restaurant/bar interior

[Ernest Burden III]

I am rendering a bar area of a restaurant, the final to be digital with colored pencil over a print to soften it up (you know, digital is "too cold"). So far my client just wants to keep to the architecture since the place does not yet have designed graphics, plates, waiter uniforms, etc. Fine wih me, less to worry about getting right.

 

These are a few view studies of a prelim. rendering in Lightscape. I did some Photoshop work on them and I am very pleased with the result, so I will share with the group.

 

Colors and materials are aprox. only, and I have not yet been given a complete lighting plan so the final will be different, and the actual bar and stools aren't designed yet. I wish they would hurry up, I'm supposed to be done with this this week!

 

 

 

 

 

[Tony]

I like it alot. The style is very well done and the client should be very happy if this is what they are looking for. My only comment would be to lessen the grain just a little. Overall, nice images!

 

It is a nice change from the typical render.

[CHE]

Ernest,

 

I really liked the result that you achieved in Photoshop. Pretty impressive work as always. btw I like grain as it is. I'm looking forward to see the final version and to learn from your technique. Two thumbs up!

[kid]

these look great, very impressive.

 

Did you freehand over some wireframe sketches and layer them over the top of the renders?

[bigcahunak]

Ernest, looks great, as always.

Some modeling problems with the beams above the ceiling penetrating below the ceiling, which I'm sure will be fixed later on.

 

Kid, I believe its a bunch of PS filters applied to cloned layers of the rendered image, with different blending mode and opacity changes. Am I right Ernest?

I sometime do it to my images also, but I must say that Ernest "owns" the style and took it a step further.

 

Well done.

Looking to see the final result.

[Ernest Burden III]

Thank you all for the comments. As I mentioned, these are view studies, the look of the final will be somewhat different. I was just looking for a way to soften and abstract the view because my client is afraid of digital renderings.

 

The grain is just for this stage, though it is a big part of what made these pictures look so good (IMO, of course). Everything you see was done with Photoshop over Lightscape images, no tablet drawing, just filtering and layer modes.

 

The lighting beams running into the ceiling is not a modeling problem, it is DESIGN, flush metal strips placed to LOOK like a modeling error.

 

If I can find the time, I could post the action I recorded to do the lines from the base render, maybe put the whole thing together as a mini-tutorial. But first a few nasty deadlines!

[Pavel Roder]

I am wondering how does your ps layers look like - would you mind to post screenshot of them + a bit of explanation ???

 

thnx

[Ernest Burden III]

OK, Ill work up a full explanation as soon as I can. But in brief, the pictures are made from three renders, though it could be done with less.

 

The first two are flat-shaded images with light from two different directions, no shadows, from which the line drawing is generated.

 

The line drawing is then layered over the base rendering (a regular Lightscape raytrace) with the mode set to Overlay at 50% (vary to taste). The raytrace image is filtered with the PS FilmGrain filter.

 

The base image is not great, with no textures yet and low-mesh artifacts. I played around with various filters to abstract it a bit, and to my surprise found that the grain did the trick. I am surprised I even tried it.

[nisus]

Hi Ernest,

 

Some very nice results you got there! Personally, I'd soften the grain a bit by using a median. Colors, lighting and textures work very well together...

 

I wonder how you made those squizzle lines that look like a pencil, especially since some edges have an extended look/feeling (2nd image)... I guess I'm just like everyone at the moment, i.e. very curious to see your tutorial on this!

 

Can you post the original version too, so we can see how far your brought it?

 

rgds

 

nisus

[Ernest Burden III]

Personally, I'd soften the grain a bit by using a median.

NO, NO, NO! I LIKE the grain!

 

I wonder how you made those squizzle lines that look like a pencil, especially since some edges have an extended look...Can you post the original version too, so we can see how far your brought it?

The squiggly look is done with an EyeCandy filter called Jiggle, though you can get similar results from the Photoshop 'Ocean Ripples' filter. I have to make that swap in the lines action I recorded before I post it so it will work in a PS-only system. The line extensions are PS motion blurs, also done better by an EyeCany version, but I used the PS one for this.

 

The line version was generated from a seperate flat-shaded render. By itself it looks very messy, but when layered as Overlay it works wonderfully.

 

 

 

I also was experimenting with using Lightscape to produce a depthmap so I could apply PS effect based on distance (like blur or desaturate or median)--but that's another topic.

 

 

thanks again for the responses!

[bigcahunak]

Ernest, its more or less as I thought it is, but I still couldn't really follow...

Waiting for the tutorial.

[Paul Griger]

Nothing to really say here Ernest except that I like what you have here so far

[nisus]

Hi Ernest,

 

What a wonderful bunch of techniques you used!

I've been searching for good squizzle lines for ages. While I got stuck with the highpass, autolevels and crystallize, your combination of ocean ripple and motionblur is just an amazing combination. I'll try it somewhere tonight.

 

Thanks for sharing these seperate files. I think many members will like the given insight

 

Maybe I'm asking too much, but could you try those actions on the npr/ps-unchallenge I posted a month ago? I would really like to see what the result of your actions is

 

Still wondering how you produced the z-depth image. Does anyone knows how to make it (in max3.1?)

 

rgds,

 

nisus

[Christian Miranda]

Hi Ernest,

 

Great artistic technique! Your final result is by far richer/softer than the Lightscape render.

 

Regarding the camera angles I thind the first image (on the top) has more depth and features more detail. How about extending the framing to the right and showing the full blue couch and some more of the restaurant?

 

Keep us posted!

[mzagorski]

Very nice image Ernest!... I spotted a few of your books in my university's library You certainly get about... LOL

 

Cant wait to see a tutorial etc on this technique... would be very helpful for my university project... similar type of space.. and your style its good for it.

 

[ March 14, 2003, 06:53 AM: Message edited by: mzagorski ]

[Ernest Burden III]

your combination of ocean ripple and motionblur is just an amazing combination.

 

Still wondering how you produced the z-depth image.nisus

Ocean Ripple is the poor step-child of the filter I use, but it will do a reasonable job.

 

I posted an application of this exact procedure to your original topic.

 

I did the depth image by setting all materials to basic white (except glass) and re-setting a solution so no light is cast, then turning on ambient. This will produce a 100% even lighting--you can't see a thing (without edge lines). Then I set fog to be black, playing with the density settings until I had a good white-to-black, testing by raytracing. Raytrace an output image with the same viewfile and there you go. As a bonus you can output to 48bits so that when you do levels or curves in PS you won't band the image, then dumb down to 8bit grayscale. Put it in an alpha channel in a Photoshop file and you can load it as a selection.

 

You can also use curves to set a middlepoint that would not be selected but selected in the foreground as well as back. Picture a camel hump in curves.

 

Now, were I smart, I would simply buy a product like MAX or c4d that can produce a proper depth channel, or do image-based lighting, instead of spending time finding ways to make Lightscape (RIP) do things it isn't designed to.

[3dp]

not much to say except it's a class piece of work

somehow reminds me of late 50's early 60's american cafe society (must the the sepia tinge)

i'm off to have a play to see if i can come up with similar some similar fx

i have been using piranessi for a long time but it's pretty wooden on it's own and i've never really got on with painter

i like to get away from photoreal as often as possible in the deisn stages in order to not let the virtual cat out of the bag

[NEVIANS Cedric Architect]

very "impressionné" ..

 

beautiful render...

 

i use this method too ...

for afraid'client of digital renderings..

 

but not arriving at your level ...

 

good job ..

 

have a good day

 

-----------------------

Nevians Cédric Architect DPLG ( France)

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[Chris_A]

Beautiful images Ernest. The look definitely complements the touch and style of your 'traditional' works.

 

Are the resulting blurs and line wiggles consistent enough in their appearance that the effect could be animated?

 

The grain would probably need to be a pre-computed 'grain' layer affecting the image to avoid shimmering.

 

Thanks for the virtual kick in the creative pants.

[nisus]

I guess an animation at 2frames/sec will look great. Saves a bunch of rendertime and keeps that remarkable traditional look.

 

btw, Ernest: a superb job you did for the building in Arnhem. I am really impressed!

 

rgds

 

nisus

[ingo]

Great images Ernest, and i love it when somebody takes his time to make depth channels the old fashioned way instead of just clicking on the button depth channel. That gives you a better understanding how things work imho.

 

nisus : 2 frames per second, that beats even MTV, that means you show six pictures in 3 seconds At least you dont have to take care much about details, is that your way of making a low-budget-animation ?

[Ernest Burden III]

Are the resulting blurs and line wiggles consistent enough in their appearance that the effect could be animated?

I have been wondering the same thing. I am going to give it a try as soon as I can. But the process involves using a Photoshop layer-mode or two, so I cannot achieve that in Premiere. It looks like it can be done in After Effects, so I need to ask a collegue here in the NYC area who has AE to run a test for me.

 

Alternatively it could be done as a batch in Photoshop, but I would have to learn how to (if its even possible) get PS to load multiple sequenced files--i.e. 'open LSPR0000.tif then open LSF0000 and copy, close, paste' etc., then go on to LSPR0001 and open LSF0001' like that, so it processes the whole set of rendered frames. This scripting exceeds my Photoshop skills. So I am pinning my hopes on After Effects.

 

I also am concerned about the noise shimmering, which is usually what makes 2D-processed NPR renderings not look very good as animations. After Effects has a function to produce animated noise, according to the Adobe website.

 

Thanks for the comments, everybody!

[ingo]

Just wondering, do you want to animate the scene, i.e. pan or zoom the camera, or do you want to animate the effect, means start with a plain white backround and then show the raytrace and fade into the grainy blurred picture ? Or do you want to show like someone draw this picture by hand ?

 

The first two are fairly easy to realize, the last one is something for a personal slave with a lot of time.

 

Still wondering

 

ingo

[nisus]

Hi Ingo and Ernest,

 

I suggest you check out traditional art-animations by hand at local animation festivals. I was not kidding saying that 2 frames a second will give you a nice effect: the change between images will be large enough at a slow enough pace to get wonderful transitions.

Check out movies of Bill Plympton or any claymation animations... www.atomfilms.com is a good reference

 

rgds

 

nisus

[ingo]

Well Mr nisus, since you have done some animation you know that 2 frames per second are completly nonsense. We are doing around 30 frames per sec, but two sec for a picture would be ok, but otherwise a bit slower will give you more room for a better crossfade.