Some (pretty bad) reeds

[N-drju]

Here are my (very) lazy attempts at creating Common Reed plant for my swamp render. I would like to share it here with you, for your review and trials.

As these objects were made with XFrog you should, upon compatibility options prompt, hit the "yes" button.

These plants are not impressive and they are supposed to be young varieties. This is why they are very basic and lack the distinct "feather duster" on top. They come in an "upright" mode and a "breezy" mode whereas the plant is slightly tilted towards the default north direction. No, this is not just a regular "tilt value" added. I actually edited the spline. I am not that lazy.

Plants lack any specific texturing for now, and the colors are probably a mess too. I don't have any IRL reeds within my reach so I can't even make any pictures of them... Also, the weather outside the window has me in a permanent state of drowsiness so I have no motivation to make a search for appropriate texturing.

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[Oshyan]

Actually not bad at all. With the right colors (not even textures), maybe procedural texturing, it could look quite good I think.

- Oshyan

[N-drju]

Actually not bad at all. With the right colors (not even textures), maybe procedural texturing, it could look quite good I think.

- Oshyan

Well, I'm glad to hear that. Yes, that was my thought as well - reeds have a pretty simple coloring. The leaves are mostly plain green, with just a few elongated "blades" running parallel to the leaf. Could well be a stretched PF with a touch of darker green, I think. The stem is a bit more complex as it seems to whiten-out next to each leaf "pocket".

[WAS]

... maybe procedural texturing, it could look quite good I think.

Proof of concept.

These are good models, should give yourself some more credit.

Thanks for sharing.

[N-drju]

These are good models, should give yourself some more credit.

Thank you. I was being critical because I was very sleepy, tired and demotivated that day. However, I forced myself to do something for the project and made these. I was afraid that nothing good can come out of my head in these circumstances...

I already have a good idea for the texture. It will be a classic material tex, but procedural-originating. I'll update these files. Maybe with some more varieties too.

[sboerner]

These are good models, should give yourself some more credit.

Echo this. And nice treatment, Jordan.

Tiny suggestion: Make 2-3 variations (leaf count, slight kinks in center spline). Does wonders when you blend them with multiple populations.

Are you using the XFrog standalone application or plugin?

[N-drju]

I am using the standalone, version 3.5 which I don't even remember when I got. Anyhow, I did and never used it until this week. Yeah, I know - kinky...

Yes, this is what I plan - 9 variations total. Traditional young-medium-aged varieties, plus three curvature levels of upright-breeze-windy. The breeze variation has leaves slightly distorted by sinus and tangens functions, (if I remember right) to simulate wind effects though it's probably hard to tell outright.

[N-drju]

Ok, so... as far as the texture is concerned, I made some RGB picks from reed pictures and then calculated the average color levels. As a result, I made a set of two procedural shaders and rendered them from top in TG. Here is what turned up:

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The only conceivable problem is that TG sun can heavily alter the coloration of both shaders and textures. So it's hard to find the "neutral" lighting that would not make color insanely bright... The final texture would of course be repeated throughout the leaf (a default in XFrog.)

[WAS]

Ok, so... as far as the texture is concerned, I made some RGB picks from reed pictures and then calculated the average color levels. As a result, I made a set of two procedural shaders and rendered them from top in TG. Here is what turned up:

[attach=1]

The only conceivable problem is that TG sun can heavily alter the coloration of both shaders and textures. So it's hard to find the "neutral" lighting that would not make color insanely bright... The final texture would of course be repeated throughout the leaf (a default in XFrog.)

Curious, are you modeling after Reed or Cattail? Reed is a lot duller green, and because of it's environments, a lot of it is dead past spring leaving lots of browns, and tans.

Cattail is more a solid green, like you have here, with thick blades on it, and retains that green through the season mostly unless soil/water problems.

[N-drju]

Hmmm... my initial idea was to make what we here call the "Common Reed". I would say the leaves of this species are lively green and I don't mean that subjectively. This is based on the photo research, RGB pickings (and even non-daltonist people consultations ) that I conducted. This is a humongous genus anyway, so we may even be referring two different things.

However, I have a bigger problem now - I just noticed that the "breeze" model got so twisted mid-section that the stem got erased altogether... I need to rebuild it.

[N-drju]

To anyone still interested - I am in the course of developing this little project.

Once I get everything on track and in a state I like, I will re-upload my reed package. Just to give you a sneak peek (or sneak peak as some like to say) I'd like to post two screenshots to let you see what I'm doing.

So, as can be clearly seen, the plants are now fully textured. The saturation might be a bit off though.

One thing that I particularly didn't like was that the leaves' edges were sticking out of the stem. This, luckily, has been improved through the "shape" settings.

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Upon closer look, you may also notice that some definition has been added to the leaf surface - rows of grooves can now be seen running through its entire length. I am quite excited about how the final model will look like, if I may say so myself.

[WAS]

Looking good! The refined leaves look much better. Nice segmentation colour too.