Forest Canopy - Update April 1st

RArcher · March 30, 2009, 02:41:07 PM

Figured I would repost this here instead of at the bottom of Frank's thread.

Single population of Klas's incredible Oak tree, with some slightly adjusted leaf textures.

Took just under 40 hours to render using reasonable settings (0.8 Detail, 10AA).

Postwork included creating a soft light layer, adjusting levels and adding a slight lens blur to the corners.

nvseal · March 30, 2009, 02:48:47 PM

Fantastic colors.

Seth · March 30, 2009, 03:22:27 PM

marvelous !
really like your light Ryan ^^

FrankB · March 30, 2009, 04:08:55 PM

as I said in the other thread: great render!
I'm curious if you could get something going in this render that I liked particularly well in the MentalRay image: the really bright spots where the sun hits the bark (plus the rays, of course). Maybe through specular highlights through a reflective shader or the texture's default shader?

that's usually the difficult bit with tg2 (at least for me): dynamic lighting, without making the overall image too bright, or some places pitch black.
40 hours are a lot of course, but I would really like to know if you can give the image the same or similar lighting dynamics.
It could well be that it's easier to achieve in post, though.

Cheers,
Frank

RArcher · March 30, 2009, 04:34:18 PM

I think that increasing the reflectivity and specularity would definitely give you those bright spots, though you may need to increase the effect after the fact. Working with .exr (because it throws out all your contrast and gamma adjustments), you are never going to get away without doing some post colour correcting anyway.

I'm still trying to get some more defined sunbeams, but I am thinking that I will need to reorganize the trees and add some additional elements that will scatter the sunlight (like the large tree trunk in the image you posted). The major hurdle for me is the near impossibility of organizing multiple populations of trees and then the sun position to hit the right trunk. I dream of the day when we could have some simple wireframes of the models we are working with. For these oak trees the population bounding boxes are huge because the branches spread so far, so you really have no idea where the trunk is going to end up. Add on to that the painful render times when trying to add sunbeams and you start having a pretty miserable time doing dozens of lengthy test renders.

For now I will simply keep trying because I know that a quality result is possible!

rcallicotte · March 30, 2009, 07:28:39 PM

Beautiful.

inkydigit · March 31, 2009, 11:35:11 AM

stunning!....love the light/mood here!

MacGyver · March 31, 2009, 01:09:44 PM

Quote from: FrankB on March 30, 2009, 04:08:55 PM
as I said in the other thread: great render!
I'm curious if you could get something going in this render that I liked particularly well in the MentalRay image: the really bright spots where the sun hits the bark (plus the rays, of course). Maybe through specular highlights through a reflective shader or the texture's default shader?

that's usually the difficult bit with tg2 (at least for me): dynamic lighting, without making the overall image too bright, or some places pitch black.
40 hours are a lot of course, but I would really like to know if you can give the image the same or similar lighting dynamics.
It could well be that it's easier to achieve in post, though.

Cheers,
Frank

Well done!
I wondered where the thread with the MentalRay image is?!

Luminos · March 31, 2009, 01:24:10 PM

Why is it that when you said reorganize trees I saw I'm my head trees getting up their roots and shuffling a little...Something wrong with me or just the realism in your renders

Excellent work of art!
Ryan

FrankB · March 31, 2009, 03:53:20 PM

Quote from: MacGyver on March 31, 2009, 01:09:44 PM

Well done!
I wondered where the thread with the MentalRay image is?!

it's here: http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=5925.0

cyphyr · April 01, 2009, 11:16:27 AM

Great image here. I got one question, how high did you set the translucency on the leaves?
richard

RArcher · April 01, 2009, 11:53:35 AM

I don't have the file with me at the moment, but I am pretty sure that I had the translucency set between 3 and 5.

Mohawk20 · April 01, 2009, 02:47:29 PM

I was just thinking... can you get the shadows of the rays darker by decreasing the evirolight settings?

FrankB · April 01, 2009, 03:11:02 PM

Quote from: Mohawk20 on April 01, 2009, 02:47:29 PM
I was just thinking... can you get the shadows of the rays darker by decreasing the evirolight settings?

maybe, but it's more effective to use a negative value for the ambient light in the fog layer... but a cautious negative, such as -0.2.

Frank

Mohawk20 · April 01, 2009, 03:51:23 PM

Ah, never would have thought of that...