What's the easiest way to create fire for a fireplace?

[danb4026]

I have the fire already in the scene using the fire effect in max, but I am not happy with the results...it's just not up to snuff.

 

Any advice would be really appreciated.

[Ricardo Eloy]

Why not applying a fire map/video to a plane with opacity?

[danb4026]

I already did that and didn't like the way it came out. It was too flat. Maybe I just did a poor job because I am tired or the fire jpg that I chose is a bad choice because it was more of a test than anything else.

 

Below is the WIP with both versions so you could be the judge.

 

The first is with the Max fire effect, the 2nd is the plane with opacity map.

[SandmanNinja]

What if you chuck a Spherical Fire gizmo in there? To give it some 3D-ness?

[danb4026]

The first image, using the max fire, is using a hemispherical gizmo. Is it possible to get a truly realistic fire out of max's fire effect? If so, than it is just my settings and I need to play around more. My problem is that I want to get this image ready for a presentation Monday afternoon and am running out of play time.

[William Alexander]

Fire can be challenging. It's an attention to detial thing. The Jpg has realistic form, but the visual looks flat-the max fire has crap form but the visual looks realistic, for a fire in a forge.

 

There is an opacity issue with fire. At the fringes there is transparency, but that transparency is through 'light emmission' and tansparencies to the licks of flame behind flames there too.

 

Another issue is how the fire fits into the exposure of the rooms image. Fire is a light source and has many effects based on exposure or even the 'exposure' our eyes have. Light intensity relative to over all exposure thang.

 

It also has an effect on the surfaces around it - that grounds the fire into it's environment, i.e it emits light right?

 

The fire gizmo can get you close without going into post work. I'd try a couple fire gizmos that make up the 'sum' of the fire effect.

 

The post work for a still image maynot be to bad either. VFX wise fire is generally screened in but also has a density alpha which can through adjustment create the subtle yet proper transparencies. You might be able to take a RGB image and create an alpha based on color-chroma key to make the fire effect work or even hand paint a mask that works.

 

Fortunately the fire is a smaller component in the scene (though imortant for composition) which may work in your favor getting an accepatable-believable look.

 

LOL If you had Maya the fire from fluid dynamics is sweeeeet and kind of easy.

 

Cheers

[danb4026]

William, I am going to give multiple gizmos a shot and see what it looks like. Fortunately, the fire isn't what the client will focus on, I just want the image to look as good as possible. Thanks for you reply and insight.

[BrianKitts]

There's some great fire textures on cgtextures.com

 

I've taken a couple of them into after effects, layered them up, then warp and play with the opacity to give them some flicker to create a good fire animation.

 

But if you're only going for a still they work well just take them into photoshop and extract out the black to create an alpha for your opacity.

 

http://www.cgtextures.com/texview.php?id=16833&PHPSESSID=5903de7a580d61b1a150a4ad30c7252f

[danb4026]

Brian, I just downloaded some fire jpg's from cgtextures. I am going to work on your scenario as well. Thanks so much.

 

I had actually looked at cgtextures form maps yesterday, but never looked in the "various" section.

[Crazy Homeless Guy]

I would recommend placing a point light in the scene where the fire is, and setting the color to be believable, and then hitting render. No mapped plane or anything like that.

 

Then open in PShop, and composite the image in. Use a normal layer transfer mode, and then duplicate the layer the fire is on, and set it to screen transfer. Now blend the two to make it look like it is actually generating light, and not just a flat plane. You may need to duplicate the screen layer a second time if it still not bright enough.

 

You could try dropping a layer set to multiply between the screen and normal layer for even more control.

 

Also, use the a air brush eraser and the burn tool to refine the flame by blending it more, and giving it more definition.

 

The problem with doing it like this is created if you have reflected surfaces in the scene. I wonder if you can make the results you get max fire gizmo invisible to the camera, but visible to the reflections?

 

This way you will have the fire reflected in areas where it needs to be reflected, but you still have the extreme level of instantaneous control, and direct feedback you get when doing it in post, rather than rendering it.

 

Anyway, I would recommend something along those lines. Kind of a combination of the two options you have tried so far, but with the compositing done after the render.

[danb4026]

Travis....that is going to work great. Using the new masking tools in CS4 the fire can be extracted quite nicely. Tomorrow I am going to re-render the image without the fire and create it in PS. I will post when I am done for critique.

 

Thanks!

[dj_frost_d]

I would suggest Fume FX....it works great with Vray and shouldn't take too long to calculate a solution.

[danb4026]

Well I ran out of time.....so here is how it turned out...Thanks for all of your help!!