Stats:
Res: 1024x768
Render time: 65+ hours on a quad core 2.4GHz with 3.25GB of RAM (windows XP)
Quality: 1.0
AA: 10 (corrected as I had stated GI: 10) ;D
Post work: very minor contrast/color correction, very minor selective sharpening/blurring all in Photoshop. A 100% TG2 render.
This image took quite some time to create and render. I spent a few weeks of off and on dialing in the scene file, and then had to render the final in quarter sections at about 18 hours per section. My PC is also unstable at times and will blue screen after hours of rendering at the worst time (like when a render is 90% completed). A real bummer. To top it off, I realized there was a flaw in the grass models I was using, so I had to replace the bottom section with new grass, requiring more rendering and more time out. This image would have been done a week ago or more. If I had a dedicated render server, it would have likely rendered in about 30 hours.
But, the good news is, the image is nearly exactly what I was aiming for! I wanted to feature some backlit trees, a new mountain and rocks technique, as well as a dialed in version of the GI lighting technique I've been working on for a while now which gives a misty ambience to the scene. I think it came out nicely. Still a few more things to dial in, but I am very satisfied with the result. My overall goal for my images is realism, with still a ways to go, but getting there.
For the scene elements:
The terrain is a standard TG2 power fractal with a few tweaks I've been developing. I plan on doing future tutorials on some of these techniques.
The surfacing is a mix of custom micro displacements, with stacked power fractals and reflective shaders dialed in just right. The rocks feature a blend of one custom image map for color variation, and power fractals for a unique look.
The pine trees were created in Onyx tree, and the grass is a modified version of lighting's long grass. I had to use an additional compute normal (separate from the surfacing chain) to keep the grass matching the slope on the rocks. I didn't think this would even work, but it did! If I had kept this additional compute normal in the surfacing chain, it degraded the look of the rocks.
The lighting and atmosphere is the GI technique I've been dialing in. I've found its very unpredictable, giving great results one time, and marginal results the next. It seems to work well on this image.
Many thanks for looking and for all your inspiration. Let me know if you have any questions.
Absolutely Amazing! Awesome rocks and trees. Lighting / atmosphere is perfect.
Iain
Very natural looking and with great sense of depth :)
But... GI 10?!
Are there any real benefits of using such high GI?
this is awesome!!!!
so natural i can almost touch the moisture in the air!
do you mean AA 10 instead of Gi 10?
Quote from: lonewolf on December 13, 2008, 01:43:32 AM
Absolutely Amazing! Awesome rocks and trees. Lighting / atmosphere is perfect.
Iain
Absolutely, this is really beautiful work man!
Quote from: PorcupineFloyd on December 13, 2008, 02:36:29 AM
Very natural looking and with great sense of depth :)
But... GI 10?!
Are there any real benefits of using such high GI?
That would be my question then as well.
I really like your image, especially the part with the trees in the fog... :)
It's very much aimed for realism as you said, which makes the lighting a bit cold for my taste but therefore there's Photoshop ;D
Now that you have fine-tuned everything, will there be a higher-res version? I know this question s*cks after some time but thank God it's christmas, so you can make us all a nice gift!
Fantastic image! This should show up on IotW.
Stunning, superb atmosphere and the trees are something else. wow!!!
As I said on Renderosity, this is near perfection. Excellent artwork.
Whoops! Sorry guys, I DID mean AA: 10 GI of 10 would be overkill (I've tried it on another image a long time ago just to see). ;D I've corrected the original post.
Quote from: moodflow on December 13, 2008, 09:07:57 AM
Whoops! Sorry guys, I DID mean AA: 10 GI of 10 would be overkill (I've tried it on another image a long time ago just to see). ;D I've corrected the original post.
Oh, a pity. Thought I'd finally see an image with a GI over 4 ;D
awesome work...love the atmo control, and the trees look perfect, as do the rocks!!!
I'm glad to hear this.
Quote from: moodflow on December 13, 2008, 01:10:39 AM
I plan on doing future tutorials on some of these techniques.
This is just fantastic. The rock surface is one of the best I've seen. The forest has a perfectly dreamy air to it. Top class and definately THE image of the week.
This GI technique, it involves making the background-sphere object luminous and using ambient occlusion lighting, is this right?
Fantastic work - a stunner!
Quote from: dandelO on December 13, 2008, 04:54:13 PM
This GI technique, it involves making the background-sphere object luminous and using ambient occlusion lighting, is this right?
DandelO,
Yes, but not with ambient occlusion. Additionally, its meant to be used for days where the lighting is diffuse across the sky, which is probably 80% of the time for most places in the world - which is why I like it. The default TG2 setup is for a bright, sunny, clear day.
Most excellent! Nothing at all to improve, I'd say, very nice. I'd like to point out how I like the surface on the right foreground, brilliant.
I'm wondering if it would have been possible to reduce the rendertime by some 50%, though. I think a few settings might have been exagerated for the benefits they bring (such as GI 10)?
cheers,
Frank
More cool work. Trees are great but I especially love your rock surface.
Quote from: FrankB on December 13, 2008, 07:03:05 PM
Most excellent! Nothing at all to improve, I'd say, very nice. I'd like to point out how I like the surface on the right foreground, brilliant.
I'm wondering if it would have been possible to reduce the rendertime by some 50%, though. I think a few settings might have been exagerated for the benefits they bring (such as GI 10)?
cheers,
Frank
Frank, the GI of 10 was a misprint on my behalf. I've since corrected the original post as that would seriously kill the render times ;D. I had meant to say AA: 10, and GI: 2/2. Alot of the reason it took so long, is I had to render the image in sections with about 12% overlap, meaning at least 24% of the image was rendered twice. This is of course, inefficient.
I think the "12% overlap rule" figured out quite some time ago is a bit out-dated. I remember rendering my last big image only needed about 5% overlap because the GI is more consistens these days.
Maybe you should test this again?
Quote from: Tangled-Universe on December 14, 2008, 12:21:34 PM
I think the "12% overlap rule" figured out quite some time ago is a bit out-dated. I remember rendering my last big image only needed about 5% overlap because the GI is more consistens these days.
Maybe you should test this again?
TU, yes, I 've also noticed its likely improved. Since the image is illuminated mostly by GI, the inconsistency effect "could" be amplified. I did notice some inconsistencies on another image I created a month or so ago, so I took the "better safe than sorry route" on this one. :)
Beautiful image, one of your best :)
Richard
Moodflow, Outstanding work! :o Definately one of the best TG2 images I've seen. The lighting is superb as is the rock textures/colours. The trees are really nice. I know OnyxTree isn't as customisable as Xfrog, but if you are prepared to do a bit of fiddling both in making the tree and in TG2 after importing I think it gives just as good results. Is the mist atmosphere or cloud?
Miles
Quote from: mr-miley on December 15, 2008, 04:04:56 AM
Is the mist atmosphere or cloud?
Miles
The mist is actually atmosphere and is another reason I like that GI method - it will light up the atmosphere and can create nice results.
Truely amazing image... the realism just keeps getting better. Awesome job! 8)
Quote from: dandelO on December 13, 2008, 04:54:13 PM
This GI technique, it involves making the background-sphere object luminous and using ambient occlusion lighting, is this right?
Are there any discussions on how to implement this technique, with atmo and lighting?
Bill, just go inside the background node and replace the background shader(constant shader) with a default shader.
Then use increments of 0.1(or that's how I do it) to add some luminosity to the background sphere. Full luminance value 1 is very bright indeed and can overpower the atmosphere too much. 0.25 is a decent level to go for. You can also use coloured luminosity for nice effects but keep the main shader colour black, otherwise you could find discrepencies in the way the sky is drawn(like big lines or geometric shapes running through it etc).
Thank you ! ;D
Cheers to you and yours BTW.
- Bill .
Moodflow's the man to thank, Bill. :)
I've only ever placed clouds or stars as the luminosity function of a shader in the BG node before, see my 'Even's Walk' image( http://forums.planetside.co.uk/index.php?topic=3636.msg38042#msg38042 ) for a luminous background-cloud shot and, in general, any render I've done with stars has used this method, too.
I never thought to leave the function blank to just use it solely for its light though. Top class, Moodflow!
OK - my bad! >:( Props to moodflow. ::)
Been playing with this all day, definitely punches things up!
Moodflow I really like the textures of your rock structure in so many of your images and this latest one has great lighting and mist duplication. Would it be possible for you to get into your texturing shader work, or have you already gotten into this elsewhere?
Quick question - I'm working on a scene right now and I plugged in a default shader with default color at 0 and luminance at anywhere between .1 and 100, and all I get is a purely black terrain with minimal light in the atmosphere. I've disabled the sunlight completely, by the way. GI is also on. Any suggestions?
Don't disable the sunlight, OB. The background object won't illuminate your terrain from simple luminosity alone, I don't think. I think it enhances the haze because it must shine through it, not onto it.
I may be wrong.
All right, gotcha :). I was under the impression that you guys were using *all* background shader luminosity, instead of just as a supplement.
o_b and dandelO - My last image of the snow used only illumination from the background object.
Really? What did you have the luminosity set to?
I'm wrong. I have the Sun lighting set to .1.
I have the Environment Variables like this -
Surfaces Strength - 10
Surfaces Color - 5
Atmosphere Strength - 10
Atmosphere - Color - 5
The Luminosity in the Default Shader for the Background Shader is .25 and all the rest (Diffuse and Translucency) is 0.
Hey guys,
I've always had an image map or a power fracter plugged into the default shader's luminosity input. If its just black, it won't light up the scene...it needs color. The values I've used range from 2 to 10 depending upon how much light is needed in the scene, and usually indirectly proportional to how much sunlight there is. For example, if I want a super hazy scene, the I set the luminosity pretty high (4 to 8 or so) and the sun's strength low.
But here is the kicker: I am not using the default sun. I am using a light sphere thats pushed back out into space but still within the background object and scaled appropriately. The brightness needs to be bumped up bigtime, usually to 2,000,000,000 or even more.
The reason for using a light sphere is, there may be a bug with the default sun. At random times, it just does not want to shine through the background object. You can see it, but it doesn't illuminate the ground. Its inconsistent and weird, so I disabled it, and ended up using the light sphere which has given me no problems.
Good to know. Thank you, Moodflow. I'll change my snow scene accordingly.
Cool. Thanks for the extra tips :).
No problem! :)
I really want to put together some formal tutorials on some of these techniques, but still deciding on how to do this. I've recently seen youtube and vimeo video tutorials (of other subjects) with recorded screen grabs and audio commentary which I found really helpful. I think this would be ideal for some TG2 tutorials, not to mention I hate typing!
Yeah, I think that video tutorials can be very helpful indeed.
Hope you find time to do this - your rocks are particularly interesting.
Mick
Awesome!! ;D
(waiting for the tutorials... ::) )
Just a small thank you here to Moodflow for his initial tip to use the background object. It has really helped to get a realistic atmo in my Irish scene!