Scene: Wishing Well

[FatAssasin]

Here's an update on the painting. I don't know about the farie dust thing, I may or may not leave it in the final piece.

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well02.jpg

[dragonz]

I think that this will become a cool scene when it gets workin in 3d. I also think that the "farie Dust" will be a good little addition if you are trying to make it more, mystical.

[FatAssasin]

Thanks. I guess the magic swirlies do give it more of a story element, which is always nice.

[FatAssasin]

Here's the beginning of the 3d scene. I usually start with the part of the scene I have the most doubts about being able to pull off, which in this case is the lighting. So I put together some simple geometry, aranged it approximately like it is in the painting, and then went to work on lighting.

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well03.jpg

[FatAssasin]

Instead of the faerie lights, I was thinkg about adding some kind of water effect. It is a well after all. But I don't know if this looks cool, or just weird. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well04.jpg

[edaddy]

since no one else is replying here, i think it's coming along nicely. and ofcourse i have a couple of crits. . . . .the view you chose is a little boring, maybe experiment w/ a couple different angles. The water coming out might not look right, but ofcourse i'm judging it based on the test pic u posted so maybe you'll be able to pull it off in the final. The lighting looks great, matching the photoshop file perfectly, and i'm digging the trees as well.. nice leaves u got there, keep it up :wip:

[FatAssasin]

Thanks for the reply, edaddy. You've got a point about the angle. I'll play with that a bit. And instead of the water I have an idea of something else that I think will be more interesting.

I kind of feel like I'm putting my work into a void here, but that's okay. I know it's not the sexiest piece around. And hopefully when it's done it'll be something worth commenting on. It just makes me try that much harder. :)

[FatAssasin]

Haven't had much time to work on this lately, but I've managed to model the wooden roof parts of the well. And I'm trying out a new camera angle.

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well06.jpg

[coCoKNIght]

It's coming along nicely. Good work so far! :thumbsup:
I like the fairie dust better than the comingoutwatter.

[edaddy]

nice update :wip:

now those textures need tweaking, and maybe alter the trees alittle as far as the limbs, they don't seem organic enough

keep going

[m_luscombe]

I like the first angle better.

From what I can tell, it looks like you are going for a magical/wonderous/whimsical feeling. The water looks like the Abyss alien. Completely different feel.

The fairy dust would work, like a will'o'the wisp kind of look. You could also try butterflies or fireflies coming out of the well. They both have magical connotations.

I think, with either camera angle, you're going to need more trees. I wouldn't fill out the forest you have now, but you need more behind the forest. More distance.

Once the grass/dirt textures are in, I think the feel of the peice will start to take shape.

[Kev3D]

I am impressed. The renders are so close to the painting!
Honestly, though, I think the original angle was better. From your latest angle it's really obvious that there are just a few trees there and not a complete forest.

[wedge]

it looks nice, but it lost something in the translation to 3D

[FatAssasin]

Thanks for the encouragement. I do like the new angle better, I think it's more interesting, but I agree that it needs more trees. I'll probably be working on that and adding grass and leaves next.

[FatAssasin]

Here's the latest version. I completely changed the color scheme because the old just wasn't working for me.

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well07.jpg

[WChestnutt]

Wow!, this new colour scheme is much better!,
it gives the scene much more spooky atmosphere which i find much more interesting!
it's coming on really well, keep it up!!

Will

[Daveaustin]

Now that's hella better!!

I love that atmosphere you got goin on..
Just a quick question about the forrest floor.... How did you do it, from where i'm sat it appears as if there are actual dead leaves resting on the dirt?!!??

HOW?? please don't tell me they are all modeled! and if so, how many did you use?

[lurifrax]

the latest pic is awsome!! :eek:
i had some crits about the others, but you've fixed them all.. very good.
the new colors are much better, and I think the leaves on the ground is adds a very nice touch to the picture...
keep ´em comming!

[xeno]

wow d00d!! This scene already looked promising from the first painting, but now...that new mood u gave it is just awesome, id almost say chilling! I really like this one.

One little thing..i like the angle, but somehow it makes the scene look a little..cropped..siince uve got so many trees going on the background. But i really like this one!

[FatAssasin]

Thanks for the response. I like this color scheme a lot better too.

Daveaustin: About the leaves, I modeled one leaf and then used the scatter function in max to put them all over the ground. The ones that happened to be on the stones I manually moved up so they wouldn't be going through the stones, but would lay on top of them. And then there's a dirt and dried leaf texture applied to the ground under the leaves.

[just do 3d]

I like your new lighting much better, its got a more atmosphere. I can imagine a sinister element to this, the woods remind me of a blair witch sort of feeling. You could add a prop or figure to suggest somethings not quite right, I dont know if thats what you want to do though. Im thinking of the wooden/viney shapes that were hanging from the tree in BW. Im not suggesting you copy that but something along the lines of. Interested to see where you take it next! :eek:

[FatAssasin]

I think this is the final version. I just need to move on to something else now, unless someone has a really good suggestion to make it better. I want this to be as good as it can, but I'm getting a little tired of it. I'm sure you all know what I mean.

I dropped the fairy dust, magical theme and went with something more sinister, since many people mentioned how spooky it looked. Thanks a ton for all the input people.

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well08.jpg

[Man]

hehe...nice addition.......final fantasy style..:xtreme:

[just do 3d]

yeah i like that a lot, it looks quality. good job :thumbsup:

[Carina]

I think that if the material on the ... creature.. was less 'sharp' it would integrate better with the rest of the image..

I don't know if that makes sense.

I really like the changes in the colour scheme!

[(Courtney.H)]

I think the material on the creature and the lighting overall is awesome... :applause:

[Mindmatter]

I really like the mood in the last version. The trees and scattered leaves are great and it's nice to see that you took the time to create all the bricks in the well.

The only thing I can think of that I want different is the DOF. With the current setting it looks like a macro shot of a miniature, but some tweaking will clear that right up. :thumbsup:

[Jos Metadi]

Cool scene.

The ground is too perfectly flat. Even some slight rolls and dips would add a lot.

I really like the texturing on the roof.

JoS

[DaForce]

man, i really like that looks very very nice.

any change of post a widescreen type render that will fit on a 1280x1024 desktop?? :-) or you could email it too me ^_^

i would be very appreciative if you could

anyway, damn nice scene there is somethign captavating about it......nice!

[Kev3D]

WOW, that looks pretty cool.
THe lighting and the creature looks awesome, I can't think of anything that could improve that image.

[FatAssasin]

Wow, thanks for all the responses. I'm posting one last image with some minor tweaks based on your suggestions. Thanks again.

MindMatter: I eased up on the DOF. I kind of thought the same thing. But it was an easy fix because it was done in Photoshop and not Max.

Corina: I don't know exactly what you mean, but I added some noise and blurred it a bit.

Jos Metadi: I know what you mean, and there are some variations in the ground, but I guess it's too subtle and the lighting is too even to notice. But that would be more of a major fix and I think it's okay the way it is. The photo ref I first looked at was pretty flat too.

DaForce: I'll shoot you over the 960xSomething version I have.

Plus, I added some noise over all to make it look more "photographic".

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well09.jpg

[Grub]

Wow, I like that effect with the tentacles. Kinda reminds me of Final Fantasy - those spirit thingies. Nice scene.:cool:

[FatAssasin]

Oh, and I forgot to mention that many people have brought up Final Fantasy, and I have no problem in saying that's exactly where I got the idea. I studied the effect in the film and then tried to recreate it here. I just consider it learning from some of the best. :)

[wunder]

i love it, and i only have one crit. the trees just look like theyre stuck in the ground, maybe ad some roots at the bottom to relieve some of the stress.
overall, its awesome 10/10

[DaForce]

FatAssasin: great if you could email it too max3ds@apex.net.au and i assume it would be the final version? , also what render times are you getting, and with what hardware?

[FatAssasin]

Here's some stats:

3DS Max 5.1.
About 1.2 million polys - everything is modeled.
10 lights - 1 of these is a volume light for the bright spot in the back.
1 sky light using low settings on light tracer.
Fog.
One light is using area shadows with low settings.
AMD 1.2ghz, 500 megs memory, old TNT2 Ultra video card.
All the textures are just bitmaps for the diffuse and bump maps. Nothing special. Except the tentacles are all procedural textures using falloffs and noise in the opacity and translucency channels (raytrace material).

I think it took like 20 minutes to render. I don't remember exactly, but it wasn't outrageous.

I did a lot of tweaking in Photoshop by rendering the whole scene in one pass and then doing quick renders of seperate elements just to get the alpha channels. I'm pretty sure I could get the exact same look straight out of Max but it would take forever with all the rendering, then tweaking, then rendering again.

[DaForce]

hmm cool....hey hows about you post a wireframe :-) i wanna see those 1.2 million polys.

[FatAssasin]

Okay, you asked for it. It's mostly just a big mess though when you look at it this way...

http://jhaywood.com/pics/well10.jpg

[DaForce]

wow thats a pretty dense mesh.

[diceroll]

:eek: omg. thats amazing. excellent work

[smellovision]

Very cool stuff!!! is there any animation?

coop

[woadiestyol]

Great work, I love how you worked with the changes in the color scheme and the point of view even though it wasn't what you had originally intended. Being able to break from intentions is the sign of a good artist (I think anyways). Could you post a link to a 1024x768 version for a desktop image? Keep up the good work!:beer:

[FatAssasin]

There's no plan for animating this right now. I thought about, but I want to go onto other images first. Plus, I have the tentacles rigged using splineIk in Max and it was a pain just to pose them the way I wanted.

Here's a link to a higher res version for anyone who would like to use this as a wallpaper image...

http://jhaywood.com/images/wishingWell1024.jpg

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