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Comments: 6
davidbrinnen

19.04.2024, 03:18

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Description:	This is my nineth project! I only wish I could get them out faster. This time I used Bryce 6 and Daz3D. It was a little more complicated than just using Bryce 5. It took almost 2 days to render. I guess I had too many things in the picture? I don't know, but next piece will be a little easier I hope. I'm still trying to figure out this Bryce 6. It's kind of similar to 5 but not everything. Oh well hope you like this one. Please send in comments. Thankyou
Added by:	tina gazcon
Keywords:	Bryce-6, Daz-3D, Paint
Date:	11.25.2006 10:17
Hits:	3989
Downloads:	106
Rating:	4.00 (1 Vote(s))
File size:	129.7 KB

Previous image: Arctic Camp

Next image: Two Bridges

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rashadcarter1
Admin

Join Date: 06.04.2006
Comments: 2610

What?!!!

Are you kidding me? This image is GORGEOUS! Absolute magic. There are so many things done so well in this image. Your development is really quite freakish in it's rapidity and I suspect some sort of sheer determination to improve behind your growth. Whoa. Wow. Very impressive work once again. Your strong compositional skills give you a huge advance. This image proves that all you need are the models and you are well on your way.

Honestly, I really don't have any criticsms. The scene is very well realized. Color choices are astounding. Model placement is efficient and plausible. Scaling is exact. There is no haze and this choice is exactly approriate as the horizon is filled in so we don't miss the haze. Clever. You've got grass and trees and stones and fountains and bushes and birds and everything fits and functions perfectly. Do not scold yourself for the render time. You did nothing wrong. Really. Even that sky looks good and fits the scene. Good for you on the cloud height. Sometimes quality takes a little time. In this case who cares about the render time, this beautiful outcome will be with us for eternity.

The only issue I see is with the stone walkway, in that there appear to be shadows missing. There are issues with ambient balance also but extremely minor. You are almost ready to explore secondary lighting but I feel it's still too soon to push you away from the ambient channel. You need time to explore it before replacing it. When you want to explore true realism then the secoindaries will need to be employed. Til then, fantasy worlds like this one can be created and adored. Beautiful. Excellent. I know you will keep it going.

11.25.2006 10:50

Horo
Admin

Join Date: 05.26.2004
Comments: 4721

Of course, it's beautiful. Rashad is quite right. Transparent or semitransparent materials and a lot of additional lights are responsible for long render time - not the number of objects. But as Rashad said, lighting is the most important thing. We all love to get patted on the shoulder for a job well done and some patting you certainly earned. It does encourage, stimulate and motivate, but otherwise, it is of no help. So I come up with a critic in order to have that part covered as well: look at the edges of the stones, the bowl and the legs of the bird. Even though you had to wait a long time to finish the render, it looks as if there was no anti-aliasing engaged. And - probably due to a queer trick of light - the water in the bowl looks like quicksilver - not the colour but the surface tension. It appears to come out a bit of the bowl.

11.25.2006 18:24

rashadcarter1
Admin

Join Date: 06.04.2006
Comments: 2610

transparency

Horo is very keen and notes the water and lack of AA. Both are truly excellent points. Always engage AA, at least to regular level. Many textures look completely different after they anti-alias. The render would double in time, from one day to two. Just keep in mind how long eternity is and two days seems like nothing. Quality is worth the wait.

The water brings up that old issue of transparency over reflection. I always encourage people to use transparency first. Don't just assume reflection is all that matters. In most cases transparency is more real as water in real life is always transparent to some degree. The water looks like silver because it basically is. It is a transprency free high reflection material, better known as liquid silver or mercury. I can see the sky reflected at 100% efficiency. Water should be see through at these distances.

11.25.2006 19:35

tina gazcon
Member

Join Date: 08.07.2006
Comments: 254

I see

Thankyou so much for your opinions. I really do appreciate them all. I see what you mean about the water. I tried using one without much reflection , but this is how it came out. I read in the B Solutions manual to turn the AA off. Is that only for terrain and trees? As fas as ambiene I read to turn it off and use blurred reflection. Is this not right? I would prefer to take your advise over the tips in this manual. I see all of your work and know how beautiful it is. If you can explain it a little more to me I would be greatful. Thankyou

11.26.2006 03:18

rashadcarter1
Admin

Join Date: 06.04.2006
Comments: 2610

B-solutions

B-solutions is a very valuable resource. It covers alot and I still go back to it here and there as I get better I find new tools that were meaningless to me before.

You will find that there are varying opinions about how to do very basic things in bryce. Water is a big issue. If you ask me, water needs NO reflection values to be added if the material is designed as a true water. As I said before a thousand times, reflection is automatic when transparent materials have internal refraction. You said you used a water material with only a little bit of reflection. Unfortunately, it only takes a tiny bit of reflection to ruin the transparency. The water above is also missing waves or surface agitation from the moving air. A bit of wavyness might do the trick, even with the added reflection, to make it look more like a"water."

Yes, always use AA unless you deliberately want obvious pixels in the finished scene. This will almost never be the case! The "resolution" of the image will seem much much greater after anti-aliasing.

Ambient. Boy, this is a very big one for me. I'll have you know that ambient expression in artwork was never mentioned around here until I started crying about it all the time. It's an issue not everyone sees as a problem the way I do. I have made my feelings about the ambient channel clear on many occassions. To me it's looks fake and 2dimensional and cannot be relied upon for 3d "realism." That does not mean that it has no use at all. One must find it's proper uses. Trial and error is the best way to go. The ambient channel is a GREAT tool when used PROPERLY.

You are very new to bryce and it would be awful of me to impress my opinions about the ambient channel onto you too much at this early stage. As I said above, you need more time to find the effects that work for you, including ambient. In the scene above, you used ambient and that is fine, at least for now. At some point in the future when you have cut your teeth a bit more, I will begin to suggest you look into more sophisticated lighting set-ups. It's too soon for you to start with secondary lighting, the only true alternative to the ambient channel. Perhaps in a few months.

p.s. the ambient channel has nothing to do with blurred reflections. Blurred reflections are used very rarely, and if used at all, the rays per pixel must be increased to at least 16 before it looks good. Translation: "Blurred reflections" is a premium special effect that requires the computer to calculate the scene in superfine AA where each single pixel is calculated 16 times (or as many as you set). Talk about long renders, this feature really eats up time and the benefit is marginal in my opinion. Hope that clears a few things up a little bit.

11.26.2006 07:15

Horo
Admin

Join Date: 05.26.2004
Comments: 4721

AA-ing

There are (rare) moments when AA spoils an effect on a material. Klaus Busse, who manages BSolutions, has been a very seasoned Bryce user through many versions and he is usually right. There's an option to switch off AA for isolated objects which I also learned from him. But this must be the exception. The moment you have edges in your setup that are not exactly horizontal or vertical, you get those steps (like the bird's legs) and AA would remove just that. Create a cube and render it with and without AA, then slant it over 30? or so and render it again with and without AA. This will take a minute or two of your precious time and you know what we are talking about. Once you render your artwork in a larger format, you can almost personally walk up and down the steps.

In my experience, AA does not always take the same time to finish than the render proper. Sometimes, AA-ing is done in a fraction of the render time (the sky is usually done within a few seconds), sometimes, AA-ing needs more than double the time. ?Border to Desert? was such a case. Rendered in 20 hours, AA-ing took another 115 hours. Don't let yourself be discouraged by long render times. Computers get always faster. In the meantime, rendering a smaller picture size may be the better option than bypassing AA-ing.

11.26.2006 07:23

tina gazcon
Member

Join Date: 08.07.2006
Comments: 254

Thankyou

Thankyou both so very much. I learn more from you than from reading it over and over. I learn pretty quickly with hands on, but computers are not my forte! Again thankyou

11.26.2006 20:44

davidbrinnen
Admin

Join Date: 01.03.2004
Comments: 2224

Looking good and a very complex scene, I believe you could improve the level of realism by relighting the scene. It need not be very involved. My recomendation for a lighting experiment would be to turn to black ambient and sky dome, also set shadow strength to 100%. And then try out different position for the sun - the shadows now will be very black and extreme. When you are happy with the sun angle - disable the sun and tinker with the haze setting with a white haze. Turn it up and down and see how it is affecting the more distant objects and the colour of the sky in the scene. Then replace the sunlight with a point light source, white or pale orange/white, with no drop off and a strength of about 10 - 15. This will give the impression of strong sunlight. Now you might want to either add more orange to the light or change some of the green mats in case they come out too green (I object to over green greens but some don't (do they Horo?)) Anyhow, Tina, the final stage is to add a couple of weaker light, no drop of, 1 or 2 in strength that do not cast shadows, say one behind the camera and off to one side, and one "opposite" the sun. These weak lights could do with being grey and grey tinted with blue - they represent the light coming from else where in the sky other than the sun. That would be my suggestion for an experiment.

11.26.2006 21:26

rashadcarter1
Admin

Join Date: 06.04.2006
Comments: 2610

Now you know.

I was going to hold off on the secondary lighting but David seems to think you are ready to learn about it now. Take his advice. Do the experiment exactly as he proposes and please report back with the results.

11.27.2006 07:08

richter
Member

Join Date: 04.15.2004
Comments: 1092

Light is essential in my work. With the proper ballance of light, shadows and materials you can recreate almost everything from the real life using Bryce. The comments above are Experience speaking for itself. Ambition, passion, will - your images convinced me that you got all those. Examine the surrounding environment, learn from it, watch the light(sun)rays passing through transparent or semi-transparent materials, watch how those rays make even the stones alive, real. Example -- the material you applied to the stones in your pic is very well chosen. Now all you'll have to do is lit the scene as your mind sees it. And if the light affects the stones Great or any other part of the image, it will most probably affect as well the whole environment as it should in real life. Experiment, Bryce 6 offers a lot.

11.27.2006 13:17

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