Time spent on illustrations

[Jonathan Sanchez]

Why would you need to redo the post work later on? Isn't it pretty common practice to do everything on layers and work nondestructively so if there's a minor update you can just replace the background layer with the updated rendering.

 

-Brodie

 

If the original render is set a particular resolution, them the post work would also be done at that resolution including all added people, vegetation, backgrounds, color corrections ect ect. Changing the resolutions of the raw image would require updating all these post-elements. Unless you do what Dave mentions above... which is a good idea, but if you have a render farm, I recommend just rendering high from the beginning and avoiding the trouble.

Edited August 22, 2011 by sancheuz

[Brodie Geers]

It certainly depends on workflow but if I were rendering small images with the thought that perhaps I'd need to render a large one later, it seems an easy thing to go ahead and work on a high res .psd created from a low res render. One could even potentially work on a low res .psd if you used smart objects wisely for your trees and people. My point was simply that having to redo the postwork is a poor reason because it's not necessary.

 

-Brodie

[Jon Berntsen]

That's what I thought, render small resolution for draft views but always work with a full res .psd?

 

For example render 2000x1500 then increase image size in PS to like 6000x4500 and do all the post work on top of that blown up render. Just shrink a copy-merged version for sending back to them at the original render size. This way when you come to render the full res version you can just drop it underneath all your post work that you've done previously?

 

This was actually a great idea if it's uncertain at the point of rendering if any higher resolution would be asked for later. And especially if you don't have access to a render farm.

 

However, what comes to my mind is that you have to be pretty careful, because we all know what happens to a photoshop view when zooming out. It only shows the real antialiasing within a certain percent zooms, else it's making unstraightened and sharp non-antialiased edges. Adjusting your final magic in these conditions would make it hard to turn it into a masterpiece, that is my first thought. I haven't tried it, though. But this discussion is absolutely relevant to the time spent on illustrations, so I'm reading with interest.

[Dave Buckley]

That's nothing to do with the aa, simply the zoom levels of photoshop not quite falling exactly on the pixel.

[Dave Buckley]

When do you ever submit a psd to your client anyway? The jpegs never show those jagged edges you see in ps

[Jon Berntsen]

Dave, just to know that we're on the same page. I'm talking about if you do what you said earlier with scaling up the draft.

 

Then you'd need to zoom out to work with the scale that you are saving out with. - As working in 100% (after scaled up) will leave you with a pixeled image. I don't know with you, but I like to see what I get. If I'm working with a scaled up and zoomed out image, which photoshop shows with jagged edges, I won't get the same image saved out as I've been working on in photoshop. Or do you have a workaround?

 

And yes, it's about antialiasing. Or should I say Photoshop's missing antialiasing when zooming out, isn't it?

 

Edit: No you would never send a psd to your client. The challenge is to take artistic decisions based upon an image that is shown with jagged edges, and without when saving out. When doing compositions, working with architecture lines and weighting the image, seeing the image correctly while working on it is cruicial IMO. But to be relevant to the thread, I find this workflow rather interesting to save render times, if you have a workaround to this issue.

Edited August 22, 2011 by chroma

[Justin Hunt]

Rescaling works to a certain degree, if you scale too much then the image becomes blurred. This isn't a problem when up-scaling for a bill board, but is a problem for a large poster where people will be relitivly close when viewing it.

 

The other problem with rendering too small is often there just are not enough pixels to get decent detail, especially for fine, thin details. Just as it is a problem when rendering too large and using low res textures.

 

I agree that most of the time it isn't nessesary to render larger than 3500px.

 

jhv