Uhem, I made my basecamp too thick, so that has consumed a fair bit of plastic filament and makes it 45% of the job so far. . . .
It is in no danger of toppling over at least :lol:

wendy♥catz said:

I have to go to work, my unused laptop had too many updates to start printing and being Vista am not sure going to work anyway with drivers
but
I got my toy today

It can be difficult to help in situations where we can't actually see screenshots of the shader setups. However, I think I can help a bit:

The gray in the bulb may be coming from a common mistake of having the "Reflections" sett too high. I could be wrong. I'm still seeing the filament through the bulb shader just fine, which leads me to believe that it may be something else.

Here's the problem:
You say that you're not getting what you were expecting, without telling us what you were expecting.
Also, we have no notes or images to go by, telling us what you've done so far to achieve the above image, and how it differs from what you're looking to achieve.
Please help us to help you! ;)

zarcondeegrissom said:

tl155180 said:

zarcondeegrissom said:

tl155180 said:

Szark said:

I don't know I just set the units to W (watts) and chose 55 then increased the Efficiency to 25 as I was going for a compact fluorescent light effect. 15% is good for the old tungsten filament GLS light bulbs.

I don't model much but I do know how to use Blender to make easy things.

You set the Luminance Units to Watts and Luminance Value to 55? That can't be right, can it? A value of just 55 barely registers on my scenes. I need to put in like a value of 1000000 just to make the light register.

Many reasons I can think of, ISO100 (outdoor film) vs ISO400 (indoor film) in the render tab, Lumans is not 1-to-1 for watts, etc.
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/782133/
"O" and real photographers lights and strobes are far more bright then regular lights. Daz_Spooky made a post somewhere listing them.
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/784881/

Hmm, nope if I change Lum Units to Watts, Lum Value to 55 and Lum Efficiency to 25 on the Med Bay indoor lights with ISO set to 400 all I get is a completely black room with some barely visible light surfaces poking through. They cast no visible light at all.

Iray makes my brain hurt... ;_;

Headlamp, it's a switch in the cam settings. when it is on, no other lights emit light. possibly.

Thanks for the suggestion, but no - I already know about the headlamp.

tl155180 said:

zarcondeegrissom said:

tl155180 said:

Szark said:

I don't know I just set the units to W (watts) and chose 55 then increased the Efficiency to 25 as I was going for a compact fluorescent light effect. 15% is good for the old tungsten filament GLS light bulbs.

I don't model much but I do know how to use Blender to make easy things.

You set the Luminance Units to Watts and Luminance Value to 55? That can't be right, can it? A value of just 55 barely registers on my scenes. I need to put in like a value of 1000000 just to make the light register.

Many reasons I can think of, ISO100 (outdoor film) vs ISO400 (indoor film) in the render tab, Lumans is not 1-to-1 for watts, etc.
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/782133/
"O" and real photographers lights and strobes are far more bright then regular lights. Daz_Spooky made a post somewhere listing them.
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/784881/

Hmm, nope if I change Lum Units to Watts, Lum Value to 55 and Lum Efficiency to 25 on the Med Bay indoor lights with ISO set to 400 all I get is a completely black room with some barely visible light surfaces poking through. They cast no visible light at all.

Iray makes my brain hurt... ;_;

zarcondeegrissom said:

tl155180 said:

Szark said:

I don't know I just set the units to W (watts) and chose 55 then increased the Efficiency to 25 as I was going for a compact fluorescent light effect. 15% is good for the old tungsten filament GLS light bulbs.

I don't model much but I do know how to use Blender to make easy things.

You set the Luminance Units to Watts and Luminance Value to 55? That can't be right, can it? A value of just 55 barely registers on my scenes. I need to put in like a value of 1000000 just to make the light register.

Many reasons I can think of, ISO100 (outdoor film) vs ISO400 (indoor film) in the render tab, Lumans is not 1-to-1 for watts, etc.
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/viewreply/782133/

Hmm, nope if I change Lum Units to Watts, Lum Value to 55 and Lum Efficiency to 25 on the Med Bay indoor lights with ISO set to 400 all I get is a completely black room with some barely visible light surfaces poking through. They cast no visible light at all.

Iray makes my brain hurt... ;_;

tl155180 said:

Szark said:

I don't know I just set the units to W (watts) and chose 55 then increased the Efficiency to 25 as I was going for a compact fluorescent light effect. 15% is good for the old tungsten filament GLS light bulbs.

I don't model much but I do know how to use Blender to make easy things.

You set the Luminance Units to Watts and Luminance Value to 55? That can't be right, can it? A value of just 55 barely registers on my scenes. I need to put in like a value of 1000000 just to make the light register.

Szark said:

I don't know I just set the units to W (watts) and chose 55 then increased the Efficiency to 25 as I was going for a compact fluorescent light effect. 15% is good for the old tungsten filament GLS light bulbs.

I don't model much but I do know how to use Blender to make easy things.

You set the Luminance Units to Watts and Luminance Value to 55? That can't be right, can it? A value of just 55 barely registers on my scenes. I need to put in like a value of 1000000 just to make the light register.

I don't know I just set the units to W (watts) and chose 55 then increased the Efficiency to 25 as I was going for a compact fluorescent light effect. 15% is good for the old tungsten filament GLS light bulbs.

I don't model much but I do know how to use Blender to make easy things.

zarcondeegrissom said:

Szark said:

I see thee is confusion of what value the Luminance units are so this might help http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/53695/P255/#781590. The reason I think it is done this way is because Wattage isn't a standard of light output as you can have a low wattage halogen that is brighter than a high wattage GLS light bulb (old style tungsten filament) or an LED which has a very high cd/m2 output. But I am only guessing. :)

Thing is, the numbers meant nothing to me, as I had no real world experience of how bright a 50,000 lumen light actually was, lol. Hence my little chart I was digging up.

Retired NAVY, so I know how bright (and hot) the searchlights are. That and I'm old enough to remember how bright a 100watt bulb was inside (not outside), lol. To finish it tho, The lumens of a 500watt halogen work-light??? hmmm.

Oh then on top of this we have the Inverse Sq law of light fall off...really does my old brain in these days.

Szark said:

I see thee is confusion of what value the Luminance units are so this might help http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/53695/P255/#781590. The reason I think it is done this way is because Wattage isn't a standard of light output as you can have a low wattage halogen that is brighter than a high wattage GLS light bulb (old style tungsten filament) or an LED which has a very high cd/m2 output. But I am only guessing. :)

Retired NAVY, so I know how bright (and hot) the searchlights are. That and I'm old enough to remember how bright a 100watt bulb was inside (not outside), lol. To finish it tho, The lumens of a 500watt halogen work-light??? hmmm.
(GE Lighting 97674 500-Watt 11000-Lumen Specialty T2.5 Halogen Light Bulb, still looking)
500-Watt Halogen T3 Double Ended 4.7 in, 9,500 lumens.

I see thee is confusion of what value the Luminance units are so this might help http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/53695/P255/#781590. The reason I think it is done this way is because Wattage isn't a standard of light output as you can have a low wattage halogen that is brighter than a high wattage GLS light bulb (old style tungsten filament) or an LED which has a very high cd/m2 output. But I am only guessing. :)

Kulay Wolf said:

Interesting. Right now I do not have the space for a 3d printer but how big is a 3d printer? Are they fragile? Does the 3d printer paint the models or do I have to paint them myself?

It depends on the model and type as there are many choices out there.

Most of the lower-end consumer printers are fairly small. The specs for one of the DaVinci models says that it is 18" x 20" x 22" with a print size of 7.8" x 7.8" x 7.48. There are some models out there that are smaller (and less capable) and the high-end consumer printers can be much larger.

When you get into the professional printers, they can get much larger. One printer was listed as 76" x 30" x 57" for the largest model. This is similar to the ones used by Shapeways and WhiteCloud to print the full-color sandstone models. And the scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory used a really large printer to printer a full-sized replica of a 1965 Shelby Cobra. (That's not even mentioning the Chinese who demonstrated a construction printer by printing a 5-story apartment building).

Returning to the consumer models, most of the printers used what's called fused filament deposition i.e. they melt a thin plastic filament and use the melted plastic to build the model in layers. Most printers can only print with one filament (and thus one color) at a time though some of the higher end consumer models can use 2-4 different filaments at a time.

That means generally, you would have to paint the resulting model if you have a consumer 3D printer.

As for the fragility of the printer, it depends on the printer. Some printers have their working parts fully enclosed and are about as robust as a typically ink-jet printer. Others have metal (sometime wood) frames, but have all of the working parts exposed to the environment.

Jonstark said:

I guess I haven't really checked prices for 3d printers. I've seen youtube vids where people were 3d printing guns, for example, which I thought was very cool, and other items, made me think maybe the prices on this stuff was naturally coming down and would eventually become more and more of a household item. I don't think it would ever make much sense to send off to some exotic an pricey company to print up your naked Vicky, but if you had a 3d printer just over on the shelf next to your regular printer/fax machine, then I don't figure it would cost much to print up whatever little daz dolly you wanted.

I don't think there's a huge niche for this either, but I guess you never know, maybe it's a bigger market than I'm thinking?

Just about all of the less expensive 3-D printers out there ($500 to $5000 range) print using only one or two colors of filament at a time(single v dual extruder). Most use PLA which is a plant based plastic (that will warp if you leave it in the car in the summer or ABS which is oil based plastic (Legos are made from ABS). Some will print with flexible filaments. There are filaments that look like wood or stone, There are a couple that will use carbon fiber or Kevlar. These are great for making parts, but the resolution is probably too low for fine detail work (resolution gets better at the upper end).

The more expensive machines can produce extremely fine detail, and a few can mix colors, but these are not cheap. So don't think you can go buy a $1000 machine and get fully textured, high resolution figurines out of the deal. (at least this year)

Research before you buy.

ncamp

A quick look on Amazon, and they're going for between £500 and a grand (so, what, $700-$1500 US at a guess). These are the kind that print ABS or PLA from a filament reel. (1kg reels are £20-£25 in assorted colours). These only print "small" size objects. "Large" size printers are around £1800

The big industrial printers... who knows. Reportedly the printer that made the gun cost half a mil!

Yeah, I agree with the previous post...

1- ask yourself, do you think you could assemble an inkjet printer without problems, now take that from 2D to 3D... Remember an inkjet requires precise calibration to work properly in 2D.
A friend of mine who is a pretty good electronics engineer, put together one of the better known kits... (maybe an early RepRap)... According to him it works, but it was a pain and if he could do it over he would have just purchased it assembled, since the price difference was not all that big.
Some people do prefer to build their own... Some kits are easier than others...

2- That free software is SketchUp... And that will most likely be for SketchUp Make (free), not SketchUp Pro which is $500... Pro is better suited to produce a solid 3D object "right out of the box", but free and pro would require you to do some digging through the plugins list at SketchUcation's plugin archive (the plugins are all free BTW) and understanding how to use and install them (not hard, but not "instant")...
Plus, to be able to make (print) solid 3D objects in SketchUp, you really should have some experience in producing "clean" closed hull models, otherwise some of SU's natural little quirks will hamper your efforts (reversed faces, hidden geometry, internally trapped faces, and native n-gon geometry). SU is not hard to learn, but I do know that you definitely have to do a bit of tinkering to get good results.

3- The free items seem like standard trade show giveaway junk.

4- Parts on a monthly basis? That just sounds a little too much like something from a 50s comic book... "Order now and you'll get one part for your personal mini-sub every month and in no time you'll be king of the seas, discovering ancient underwater cities!"

5- The free filament spools (plastic for making stuff) seem way too good to be true, probably they are only a foot or two of material... A regular spool runs around $30 in these parts, and here they appear to be giving away 6 or 7 spools...
I would guess they would really only be enough to produce, something very, very small...

6- A 4 gig flash drive... Wow!... I just picked up a 16 GB for $4.

7- The tools look a little bit "99 cent store"... And if you don't already own those very same tools (as well as a few more) you probably should not be assembling a 3D printer.

8- EDITED THIS- maximum print size is average.

9- "Can't wait to get your printer built? Get your designs printed by our friends at..."Sounds a little like "When you finally give up on making this thing work, let these guys with a real printers do it for a fee"... Which is a service which there is no short supply of...

Okay, I'm just picking on the gimmicky sales pitch, but to be honest, most gimmicky sales pitches, pitch gimmicky stuff... When I see an ad that I can easily pick apart, I tend to dismiss it and what it's pitching.
This thing could go together smoother than bread and butter and print like a gem, but the alternative is you are stuck with a product you assembled and then are left with the blame of it not working properly if there is a problem.
I'd save my cash for a while longer, there are more printers coming on the market every day. I don't know if you are a U.S. resident, but just last month I went in to Best Buy and found they have a whole display and are selling 3D printers in the store as well as online... The cheapest is around $500 and change... That's a pretty big step in 3D printers coming into the mainstream.

That's all just an opinion based on a quick look at the site...but that more or less what was asked for.

EDITED TO ADD... Okay, I looked into it a little more... There is no actual mention (in writing, I did not watch the video), but based on the subscription that runs up to at least 59 issues, you'll pay at least $625 USD... Or more, the circuit boards are slightly more for shipping, and there is no mention of the ultimate number of issues required to complete the machine...
So that's four issues every for weeks, for at least 59 issues...
Ooooookay.
If one were to opt to purchase the assembled 3D printer, it would be over $1,000 USD...
There are several known and reviewed brands available for that price... all that produce decent results.
That price is pre order.... Shipping in April 2015.
There is also no oblivious mention of the printer's resolution.
The layer thickness is normal (0.2 mm) for this size machine, but there are thousand dollar machines (even one $700 machine) that go down to 0.1 mm.
The print speed seems a little slow for the machine's price.
The printed object's size is listed as more or less 5.25" x 5.25" x 5.25" square... Which is about average.

dana365...cheers. As to the metaballs used - red meshes below. Actually, it wasn't as easy as it looked to get the bulb proportions correct, as a slight separation between the two produced a too-extended-like bulb.

Yeah, Horo, does look like the chance alignment of the sun with the bulb filament - what essentially is a squished-in radial light down to what looks like a line.

Jay

That's interesting. So what more did you 3D printed so far? Mine are collection of jewelleries and other accessories for my wife's shop. Actually, it looks like this one-- http://www.3d2print.net/shop/blog/cool/clear-earrings/. I'm trying to print more some masterpieces to be able to be featured in that site. If ever they choose my creation, I'll be able to get 20% discount in all filament materials I will order. Not bad, right?

Fauvist said:

Thanks for the information! With "ambient" in Poser - how do I make a surface of an object abient? Is there a setting somewhere to specifiy which object to make glow, and the intensity of the glow?

You know, I'd use DAZ studio, but I have so much trouble moving figures back and forth from Poser to Daz that it makes it not worth it. I make a figure in DAZ Studio with Genesis and a bunch of 4th generation morphs and add skin texture, then move it to Poser and pose it with fabric and then move it back to DAZ Studio and the skin texture is out of alignment - and I know there's some solution to this, but when I try to fix it - I can't figure out how to do it.

Go to the Material Room (why are they called 'Rooms', anyway; that makes absolutely no sense!), and select the 'Advanced' tab. Use the 'Object:' and 'Material:' drop-downs to locate the filament surface material. Then look for 'Ambient_Color' and 'Ambient_Value' (they're, like, the seventh and eighth items on the 'Poser Surface' panel); those are the items you want to play with. Pick your color (a nice, warm, pale-yellowish, as maclean suggested), and dial up the value. Render. Tweak. Re-render. Repeat as necessary. (And I challenge you not to start sounding like Scooby-Doo while you're doing it!)

You might also try applying a probe light to the filament surface. I've use those to make, for example, runes glow. Of course, the object you're trying to make glow needs its own material zone, but I'm assuming you already have that covered....