I was playing around for a possible commission and built this tidal landscape with mounds and some Iron Age farms. I will possibly extend this with high water and very dry versions. Possibly...
A 1920x1200px version at 0.5 and AA4 rendered for 5 hours, and I think that was due to the fact that I plugged another PF into the cloud functions. The muddy water is just a reflective shader.
Nice image. I especially like the foreground and the general mood of the scene. Should make a good basis for other drier/wetter versions.
Lovely image Ulco, feels really Dutch! :)
Good atmosphere and very nice surfacing.
My only minor crit could be that the mounds are a bit low, the ones I have ever seen here are usually 10-30m high (in Brabant there are some big ones).
Looks very similar to areas round where I live. Here the mounds are not even a meter high but its higher enough to raise it above the local marsh (at the time).
Richard
Quote from: cyphyr on July 08, 2011, 06:41:05 AM
Looks very similar to areas round where I live. Here the mounds are not even a meter high but its higher enough to raise it above the local marsh (at the time).
Richard
Since that's what they are basically meant for it means that Ulco's image still is accurate, except that my biased vision may not notice one meter high mounds :)
These Iron Age people wouldn't have cranes and caterpillars to build there hillocks, so I suppose they weren't very high. But actually, I don't know. But 30meters??? That's as high as a 9 story flat...
I'm now making some Limonium vulgare to get some color into the marshes.
Quote from: Dune on July 08, 2011, 07:31:35 AM
These Iron Age people wouldn't have cranes and caterpillars to build there hillocks, so I suppose they weren't very high. But actually, I don't know. But 30meters??? That's as high as a 9 story flat...
I'm now making some Limonium vulgare to get some color into the marshes.
30 metres is exceptional and maybe a bit over-estimated, but there's a huge one nearby Roosendaal for instance. It's along a highway and definitely is artificial and very high.
Several hundreds of metres wide and definitely in the range of 20 meters. I'll see if I can find it online.
The village where I grew up though, also has one and it survived the big flooding of 1953 so it's at least 7 metres high.
Mounds of that size weren't uncommon.
But I agree with you about Iron Age people not being able to make very big ones. I think you would need some tools like buckets horses and such to move such massive amounts of soil.
The Mississippi culture, native Americans built large mounds. Some were as big as football fields and larger. Many were quite high as well.
Looks good Ulco. The marsh is great. Add a power fractal to the Final Density modulator on the clouds function tab. It will add detail to the clouds you have. (If you have not done so yet).
In Wiltshire (next county over) we have Silbury Hill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbury_Hill), a man made mound about 37m high. Built about 4750 years ago and that it took 18 million man-hours, or 500 men working for 15 years.
Why and by what motivation is as clear now as it ever will be ...
:)
Richard
Very pretty. So much visual interest, as always. The cracks are lovely, but maybe should be a bit less pronounced where covered with vegetation.
A fine image Ulco; and, an excellent base to build upon.
Very nice! Looking forward of seeing more! Maybe decrease the cracks a bit? They seem a bit too intense on some areas?
Nice render!
High water version. C&C welcome, as always.
Quote from: Dune on July 11, 2011, 11:45:45 AM
High water version. C&C welcome, as always.
Nice flooding.
I like this one.
It looks dangerous to live there! Nice :)
very nice, a lot of detail like the bird and the old fence. I also like how some grassy areas are hit by light, some others not. The trees are a tad dark for my taste though.
Yeah, the trees are strangely dark. I'll check them out. Here's a dry season version. The only thing that went wrong was the depth of the creeks; it seemed to have flattened out a bit too much. I like the sky most, somehow. I realize I need to make some 3D swallows... and perhaps change the poles (they are stones, actually) to better poles.
I like this a lot. Nice balance with the grass distribution and flowers, and the dry ground really works well. I think it needs something extra in the foreground though, like maybe an old cart or a pile of logs?
This looks very nice indeed Dune! It's a pleasant composition you have there. The polders in the distance with the islands running through them give a good sense of depth and scale of the environment.
I hope you'll work a bit more on the foreground however. Perhaps have the pathways worn down a bit more to the point where they slope down a tiny bit in the center as well as having a smoother surface. That and have some smaller weed-like plants (shorter than the grass) bordering the edge of the path for a better blend. It's a bit too abrupt right now. That is unless they are meant to be footpaths of course. :)
Also maybe experiment with adding a few more populations to add things like small pebbles, fallen leaves, and general "debris of nature" of that sort. Don't go too far with it though, right now the composition has a peaceful, minimalistic look to it. It would be a shame to lose that.
I must say that I really like the darkness of the trees (as well as the houses). It makes it more realistic in the photographical sense. I wouldn't brighten them up if I were you.
If you were to take a single photograph of a similar scene, under similar lighting conditions, you would never be able to capture a wide enough dynamic range to correctly expose both the brightness of the clouds/sky and the darkness of tree shadows. A choice has to be made as to which parts you want to expose properly. In sunny lighting conditions it's always a sacrifice you have to make. The power we CG artists have been granted enables us to bypass such limitations. 'Great power comes with great responsibility' as the saying goes and often times that power is exploited with the unfortunate result of unrealistic imagery. I think you've done really well here! :)
I also like this version very much with the clumping of the grass. As you said, perhaps the bare spots might appear better if that looked lower than the grass. As for the darker appearance of the trees, this is no different than real life with the lighting you have set - I think they look good as they are. Mentioned by someone else, maybe the cracks in the bare spots would look better if they were smaller.
Yes, the first thing I noticed is the sky. Lovely!
There may also have been some mollusk hunting. I would have some dug up areas where they had been found as the tide went out.
This is really looking great now.
Thanks for your lengthy comment, DD. But they are not pathways, as you can see from the first iteration; they are supposed to be runoffs/creeks in an estuary/tidal area. The sea (Waddensee) in the distance. And there is no room for pebbles or fallen leaves, as this is just muddy ground in a quite bare environment in what is now the province of Groningen. Only some bushes trying to survive at the edge of the settlement mounds.
@ Henry: that's an idea. As you can see from this partial render, I have already dumped a forgotten bucket.
The proportions are better here, especially the poles. They wouldn't have found the huge beams I used earlier.
I'm hoping to make another book some day (I self-published my paintings earlier at Blurb), and this one is a good candidate to add, IMHO.
This is looking quite nice. Lots of great detail.
- Oshyan
Thanks, Oshyan. By the way, how are things going ;-) ??
Fairly well. Email soon. ;)
- Oshyan
:)
Wow this just gets better and better! Great work
Realism at its best.
Another wet iteration, just testing some settings. Any comments before I go on?
it really invokes the feeling of a cold shore line, any way to make the vegation reflect the inplied wind
folder
The waves hitting the piece of land to the right are less than realistic (straight edges). Also, I'd expect that grass at water line to last at most a few hours with these waves, then erosion should set in. :) Great atmosphere here, I fully agree.
I think they might have coracles or something like one. The tide might come in too high at times. My only other thought is that the waves would have a smoother area where the lee side of the tide is.
Nice stormy scene.
Larger version, took almost 4 hours at 0.5 and AA4 GI 1/1. I'm not sure yet about the water transparency color (the soil shining through). Perhaps less and murkier is better.
And I took care of this:
Quotethe waves would have a smoother area where the lee side of the tide is
Ulco, this is super.
This is great. What do your clients think? It looks like it's about finished.