solefishes Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 hi!!! ok here is a question i have that just can't seem to be answered in a straight forward fashion..... how do you make foliage look really realistic? i need it to enhance a couple of my scenes...3d foliage would be best cos then i can import it into max and position it exactly where it needs to be. if not, then please could anyone, as in ANYONE..... please help me to put foliage into my scenes.... thanks so much!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain Denby Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 Take real pictures of real foliage. Cut out in Photoshop and composit in image. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 try some RPC Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
solefishes Posted January 31, 2005 Author Share Posted January 31, 2005 the problem with compositing foliage into a scene is that it still looks flat and then the lighting doesnt fit 100%..... maybe i'm just doing it all wrong.... if you could refer a website/tutorial to me that i could take a look at with regards to compositing, i'd appreciate it greatly....!!! thanks for your response.... kind regards solefishes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jonny English Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 The most realistic foliage I've seen is from Nat FX by Bionatics. It is 3D geometry you place in your scene and render with the model. I guess the render time jumps up, but the for the results I've seen I think it's worth it. I know they have recently restructured their pricing, so maybe it's more affordable now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
solefishes Posted January 31, 2005 Author Share Posted January 31, 2005 thanks Jonny English for the reply... u wouldn't prehaps have a website address for me? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STRAT Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 http://www.bionatics.com/home/index.php3?QuelleLangue=en wonderfull what 5 seconds in a search engine does Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ernest Burden III Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 the problem with compositing foliage into a scene is that it still looks flat and then the lighting doesnt fit 100%..... That depends on the photos, then, doesn't it? Take your foliage pictures in different lighting conditions to build up a library of varied material. It's a lot easier overall then painting them into every rendering. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbr Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 We are using XFrog with XTune and getting some good results. http://www.xfrog.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazy Homeless Guy Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 alternately, along the lines of ernests suggestion, you can place your flat trees, the create a selection of them and use burn and dodge tools to darken in certain areas for shading, and lighten in certain areas for sun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Mottle Posted January 31, 2005 Share Posted January 31, 2005 I swear by Onyx trees Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nisus Posted February 2, 2005 Share Posted February 2, 2005 Hi MBR, Can you post some samples done with Xfrog pls? tnx nisus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
solefishes Posted February 3, 2005 Author Share Posted February 3, 2005 wow!!!! i never thought i'd get such an awesome response.....thanks so much to everyone!!!!!!!!!!! at the moment i'm trying NatFx and then i wanna check out Onyx....i downloaded the free demo today and so i'm gonna try it out later... if anyone has any tips and techniques that either involve Natfx or infact any other plugin/download, i would love to hear from you!!! thanks again everyone!!!!!!! kind regards, solefishes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nisus Posted February 3, 2005 Share Posted February 3, 2005 I'll be gald to hear your experiences with NatFX. Mine in max6 were NOT great, but since MR is 3.3 instead of 3.2 in max7, those probs should be solved I'll have a shot at it in a fortweek or so... rgds nisus Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bugga_Guy Posted February 4, 2005 Share Posted February 4, 2005 Too bad Onyx doesn't have a demo... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MegaPixel Posted February 4, 2005 Share Posted February 4, 2005 I made a post similar to this a year back or so and this is a list that I have compiled of some of the best 2D or 3D Foliage options available out there for use with MAX/VIZ or Photoshop (For a price that is...): XfrogPlants by Greenworks http://www.xfrogdownloads.com/greenwebNew/products/plantlibStart.htm EASYnat by Bionatics http://www.bionatics.com/Site/product/index.php3?UrlSuite=%2FSite%2Fproduct%2Fnursery%2Fcategory.php3%3FCategory%3D12%26Community%3D2%26ProductLineId%3D3&Res=1&Height=1024 RPC by Archvision http://www.archvision.com/Gallery.cfm?Content=Trees&referrer=GoogleTrees Trees & Conifers by Dosch Design http://www.doschdesign.com/e_start/index.php Virtual Trees & Foliage by Marlin Studios http://www.marlinstudios.com/products/vtf/vtf.htm SpeedTree by Digimation http://www.digimation.com/software/asp/product.asp?product_id=388&category_id=1 OnyxTree Professional by CadPro Systems http://www.cadpro.co.nz/html/visualisation_onyx_ov.htm#TreeClassicProfessional Trees by Got3D http://www.got3d.com/non-members/products/00tree/index.html Plants Entourage by RealWorldImagery http://www.realworldimagery.com/products.html Forest Pack Pro by ItoSoft http://www.itoosoft.com/english/frameset.html Some of these links might be dead now but hopefully this will create a kind of "one-stop" reference on the subject. Feel free to add on any new links below. -MegaPixel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chad Warner Posted February 4, 2005 Share Posted February 4, 2005 Nisus- I just started using xfrog myself...so far I like it. As soon as I get something presentable, I will post some images. -Chad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eric Posted February 4, 2005 Share Posted February 4, 2005 the problem with compositing foliage into a scene is that it still looks flat and then the lighting doesnt fit 100%..... I have to agree with Ernest's reply to this one - it all depends on the photo. If your photographs look flat, and the lighting doens't match, then you need to do 2 different things. Take better photos, then learn to composite them and adjust their colors in photoshop to make them fit your scene. Don't take your photos in the middle of the day. Take them when the sun is low in the sky - early morning or late evening. This will help you to get more roundness in your subject. Use the absolute highest settings your digital camera will allow - RAW is even better because it will allow you to save your original image, and you can tweak the colors of the subject before you even drop it into your rendering. There should be no reason why 3D images would look more realistic than photographs - even the best of the 3D plants still look computer generated (at least in my opinion). I have basically quit doing landscaping in 3D, unless I'm doing an animation. Almost every bit of my landscaping is done in photoshop using digital photos of stuff taken right around my office, or no more than a few minutes drive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
solefishes Posted February 7, 2005 Author Share Posted February 7, 2005 ....ok, so here's the situation....i eventually managed to download the free demo of RPC and get it working.....it doesn't look that bad - pretty good really. so what i want to know from anyone who reads this is the following: is there any website that offers free RPC images? i've got the free tree they provide with the download but quite frankly, i can't afford any of the other ones.....student loans are intense!!! well, thanks alot! many thanks solefishes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loydering Posted December 2, 2005 Share Posted December 2, 2005 We've tried just about everything so far. RPC has pretty good looks for still shots, but in animation the trees look like they are "rolling" as the camera passes by them. I've also had a hard time with their pre-lit look that can keep them from blending into the scene. They do have several collections that look good (at a certain distance). By rotating the RPC object slightly, you can get a somewhat different looking tree. Forest Pro works great for trees in the distance. It also has some limitations in animations but you can't beat the poly count. I highly recommend using your own maps though. The ones that come with it are okay. I never really explored the full potential of Xfrog. I ended up just using the .max files for most of the scenes. As mentioned in previous posts, the render times were really high. We did employ Xtune for some of them and it did help. We recently picked up OnyxTREE. I'm still pushing it and working out the kinks. It is nice that you have the ablility to "easily" create your own trees. The external creation programs can be a bit combersome at times, but I really like how you can add foliage right into MAX using TreeStorm. It even has its own version of Xtune built in to modify the poly count per plant. Pretty slick. I hope that it the next version they work out the user interface to be more user friendy for us non botanist types who work visually instead of from latin names. Ultimately, combining a couple of these in a scene works best. Have the wonderfuly, high poly count trees up front and use the low poly trees in the distance. There's my two cents. Hopefully there are a couple nuggets in there for you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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