Knotwilgspoor/ Pollard willow track

[AndyWelder]

Anxious to hear what do you think!
The whole scene is build around the puddles in the cart trail. There are some flaws i.e. the leaves of the trees don't look like leaves but more like colored planes.

How the puddles are done you can find here: http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=13818.0

Credits:
dandelO - masked water shader clip and daffodils.
Bobby Stahr - reeds

[inkydigit]

 
I like this a lot Andy...
the track is excellent and the vegetation fits well, I especially like the 'pollarded' willow!

[Kevin F]

Overall this is a really nice pic. But you're right about the leaves - can you turn the transparency down?.
The daffodils look very 2dimensional and hence false. Look forward to further iterations.

[cyphyr]

Very nice, good composition and a sweet concept. The landscape is very similar to my local area, Somerset, so I recognise the pollarded willow My boots are covered with this mud too!
If you feel like developing it further maybe some boot, paw, hoof and vehicle tracks mixed in with the mud.
I agree about the leaves, this close you would normally use textured and opacity masked leaves, is this not a possibility for you? What program did you make the willow in? The same would be true of the daffs, you'll get a better result, less saturated if you use a texture on the flowers and a translucency map on the flowers.
Cheers
Richard

[FrankB]

the bad object quality aside, you've nailed something photorealistic here! You're spot on with the lighting, the colors and the mud and puddles, and the sky. If you would just replace the trees with better ones, and use better flowers, .... honestly when I saw the thumbnail, I thought you'd uploaded a reference photo and not a render. Congratulations!

Frank

[efflux]

This is cool. The tyre tracks look great. There are some CG looking parts but this is OK in my opinion. It has a slightly cartoon like unreal look to it that works. It has atmosphere. The setup is very good. You are led into the background.

[Derek Tokarzewski]

Hi, these are thing that jump out to me.

First thing that i notice to stand out is the highlight in the right puddle.
The wetness just goes up way too high which makes the reflection from wet mud too noticable.
I think if you make it more subtle it will look lot better.

another thing that i noticed are those two plants on the banks of the river.
They seem lonely over there, either populate few more of just get ridge of them.

Those flowers look too synthetic, see how the road look like without them., they look great in the distance, and maybe that's where they belong.

Grass looks great.

[Derek Tokarzewski]

Trees,  hmm.
I'm not a tree expert but all those trees seem funny to me.
Usually there is a main stem and then they branch out, but not this one.
Seems like it's missing lots of splits before reaches final branch that the leafs are attached to.

Also the size of the tree closest to the camera is off.
If you took this "photo" from 6' this tree is only about 4' taller.
again the trunk is too wide and tree is too short.
In the distance they seem to work.

Final advice, reevaluate your foreground.

Good luck.

[Derek Tokarzewski]

I guess i am wrong, those trees look like that.
One problem solved.

[Dune]

This has a lot of potential, Andy.
1. Like I said in the other post; some more clumps in the clay would benefit the scene.
2. The daffodils are too large. I'd reduce them to 1/2 size and add a PF over their default shaders for some variation.
3. The knotwilgen don't have a leave texture but planes as leaves. I think you should add an image of a leaf in the opacity tab of the leaves default shader. And also add a PF for variation. And their trunks are really big, a bit too fat I'd say.
4. I agree about the reeds. I'd add some patchy rows of (different) reeds in the 'sloten', covering quite a bit of the slootranden. Not wishing to advertise myself here, but I got some nice reeds at NWDA, and there are probably more to be found for free.

[Tangled-Universe]

This is cool. The tyre tracks look great. There are some CG looking parts but this is OK in my opinion. It has a slightly cartoon like unreal look to it that works. It has atmosphere. The setup is very good. You are led into the background.

I think this comes closest to my opinion. I really like this render and despite it looks a bit CG'ish/cartoonish in some way it does work!
One thing is really off to me though:

Trees,  hmm.
I'm not a tree expert but all those trees seem funny to me.
Usually there is a main stem and then they branch out, but not this one.
Seems like it's missing lots of splits before reaches final branch that the leafs are attached to.

Also the size of the tree closest to the camera is off.
If you took this "photo" from 6' this tree is only about 4' taller.
again the trunk is too wide and tree is too short.
In the distance they seem to work.

Final advice, reevaluate your foreground.

Good luck.

I think Derek is right.
I normally see these trees sometimes slightly taller and especially a lot thinner here in The Netherlands.
See HERE

[cyphyr]

I have trees exactly like this in my area ... so I guess there is some variance..

Richard

[inkydigit]

pollarded willow come in many similary forms and variations...
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=pollarded+willow&hl=en&cr=countryUK|countryGB&tbs=ctr:countryUK|countryGB&prmd=imvns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=5p8WT6ivJIewtAa8vOVT&ved=0CEAQsAQ&biw=1672&bih=835

[Tangled-Universe]

Ah I see...it's funny to see the different results you get with google, purely based on language
So it depends on what Andy tried to achieve I suppose.

[inkydigit]

 
oops forgot that!