed, vague, abnormal, amorphous, asymmetrical, embryonic, malformed, mutilated, undeveloped, obscure

 

Carrara Function Requirements: None for this challenge; Carrara is packed with tools to help you create very orderly scene elements, like a Replicator, or the Replicate tool in the Vertex Modeler. Or for a more organic feel, a Surface Replicator using a procedural shader. Modifiers can be used to help create an “Unstructured Structure”. Particle Systems, Terrains, Clouds, Fog, Metaball Objects, the Spline Modeler, Bone Rigs, Displacement Tools, Physics  -  all and more can be used and abused to perfect your vision.

 

Rules: You are required to post at least one WIP image to this thread with an explanation of how you achieved your Structured or Unstructured element(s).

You can enter as many images as you like, but can only win once. In the case of any ties I will use the method Bunyip02 used in the previous challenge of flipping a coin 5 times to determine the tie breaker.

Images must be rendered in Carrara or any Carrara render engine plugin.

Animations are welcome!

Images must be new (previously unpublished)

Post work is allowed, but it would be nice to have an explanation of what was done so we can all learn.

Use any and all content that is allowed under the Forum Terms of service. Any content that is used should be credited in the Entry Thread.

The 1st place winner will become the host for the next Carrara challenge, decide the theme and set the rules. If the 1st place winner is unable to host, then it falls to the 2nd place winner, and so on. If none of the winners are able to host hopefully someone will volunteer.

Prizes:

Thank you to our generous sponsor DAZ3D for offering the following awards to the winners:

1st Place: $70.00 towards DAZ3D owned item(s)
2nd Place: $50.00 towards DAZ3D owned item(s)
3rd Place: $40.00 towards DAZ3D owned item(s)
4th Place: $30.00 Towards DAZ3D OWNED ITEM(s)

(Can only Win Once)

 

Dates to Remember:

WIP Thread Opens: Friday May 31
Entry Thread Opens: Sunday June 23
Entry Thread closes/Voting Begins:  Monday July 8
Voting Ends: Sunday July 14 at midnight MDT

I chose Monday July 8 to close the Entry Thread because July 4, a national holiday here in the US, falls on a Thursday and I don’t know if anyone might make a long week end of it.

Post edited by DesertDude on
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Comments

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234

    PA Sponsor - Vyusur

    A huge thank you to Vyusur for generously sponsoring the Challenge - THANK YOU!!

    Vyusur will award the author of her favorite picture to choose any one item from her store.

    She is an incredible modeler of the human figure in addition to being able to model...anything!  And her skills are not limited to modeling but include texturing, rigging, posing, lighting and composition. She also generously shares many of her workflows via tutorials on YouTube.

    AND, her skills are not just limited to the digital arts, she is an accomplished painter of many mediums and subject matter. I encourage any and all to view her Fine Art Gallery.

    We are fortunate to have her as part of our community.

    Her Store: https://www.daz3d.com/vyusur

    Link to thread ‘Experiments, discovery and experience’ :

    https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/207651/experiments-discovery-and-experience/p1

    Her Fine Art Gallery: https://vyusur.com

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234

    reserved

  • StezzaStezza Posts: 7,802

    I posted my ghost who can be unstructured to quickly lol

    awesome challenge here...  yes

     

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    Stezza_Carrara9 said:

    I posted my ghost who can be unstructured to quickly lol

    awesome challenge here...  yes

    smiley
    Thanks Stezza.
    Now it's my unstructured bedtime in my ustructured time zone

  • VIArtsVIArts Posts: 1,496

    Unstructured like my hair in the morning?

  • Bunyip02Bunyip02 Posts: 7,699

    Woo-hoo, now to get that thinking cap on !

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,079

    My thinking cap is on also.  

    Thank you, Vyusur, for sponsoring.

  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675

    structure could be archvis ?

    haven't dusted off the old asbru crossing in half a decade, laugh

     

    anything glows lights need idl and or caustics on? cant remember.  brain farting.  

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    edited May 2019
    MAJourney said:

    Unstructured like my hair in the morning?

    It's been man, many years since I have had such a problem...
    Would make for a great render though! laugh

     

     

    Mystarra said:

    structure could be archvis ?

    haven't dusted off the old asbru crossing in half a decade, laugh

     

    anything glows lights need idl and or caustics on? cant remember.  brain farting.  

    Of course it can! 
    As for Anything Glows...I don't have the most experience but just did a quick test:

    I made a vertex cube and isolated one polygon for a "window". I gave that window a shader with a light peach color in the the Glow Channel and inserted an Anything Glows Light and tied it to my window object. I set the Color from the chooser to "Object Glow". That should do it. I did a second render just for fun and for the window object and turned on "Aura" in the Effects Tab and dialed in what I thought looked ok.

    anything_glows.jpg
    640 x 480 - 9K
    anything_glows_aura.jpg
    640 x 480 - 10K
    anyting_glows_settings.jpg
    233 x 403 - 38K
    Post edited by DesertDude on
  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675
    DesertDude said:
    MAJourney said:

    Unstructured like my hair in the morning?

    It's been man, many years since I have had such a problem...
    Would make for a great render though! laugh

     

     

    Mystarra said:

    structure could be archvis ?

    haven't dusted off the old asbru crossing in half a decade, laugh

     

    anything glows lights need idl and or caustics on? cant remember.  brain farting.  

    Of course it can! 
    As for Anything Glows...I don't have the most experience but just did a quick test:

    I made a vertex cube and isolated one polygon for a "window". I gave that window a shader with a light peach color in the the Glow Channel and inserted an Anything Glows Light and tied it to my window object. I set the Color from the chooser to "Object Glow". That should do it. I did a second render just for fun and for the window object and turned on "Aura" in the Effects Tab and dialed in what I thought looked ok.

    it looks beautiful.  Thank yoo.

    i was trying to use a floor as a light, and i couldnt get it to work  >.<
    think i missed the 'facet' part

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,079
    edited May 2019

    Freebie

    Hexagon hive structure in Carrara format.

    Lets see some bees. Little bees doing the crucial pollination of our gardens.  Giant bees in Jules Vernes Mysterious Island.  

    Or, forget the bees and do anything else you want with a hexagon lattice.

    See zip file attached.  Yucky simple procedural texture because I plan to use a wax shader purchased, and not sure I can share.

     

    zip
    zip
    Free Hexagon Structure Hive.zip
    172K
    aa07 Final UVMap.JPG
    1573 x 771 - 211K
    Post edited by Diomede on
  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,924

    nice choice @DesertDude

    thanks for the freebie Ted :)

    here's a quick proof of concept

    melted m3 RR onto p4 skeleton with VWD

    quick play as usually full g4 are too much

     

    Untitled-1.jpg
    1725 x 1307 - 457K
  • UnifiedBrainUnifiedBrain Posts: 3,588

    Excellent work there DesertDude!  It looks like this Challenge is pretty wide open. :)

    My thinking is to explore GMIC a bit more, and create some semi-abstract renders.  Hope that at least partially fits the bill.

  • HeadwaxHeadwax Posts: 9,924
    edited June 2019

    second proof of concept - parented m4 skeleton to genesis - not sure why i di  but it worked 

    i addede lots of alpha maps to the clothes and one side of genesis 

     

     

     

    Untitled-4.jpg
    1603 x 1396 - 259K
    Post edited by Headwax on
  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,079
    edited June 2019

    Way to start us off, Andrew.  I'm assuming that the pirate army of the dead represents unstructure, but would be cool if there i get surprised.  Either way, thanks for the workflow.  Clever use of VWD.

    Post edited by Diomede on
  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    UnifiedBrain said:

    Excellent work there DesertDude!  It looks like this Challenge is pretty wide open. :)

    My thinking is to explore GMIC a bit more, and create some semi-abstract renders.  Hope that at least partially fits the bill.

    Thanks UnifiedBrain - and yes, some semi abstract renders totally fits the bill!!

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    Diomede_Carrara said:

    Freebie

    Hexagon hive structure in Carrara format.

    Lets see some bees. Little bees doing the crucial pollination of our gardens.  Giant bees in Jules Vernes Mysterious Island.  

    Or, forget the bees and do anything else you want with a hexagon lattice.

    See zip file attached.  Yucky simple procedural texture because I plan to use a wax shader purchased, and not sure I can share.

     

    Thanks for posting that Diomede! Looks cool. I'll see what I can do with it later this morning. 

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    Headwax_Carrara said:

    nice choice @DesertDude

    thanks for the freebie Ted :)

    here's a quick proof of concept

    melted m3 RR onto p4 skeleton with VWD

    quick play as usually full g4 are too much

     

    That looks super cool Headwax. In addition to a cool image, I love the choice of words..."melted m3 RR onto p4 skeleton..."... like an abstract lyric from a song. smiley

     

    Headwax_Carrara said:

    second proof of concept - parented m4 skeleton to genesis - not sure why i di  but it worked 

    i addede lots of alpha maps to the clothes and one side of genesis 

     

     

    Awesome! Looking forward to more.

  • Persona Non GrataPersona Non Grata Posts: 1,365
    edited March 2021

    .

    Post edited by Persona Non Grata on
  • Persona Non GrataPersona Non Grata Posts: 1,365
    edited March 2021

    .

    Post edited by Persona Non Grata on
  • WendyLuvsCatzWendyLuvsCatz Posts: 37,821

    Would make good relaxation videos yes

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    edited June 2019

    Awesome Selinita! Glad to see you here

    Just curious how you went about making the cylindrical shape. I had a go with the freebie Diomede posted. I used Modifiers in the Assembly room, but once you dial in what you like you can jump into the Vertex Modeller and apply the same under Model>Deform and scrap the Modifier. So in the first picture I applied Bend and Twist and manually typed in 364 and changed the axis to 'X'. (360 degrees left a slight gap...)

    (That's how I made the chain of ovals on the lampshade in the last challenge, I modeled one oval to my liking, duplicated it, moved it, welded them together, duplicated the two, welded, etc. I then applied Bend and Twist  using 360 degrees under Model>Deform and welded the final seam together. I used a similar technique to model the bowl in that same picture.)

    Meanwhile, I went a few steps further and started wrecking the Hexagon Structure Hive with more modifiers.laugh

    Some of the Modifiers aren't avaliable in the VM, but you can always apply those in the Assembly room and export as OBJ and import and carry on.

     

     

    hex_hive_cylinder.jpg
    640 x 480 - 30K
    bend_twist_modifier.jpg
    291 x 240 - 10K
    hex_hive_002.jpg
    1440 x 953 - 209K
    hex_hive_001_modifiers.jpg
    295 x 546 - 21K
    hex_hive_003.jpg
    1440 x 948 - 169K
    hex_hive_003_modifiers.jpg
    296 x 529 - 21K
    Post edited by DesertDude on
  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    Selinita said:

    Another short animation (unstructured?) water molecules cheeky

    WaterMolecules by Selinita;

    Beautiful! 

  • DiomedeDiomede Posts: 15,079
    edited June 2019

    @Selina - Magnifique!  Show me the honey.  Wonderful textures and animations.

    @DesertDude - Great results with the assembly room modifiers.  I think the assembly room modifier will suffice for a great many concepts.  

    If for some reason, there is need for more control, here are two more suggestions.  First, the vertex modeler often offers the ability to enter numeric values to edit selected vertexes.  Second, can attach a skeleton and pose an object to add twists and turns.  In the following test render, the circular shape of the cross-section of the tube resulted from joining 6 hexagons at 60 degree angles (for a 360 degree circle), the spherical indentations are from extruding the hexagons twice with a taper.  Then applied smoothing, The curve in the tube resulted from attaching the model to a skeleton and posing.  Could have had several turns in different directions, or even closed the circle.

     

    zz05 render posed tube.jpg
    640 x 480 - 42K
    zz01b rotate hexaon numerical.jpg
    1597 x 818 - 221K
    zz02 bone the tube.JPG
    1060 x 409 - 50K
    zz04 posed tube.JPG
    1408 x 812 - 150K
    zz06 tsist and turn.jpg
    640 x 480 - 16K
    Post edited by Diomede on
  • Persona Non GrataPersona Non Grata Posts: 1,365
    edited March 2021

    .

    Post edited by Persona Non Grata on
  • StezzaStezza Posts: 7,802
    edited June 2019

    wow... !!

    melting undead people and advanced honeycomb maths ( for me anyways ) gotta love it heart

    all I came up with was a modeled concrete building block wink

    then I duplicated it three times.... cool

    rendered without postwork .. apart from my sig. 

    Building Blocks

     

    Building Blocks.png
    800 x 600 - 845K
    Post edited by Stezza on
  • Bunyip02Bunyip02 Posts: 7,699

    Wow - plenty of progress.

    Misty - hope you can join in with the Archvis.

    Desertdude - very nice workflows - hope we will see more.

    Diomede - the bee's knees - awesome work

    Headwax - "Deadly" pirates - cool

    Selina - great aimations - have you got time to join in with an entry ?

    Wendy - is an animation forth-coming ?

    Stezza - very nice Mr Bean surveying the castle

     

  • Bunyip02Bunyip02 Posts: 7,699
    edited June 2019

    Future City - due to high density living would need very structured living and work spaces - traffic streams would be vigourisly enforced.

    Went for a crowded dystopian city that gives a highly structured environment look.

    City 1.png
    2267 x 1039 - 2M
    City 1 render.png
    2400 x 1800 - 5M
    Post edited by Bunyip02 on
  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    Diomede_Carrara said:

    @Selina - Magnifique!  Show me the honey.  Wonderful textures and animations.

    @DesertDude - Great results with the assembly room modifiers.  I think the assembly room modifier will suffice for a great many concepts.  

    If for some reason, there is need for more control, here are two more suggestions.  First, the vertex modeler often offers the ability to enter numeric values to edit selected vertexes.  Second, can attach a skeleton and pose an object to add twists and turns.  In the following test render, the circular shape of the cross-section of the tube resulted from joining 6 hexagons at 60 degree angles (for a 360 degree circle), the spherical indentations are from extruding the hexagons twice with a taper.  Then applied smoothing, The curve in the tube resulted from attaching the model to a skeleton and posing.  Could have had several turns in different directions, or even closed the circle.

    Sweet!! Thank you for the detailed explanation Diomede. 

  • DesertDudeDesertDude Posts: 1,234
    Selinita said:
    DesertDude said:

    Just curious how you went about making the cylindrical shape. I had a go with the freebie Diomede posted. I used Modifiers in the Assembly room, but once you dial in what you like you can jump into the Vertex Modeller and apply the same under Model>Deform and scrap the Modifier. 

    Yes, that's exactly how I did it, but I didn't guess the actual angle to use for a perfect fit of the cells...

    1. Count the number of cells in one row along the axis you are going to bend, say 16;
    2. Double it (32) and divide 360 by this number, say 11.25
    3. Multiply the result (11.25) by the doubled number plus 1 (33) to get the exact angle needed, say 371.25

    Hope that helps smiley

    Yes...except for me it made my head spin....ha ha I'm a total math F-.  Lol .
    Yet again the brilliance of the Carrara community shines at how we approach different problems in different ways. Thank you Selinita

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