First Exterior - floundering...

[SandmanNinja]

Hello,

 

This is my first exterior and I feel like I'm floundering.

There's only one way for me to get this figured out, and that's to start applying what I've studied in tutorials and make scenes and get feedback from the community. I thank you in advance, and beg your patience while I'm learning.

 

I'm using Max 2008, Mental Ray, A&D Materials with Ambient Occlusion used when possible, Daylight System set to my latitude and longitude and 1pm in the afternoon (I'm in Australia, so the sun won't be exactly overhead - I'm near the south pole). GI and Final Gather (for the Daylight system and the skylight/lighting HDRI).

This particular render was done with the preset of MEDIUM, but added a few tweaks:

Initial Final Gather Density: 3

Rays Per Point: 1000

Interpolate Over Num Final Gather Points: 100

Multibounce: 1 (to help get some light under the overhang near the camera)

Anti-alias and Oversampling: min: 4 max: 16

Photons: Max Sample Radius: 100mm, Photons per Sample: 1000

(I tweaked the settings so the render would look nice for your review)

 

I saw a scene on t.v. today and it really caught my eye and I wanted to try to capture it.

Two buildings, camera is underneath one looking at the other through some columns.

I used the Stone A&D material to start with for the columns, but it was too dark.

So I used a white matte colour with some noise (30%, size: 2, fractal). Just trying for a concrete look.

 

The building that the camera is looking at has 4 materials applied via multi/sub-object:

smooth concrete, black/rubber (for the spacing between the concrete sections), glass for the door, and chrome near the door. I stuck a 1.82m biped near the door to help with scale.

 

HDRI for the environment and a copy for the lighting, instanced to a skylight.

 

I wanted to use the awesome concrete texture that was so kindly shared with us, but it was tiling. So, I went with a white matte material with some small noise (similar to the columns).

 

I added a slight chamfer to the edges of the columns, to give them a Greek appearance instead of them being a solid piece of geometry.

 

When I'm through, I plan on having rain coming down via particles, interacting with the building and ground.

 

Any ideas on how to make this look like a proper scene?

 

I'm thinking a large water fountain in the middle (with particle water shooting up or pouring out?).

I want to break the ground plane up, but not sure how. I tried a number of things and it just looked like sand (which is good to know for future projects).

 

I know I need to fix my textures, but not sure what to use. I wanted to avoid a mostly glass exterior on the building in the back.

 

PS: It looked 'better' in 3DS and I had to save it as a HDR, adjust the gamma and brightness and save it out as an 8-bit JPG. (I'm mentally wrestling with Gamma currently)

 

Thanking you...

[SandmanNinja]

sigh - I know it's a horrible render.

 

I'm thinking maybe a big tree with some benches in the centre.

 

Maybe I'll withdraw this until I do more private practising.

[Horhe]

Well at the moment its a mass rendering and a WIP so its hard to comment on anything. Start designing and building the facades and placing the textures and then youll see the image come to life. Also the comments will flow then.

[Tommy L]

I agree with Jakub. The lighting looks fine and the there isnt any noise and the AA looks good too, so until theres more detail its hard to comment on anything.

 

I got some really good advice at architecture school. I was grinding to a halt on a design and my tutor said "just keep your pencil moving". I think this is applicable in 3d as well.

[SandmanNinja]

Thanks guys. And that's some good advice, Tommy. "Keep the pencil moving."

 

Will work on this some more as time permits and will post more WIPs then.

 

Thanking you...

[Justin Hunt]

The scene has alot of potential, however some of your settings dont make sence

 

If you are using Photons then let them do the hard work. In other words crank the photon settings up rather than the FG.

 

When using Photons then FG bounces can be set to 0 as any additional bounces are disregarded. Also 1000FG samples is way too much, try 200. For more detail increase the density between 0.5 to 1 is more than enough.

 

Photons can be 100000+ for the sun. Play with the sampling radius , too small then you need too many photons and too large and samples could wrap around corners etc. try 1 meter. The FG will clean up the Photons

 

 

Hope this helps a little

 

jhv

[SandmanNinja]

Thanks Justin!

 

I've updated my Mental Ray cheat-sheet - appreciate the info.

Trying to collate my textures into a single location so it'll be easier to find them.

 

Question about anti-aliasing min/max values.

For a high-quality setting, min:4 and max:16 is what I've written in my notes.

Would increasing that range improve the anti-alias quality (at the expense of render time)?

So - min:4 max: 64

What if we went the other way?

min: 1/4 max: 16 or 64

 

Thanking you...

[Justin Hunt]

90% of the time I use min1 Max 16, if there is alot of fine detail, moire patterns or detail "melting into each other then I do 4, 16. For testing I start at 1/4 , 4.

 

If I ahve time in animations then it 4 ,16 (more if needed)

 

You can also drop the spatual contrast so that the max samples start sooner.

 

jhv

[kris McIsaac]

Arroway.de have some good concrete materials you can "borrow" they are smaller versions of the ones they sell but they can look OK.

 

I know you are using the correct sun angle but I dont know if it is helping much. You will not get much highlight on any bump in your materials.

 

Have you tried using only FG? I use this for most exteriors, if you need more light into shaded areas you can up the bounces and finish off in photoshop with levels and brightness.

 

What was the render time on this. Your FG must have been slow.

 

I usually only use FG medium preset and 4/16.

[Tommy Burns]

 

I usually only use FG medium preset and 4/16.

 

I normally use FG Draft preset and 1/16. This will speed up your renderings alot allowing you to have more test renders and adjust

[SandmanNinja]

Thanks again guys - this contribution is improving my knowledge.

 

Justin - thanks for your settings.

Not 100% sure what you mean by the spatial contrast tho.

 

 

Kris - (g'day!) Thanks for the link - I'll check them out.

Yeah, I played with the time and watched the sun cycle around the scene.

When it's shining directly onto the face it's very hard to see.

I'll probably do a few different times-of-day renders, maybe even a time lapse (once I get my new computer).

The final gather WAS slow - but I have a real crappy computer now. Pentium D (duo core 2.8 GHz) and took about 25 minutes.

BUT - that was after I cranked up the settings.

Thanks also for your settings.

 

Tommy - thanks also for your settings.

 

 

Okay - still a little confused.

I normally use DRAFT to test things, then move up to MEDIUM when it starts looking good, then when I'm happy with it, I tweak MEDIUM to the settings I listed above.

For FINAL renders (like, for posting WIPs), I tweak MEDIUM to have:

Final Gather Density: 3

I know noise can be introduced, but that's why I turn up the Interpolation

 

Rays per Point: 1000

(one tutorial I did talked about having a value of 12,000!)

 

Interpolation: 100

(1=very blotchy, 30=pretty good, 200=very smooth - so I use 100)

 

[by the way, if these settings are just silly or don't make sense, please let me know]

 

 

BUT what's confusing me is the anti-aliasing.

If I wanted some settings to use for "FINAL" rendering, where the render time is high but the quality is high, what would be good numbers?

The 1/16?

 

I don't understand the MINIMUM setting.

 

When I did some V-Ray tutorials (way back when), the way I understood it was that it did super-sampling based on the min and max values.

So, if you wanted nice contact shadows, use a wide range (a negative? number for min and a higher multiple-of-power-of-two number as max).

This was early in my study of light, and I've since dedicated myself to mental ray for the time being, so I might be mis-remembering it. So, if you want good contact shadows (and other anti-aliasing benefits), have a big range.

 

Can someone shed some light on the MIN and MAX please?

 

Thanks again everyone - I really appreciate the comments and info.

[SandmanNinja]

Found a concrete texture for the columns and a cobblestone texture for the plane.

Made them tilable in photoshop, and then made the BMP maps for them.

Changed the time of day to earlier in the morning, to get the light to show off the new materials.

 

I'll bust up the plane and add a footpath under the overhang (where the camera is) next.

 

Working 2 jobs makes it hard to squeeze time in for 3D practise, but slowly-but-surely I'm inching towards that goal.

 

More later...

 

Cheers

[SandmanNinja]

Changed the textures once again.

 

I've never really explored a lot of texturing options, as I focused mainly on modeling. Will continue to play with the textures and not post anything else for a bit. Will add more geometry (a central feature in the middle of the open area) and will post a new render in a few days.

 

Thanks again everyone.

[Justin Hunt]

The AA sampling does not affect the contact shadows , AO or Ambient Occlusion does. IF you are not using AO then its the density and FG samples that define the contact shadow quality.

 

I'd say 12000 FG samples would be useful if there is alot of really fine detail that you want to bring out. Or for really detailed closeup shots, Macro shots so to say. A range of 150 to 300 is plenty for your average scene.

 

Interpolation does smooth out the fg solution, go too high and it becomes too smooth and detail is lost. Too low then the blochies show up. between 50 and 100 is fine

 

Spatural contrast is in the AA sampling tab, it that row of RGB and A values, basically this determinds the threashhold of contrast that controls whether a pixel is sampled by the min or max value. Most of the time you will leave these as is, but can be useful in a low contrast rendering to drop the values slightly to force the max samples to begin sooner.

 

I hope I havn't confused you even more.

 

jhv

[SandmanNinja]

Thanks for the explanation, Justin.

 

Last night, at about 130am, it suddenly hit me and I 'got' the Min/Max settings.

 

Added a central art feature and some more textures.

Thinking of adding a bike rack with some bikes out in front of the rear building.

Not sure what else to add - will review some real life photos and "keep my pen moving".

 

Thanks guys

[kris McIsaac]

Looking a lot better.

 

Try the test renders without the background image. I think it is a bit dull and doesn't fit too well. The textures are getting there. It looks like you have a low sun angle, late afternoon or something. Try increasing the softness of the shadows to 1.5. Dont forget to increase the shadow samples at the same time to smooth it out (not needed for tests). Can you get the shadows from the columns to project under the overhanging building. I know you were using the correct location for the sun setup but you can just change the north direction. Are you using any A/O? the columns would look a bit more attached with some contact shadows. Just my thoughts anyway.

 

Regards,

Kris

[SandmanNinja]

Hey Kris - g'day!

 

Thanks for the feedback - every little bit helps a bloke out.

 

Yeah, I agree about the background image - too dull.. hmm... something.

I'll lose it in the next render.

 

Good tip about the shadow samples...

 

I've got AO on all of my A&D materials, but can't on my bitmap textures?...

 

I'll have a play at spinning the compass rose around some, too.

 

Thanks again

[shaneis]

Are you using a linear work flow?

[SandmanNinja]

Hi Shane,

 

Well, hmmm... this particular scene is just as it comes to me. I've yet to do an external and am getting the hang of textures and external lighting.

 

I actually have a check-list of 'Things To Do' for interiors (which does get refined), but am just doing this as i have time.

 

As a general rule of thumb, I like to do:

1) lay out scene - basic primitives as place holders for complex objects

2) a very BASIC lighting solution (usually scanline engine, sky light, light tracer)

3) start modeling

4) apply textures and switch to mental ray

5) put in real lighting solution

 

This particular scene struck me as I was flipping channels and I saw the camera looking between some columns at a building in the background. I was in a funk, uninspired, and it just caught my eye.

 

I think I'll add some street lamps, some benches, and then the particles for the rain. The rain will interact with the solid objects, striking them, making puddles, etc. I recently got Deconstructing the Elements and I've been itching to try some things out. Plus the new computer will be here (hopefully) this weekend and I can speed up my modeling/test renders.

 

Can you perhaps share your concept of a linear workflow with me?

 

Oh, and I do my post in Photoshop CS2 - mainly adjusting gamma, contrast. I treat the renders as if they were photos and touch 'em up. I've long since given up on getting 100% work done in 3DS.

[shaneis]

In your "rule of thumb", it's just steps 4 & 5 where LWF would come in, but it will make those steps a whole lot easier and your photoshop post work much more satisfying.

 

Hmm, how to put it into a few words...

 

If you use a linear work flow, you will find it MUCH easier to get a photorealistic result because you have retained all the tonal information in a uniform state - without loss... think 8-bit (0-255) colour compared to 32-bit (floating point)... or limited range to "unlimited" range. The boffins will probably punish my poor description. Oh well

 

I use Maya myself so I wouldn't be able to give specific advice but here's a link to a good thread on LWF in MAX.

 

http://www.cgarchitect.com/vb/29344-lwf-benchmark.html

 

To see it in action, I've attached a zip with a 32-bit image and an 8-bit version of the same image. Open them in photoshop and play with the exposure controls (Image>Adjustments>Exposure). You'll see that the exr can be pushed much further than the jpg.

 

Also look at (View>32-bit Preview Options...) and when you change the image mode to 8-bit (Image>Mode>8 Bits/Channel) you have more to play with . Endless fun!

[SandmanNinja]

Hey Bri - so, when are you releasing that tutorial on Gamma correction? hehe

Back in Max 9, I'd never messed with 32-bit files and the lighting looked great - in max and in a jpg viewer. When I switched to Max 2008, things got more complicated - not sure why.

 

Shane - thanks for the .zip file. I'll have a play when I get back to the house.

Since doing Bri's tutorials, I've set my frame buffer to 32-bit and save everything I render as a .HDR and take it into PS CS2 and do what you suggested - Image -> Adjust -> Exposure and play with the gamma. I then convert it to 8-bit and save the image out as a JPG. What I think is interesting is that PS will ask if I want to (further) adjust the gamma when I save the 8-bit JPG out. I always ignore it because I've gotten it looking how I want by doing the Image -> Adjust -> Exposure method.

 

I just rendered out a sequence of BMP files for an animation, and I'll make an Action Script to adjust the Gamma on the first image and then apply the Action Script to the entire folder that holds the BMP files - adjusting their gamma in one fell swoop.

 

This has been a very informative thread, and I appreciate the experienced guys helping me out. The weekend is coming up, and I'll have time to knock this out.

[Justin Hunt]

Personlly I dont like how photoshop handles 32bit images, the gamma adjustments just dont look right to me. Also not all the filters / adjustment layers work with 32bit images.

 

I have fun 16bit has just the right level of information to work with.

 

my 2 cents/ pennies worth.

 

Looking forward to a well explained video on Gamma liner workflow. I agree with you Brian on the level of mis information on the subject. Some make it far too complicated than it needs to be.

 

jhv

[shaneis]

Brian, thankyou for replacing my mumblings with eloquence

 

Justin, have you tried Picturenaut...

 

http://www.hdrlabs.com/picturenaut/index.html

 

It comes from a photography background and it feels more accurate than Photoshop. There's also Photomatix which is not free, but still cheap and is like a grown-up version of Picturenaut. Both these apps are geared towards HDR photographers so the control seems to lend itself to photographic results more than photoshops "and it does 32-bit as well" approach. One thing I've never understood about Photoshop is that it only gives you reasonable control when you're converting to a lower bit depth.

 

You can also plug the HDRshop plugins into Picturenaut, so building your own HDR spheres from 3D scenes is a snap.

 

Regards,

 

S.

[SandmanNinja]

Shane - I have PhotoMatrix Pro (use it to "average" exposure-stepped image sequences). Can that be used to edit/adjust HDR's? I currently only use it to average, but am exploring making HDRs from my pan camera and feeding them into EasyPano for spherical HDRs.

[shaneis]

Definitely, check here - http://www.hdrsoft.com/resources/features_list.html to see all that you can do INSIDE photomatix.