Eon (3D Scene) Entry: Leonidas J. del Rio de Leon

[Leotril]

http://img247.imageshack.us/img247/309/eontcomp2an5.jpg

Playing around with the title ..

[Leotril]

Hi Everybody..

I finally decided to join the challenge a bit scared cuz im learning to model as i go + only 47 days left :sad: .. but i think i have a clear idea of what im trying to do anyways.

My scene is gonna be in some of the libraries .. a panoramic view is gonna be needed with windows looking at the city in Alexandria or any other city.. Patricia is gonna be there some how..

I already did some sketches that i will publish tommorrow.. also i did some testing with models buildings and some part of the interior of the library.. i been reading the book for the last 2 weeks and also thinking of my aproach ..

I think this gonna be more of a learnig experience to me ..

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1165329194_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1165329194_large.jpg)

Ok here we go..

[vmulligan]

I like the style of the Thistledown so far. My only suggestion would be to make things a bit more exotic. Remember that Alexandria is a very terrestrial-seeming city, with Earthlike towers and skyscrapers, while Thistledown, built later, is a city more uniquely adapted to the environment of the Stone.

Keep plugging away at it. It looks good so far!

[Leotril]

@vmulligan.. thx for the coments.. im looking into making things more interesting working on the interior right now and will look into those buildings after that .. i get the golf tee buildings all wrong the look like mushrooms :scream:

[Leotril]

Thistledown City was astonishing, newer than Alexandria by two centuries; it had been built after the Stone's launch, incorporating designs not thought of until the inhabitants had had long experience with their environment. Here the Stone architects had allowed themselves complete freedom. Treating the chamber as a giant valley, they had strung cables from cap to cap and hung buildings from them in graceful curves. Taking advantage of the upward slope of the floor, they had built arched structures fully ten kilometers long, bands of steel and processed Stone material interacting in patterns of silver and white, casting soft-edged shadows over the neighborhoods below. Some of the structures rose to the very limits of the chamber's atmosphere; these were actually thicker at the top than the bottom, like golf tees.

Even empty, Thistledown City seemed alive. It would take only the merest suggestion of people to come to life, Patricia thought; a few hundred citizens, moving from building to building, dressed in outrageous clothes—colorful, flowing garments suited to the curves and vaults and arches, bright colors to contrast with the muted creams, whites and metallics of the city.


Pretty cool huh ? Theres a lot buildings to be add also the golf tee .. the cables, hanging buildings .. oh the arc buildings.. the roundenss of the chamber is not clear right now .. i think buildings could be hanging from the walls .. i need to get all the metrics right for this ill do some research ill work on the buildings an city next week..

Im working on the interior of the library right now i having a hard time with polygonal modeling but ill see what i can do.. i get some inspiration from art deco and some movies also

Later

[element5]

Hi there, I have come over to support your thread. Great start on Thistledown City. Keep the updates a coming :thumbsup:

[musi]

Hi Leotril,

Your thist steps are looking promising, I am going to follow your progress.

Good luck!
Sasha

[Leotril]

Thanks for the support element5 and musi.. :wise:

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1166765536_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1166765536_large.jpg)

Some of this sketches are pretty old before i started k .. well the chair i added later thats really important cause is the way Patricia find information about Thistledown and things to come in the form of a hologram.. i started with the golf tee building design..

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1166766102_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1166766102_large.jpg)

I take some time thinking about this building i think theres something kinda alien about it and maybe art deco .. well i need to thing also about the rest of the buildings the concep stuff is just temporaly i mean the buildings i did before ..

[Leotril]

I already started modeling all that stuff k.. things are going a little slow cuz im learnig a lot stuff about modelling and also modeling patricia's head .. much more to come tommorrow and this weekend ..

Later

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1166767224_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1166767224_large.jpg)

I hope to finish this model over Weekend once i add the details of the sketch. I did some lighting test on this also add a directional light in conjuction with Global Illumination HDR lightning .. just a test

[claudiojordao]

Hey Leotril, good start... I hope you have time to finish it... hurry up mate!

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1167391917_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1167391917_large.jpg)

This is my take in one of the chairs of Thistledown library
Im planning to add more detail to this k also need to model much more important things and time is running out :(

[Leotril]

im having some problems with my head model i lost a couple nights working on it..
I was following this tutorial (http://www.highend3d.com/maya/tutorials/modeling/polygon/191.html) i dont understand the method the describe for patchin in maya i dont find that option what i can do is an operation call loft but with just 11 splines also i cannot connect the splines that made the topology (page 2 tut they describe taht is basically making another splines for the topology) this method is with polys as u can see .. well i star lofting the splines u know from top to botton when i didi the loft it connects the vertices kinda but is not as precise as in the tutorial but at least i got something but is not pretty yet..:)

I would like to finish the head model but time is running out :sad: i got my splines 23 points on each hope to find a way to patched in maya cause the loftin mthod is not helpint that much

more updates coming today ..

[Leotril]

Hey Leotril, good start... I hope you have time to finish it... hurry up mate!

Thanks for droping by Claudio..

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1167809693_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1167809693_large.jpg)

Modeling the details of the library .. much more to come today including a lightining test :)

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1167908825_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1167908825_large.jpg)

I need to add more lights to this also texturing , glass shader need some work also the tube light..
I hope to finish modeling this weekend maybe and then get back to lightining ;)

I just notice that the jpg quality kinda sucks.. ill leave like that for now .. any pointers for a jpg converter programn ?? :)

[BlackDidThis]

Sorry for dropping by so belated Leonidas (http://forums.cgsociety.org/member.php?u=233998);

Even though I had had said I would pay you a visit as soon as I could.


Now I think I can better grasp your problem on how you got stuck on the head.
There are actually several types of modellers, some are polygon modellers, some are NURB'S/Patch modellers, or possibly Sub-D/Ubber-NURB'S/NURM'S modellers (There are also "Architect modellers... but that’s a whole different category :p .. A personal joke I make with my wife about the messy meshes some architects tend to bring in and I have to clean up :) )

Sooo it is very difficult for me to directly tell you on how you SHOULD or should not model your head.


But I can tell you a few things.. one of them is that the given tutorial is one of the most complicated ways to start to model out a head.
Unless of course; you have an exceptional understanding of the human head features. And EVEN if you do... the resulting first mesh will most possibly have a lot of errors in it's placement, demanding you to tweak very carefully.

It also prevents you to have correct edge loops, disabling you to sculpt out a decent nose (hence the reason he keeps having you remodel over and over your new mesh)



But IF you want to work this way... I would advise you to at least try and go for a sort of high-res sculpted sphere in the shape of a head first... so you can snap the curves onto.
I have had done something similar HERE (http://forums.cgsociety.org/showpost.php?p=2250855&postcount=185) in an earlier thread for a lion statues main


All this said… I really don’t want to get offensive on the matter of the tutorial... It WAS a fantastic way of getting some where in times that the Human head was a great challenge to the everyone… just like 5 years ago the human skin was THE thing, or last couple of years the Displacement/Normal-maps.
Now the head is so much more examined and learned... the tutorials have evolved dramatically since. I WOULD advise you to browse around to find out more about this subject… As it has a serious amount of documentations attached.
(I would strongly recommend for you to visit the link for the Hobbit Guy’s head tutorial that I gave a link to back in my thread)

Also… do NOT demoralise that your head took you over two nights of work… even though NOW I am much more capable, I think my first head had taken up about a week of my time :sad:
So just keep up with what you are doing… you ARE getting to places.. and your results rock!


As for the *.jpeg compression… I would definitely offer you to use the “Save for Web” feature that comes in with PhotoShop.
But you may not own Photoshop, as well as maybe you may have an earlier version that doesn’t have “Save for web” or Image Ready.

In this case there are a variety of free compressors out there… I think Irfan-View (http://www.irfanview.com/) HAS such a feature embedded. I would advise you to go take a look.
But if all else fails… the BEST compressor is actually within your computer itself… the option to “PrintScreen” your image.

What happens is that in one pixel in an image... there is not only ONE single colour (like the old arcade games) but in fact there are 8 colour informations by default.
So what compressors do is they optimise the image data per pixel to what WOULD give us a good looking image without all the data that we can’t see or differ anyways.

When you PrintScreen, you grab directly from your screen which IS an optimised interpretation of the image (Can you follow?) so just get yur image to match the screen size, and then screen grab it and paste this onto what ever graphic editing software you use.

It most possibly will be under 150K. Especially since you lack too much red tints in your images so far.


Hope some of this has managed to help you out on your problems… and that you may want to make use of the newly extended time.
The best fun in learning new things is the “getting your hands dirty” part :)


Black

[Leotril]

Thanks for coming Black..

I think ill find some time to work on the head now that the deadline is extended and all but im kinda worried about the rest of the body and the riggin it will be to much for me but if i can, ill do the head only k.. ill be fun :wise:

I just started with 3d last year in June doing lightining and texturing then this challenge was an excuse to learn modeling but it has become more than that i learn a lot already and still learning.. i been working this last days but nothing impressive ,uptades coming today and tommorrow i promise :rolleyes: i spend some time working on the city chamber buildings .. i call this buildings the fill buildings theyr on tge ground of the chamber and the repeat a lot .. it was kinda unsuccesfull so i get back to library interior and update the chair now i got some ideas about the cap and ill do that next .. i need to develop a rock shader for that..

hey man that joke about architect was funny lol... it reminds me that i have to fill the roll of an architec for this challenge kinda of uknow is kinda hard to come up with buildings for the year 2220 aprox.. if u know what i mean i think u know.. but i guess i can come up with that stuff since i did a class on solid edge in college duhh... i got a friend whos is an architect maybe he can hook me up with lightining jobs for building and such does taht pay well ?

thanks for the head and jpg info ill look into it :scream: that's it for now im gonna get some lunch..

bye

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168783173_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168783173_large.jpg)

More Concepts for the interior of the library ..

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168783313_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168783313_large.jpg)

Progress on the seat.. its starting to look like the sketch .. still not happy with it.. :(

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168783466_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168783466_large.jpg)

I started with the shader last night this is what i got so far.. im using a layered shader node with to high res textures for color connected to a blinn .. using bump map and displacement mapping

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168857762_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1168857762_large.jpg)

This is my progress with the shader it need to look kinda shinny .. nickel iron base type.. like an asteroid duh..

Ok i need to move on to more modeling ..I do like criticism so feel free :)

[mmoir]

Hey Leonidas,

The Chair model is looking cool as is the library area, maybe a few more details there would be good. Keep plugging away with the head modeling , it is a hard thing to do but very satisfying when you make progress.
Keep up the good work and hope you finish.

[Leotril]

Hey Mike.. I spent some time with the head today and things are looking better but not great :wise: .. i think i upload some of the progress tonight or early in the morning .. your scene is looking pretty good il give some comments later k..

[Leotril]

http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/1516/shaderjx5.jpg

this the shader im developing in maya using layered textures i use a 2d fractal for displacement .. i import the shader to the scene and for some reason the shader does not displace in the Eon scene.. i make this on a new scene the import into Eon scene..
i need to apllied that to a big surface like cylinder with 25 km radius and 30 lenght .. i did try with other surfaces that big and i didn work does not displace ..i see only textures with no reflections even the bump does not work .. everithing works well in the scene i develop the shader but no when i import it.. im using RfM..(renderman for maya)

i did some test in the final scene making another simple shader with lambert i think and 2d fractal also for displacement it does work on some of the objects but not on the cap wich is 25 km radius .. i just get only color of the shader no displacement no bump no reflections.// but in the interior part of the scene works well on the objects.. if i try to resize and object that th shader actualy work it happen again no displacement when i resize it big enought.. hoping to get some help with this :sad: .. modeling update coming up im gonna give this shader a rest a move on to other thing otherwise i aint goint to finish.

Thanks

[BlackDidThis]

Thats a nice network...

But there is something I don't get.
Since all five of the textures are file textures (that you set as an input value for the Layered texture)... why don't you just create ONE texture file and use THAT alone? Instead of having MaYA have to calculate each and every node (not to mention a 2D placement for each and an aditional layeredTexture Node)?

UNLESS you have made a very special arrangement with the place2DTexture node for each file texture (since none of them are 3D projections), I believe you can do your computer a great favour by merging the textures before you import them.
Or, at least convert them to a texture file within MaYA if you don't have an efficient graphic editing program.


That said, the render of your shader looks fantastic... thank you for sharing the network with us.
I am not sure if I would call it "Asteroid" as of yet...
But I can see where it can take you.. I would like to see how you use it in your scene.


Good luck! :thumbsup:


Black

[Leotril]

@Black.. yes ur right about the shader the 2d placemen is the same on each it need lotsa optimisation ..but i have a litle problem its not working fine on the Eon scene .. the renders its from the scene i develop wich wasnt the Eon scene unfotunatly ... i gotta do more testing with that ill keep u inform k .. hope u hava an idea about fixing the problem im getting

Thx

[BlackDidThis]

I read all through your thread over again... sort of searching for the problem you said I must have skipped on, but I don't understand what you meant... as I HAD read your latest post... if the problem you are referring to is the rendering bit;
Unfortunately I don't use Renderman myself.. it has been used in many projects I had been introduced to... But not by my person (not to mention that I don't have one :sad: )
That was why I couldn't/didn't post any pointers...

But through personal experience, I do not understand why it wouldnet displace a surface just because of it being too big.


I use Mental Ray;
If you were using Mental Ray, I would presume you have made a mistake in the proximation editor... Or that you have to play with your colour gain values to increase it. But the bit about your trying it elsewhere and getting results... but not getting results in Eon is sort of puzzling.
I am sure you must have checked your surface for errors, and it most possibly is fine.

And Normal maps;
I personally use Normal maps as displacements can get too messy or unpredictable some times.
Since MaYA on it's own doesn't have a normal map node to read the colour data into the normal camera (at least that I know of) after converting the normal map through RGB-to_XYZ node I have the output run throgh a variaty of vectorProduct nodes (vectorised samplerInfo as its inputY)

Because the normal ap tends to alter the light bouncing off, and doesn't force the geometry to be tesselated at a higher triangulation; it even renders faster...


Sorry.. cant help you there;
So be it because of my tendency for normal maps, or be it my never using RenderMan for MaYA, I am this time of the last people that can help you :sad: ... Sorry



Black

[Leotril]

@Black .. Its ok friend i need to do more tests tonight and ill try to explain the problem more clearly :wise:

Lets keep Eoning

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169271652_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169271652_large.jpg)

im gonna include this table into the scene with some objects in it that ill add later ok .. also i like to keep hard edges when im modeling this stuff then i bevel them in the end k so dont worry :(

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169375204_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169375204_large.jpg)

This are the lightining tests ive been doing tring to get a mood for the foreground part of my scene please mind the hdri image for now and some dark areas cuz the light is not setup correctly im trying diferents setups for light and shadows ..

I use raytracing and GI wich is bake previosly also using a combination of directional, volume, an area lights.. i think ill change those lights on the upper part of the the columm thingy and create some other objects for the lighs probably in the ceiling ..right now those lights are not creating light..i need to develop some shaders for the floor specially and the rest of the objects cuz now im using some old stuff i got and it doesnt fit well for the scene.

i kinda like the latest shot for a final composition i get thos reflections wich can be blurred and i will look better.. i need to continue modeling and doing more test renders.. i want to add particles like rain also in the final scene ill be using render layers cause is the only way to render the scene properly also ill do a Fog pass wich is gonna be render in mental ray or maya render and will composite that later

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169617483_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169617483_large.jpg)

I tweak some shadows settings.. i was using raytrace and depth map shadows before now im using only renderman shadows rendertime decrease from 3 hours to 45 min aprox.. also i got some crashing problems and i notice it was a system cache issue so i increase that.

..in the las couple of days i have little time with this cause of personal stuff ill do some modeling today and shading next.

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169720642_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169720642_large.jpg)

added fresnel to some of the surfaces .. i did some research yesterday need to make marble shader for the floor .

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169834753_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1169834753_large.jpg)

Ive been doing some modeling lately, adding details of the golf tee and more objectos for the foreground updates coming soon.. for now more renders.

[Leotril]

In the las couple of days i got some problems with rendertime it was cause by a deph map shadow in one of the spot lights firstly i thougt it was cause by some reflection blur added to the floor and other surfaces but that wasn the cause it was the deph map shadow i fix it using ray trace shadows instead on that light ..

also i got some issues with image format i was using maya iff and fcheck for exportint to other formats but when i try using higuer resolutions i end up with a lower resolution when i exported from fcheck.. i fix the problem using other formats like tiff or targa and not using fcheck at all..

I learn a lot about compositing thelast couple days and also light linking trying to find a solution for rendertime problem .. back to normal now but the scene its not finish :( heres the deal i will try to finish the scene but for the animation part i will not have time render it cuz the rendertimes are about and hour or so.. that doesn leave enoug time render the animation so ill do my best finish the scene with as more detail i can put in ther but no promises for the animation.. :sad:

[vmulligan]

In the las couple of days i got some problems with rendertime it was cause by a deph map shadow in one of the spot lights firstly i thougt it was cause by some reflection blur added to the floor and other surfaces but that wasn the cause it was the deph map shadow i fix it using ray trace shadows instead on that light ...

Hey, Leotril. You use Mental Ray, right? It's weird, but it's the only renderer I've ever used that seems to be able to do ray traced shadows faster than depth mapped shadows. I have found, though, that playing around with the default settings for Mental Ray for Maya can speed up shadow map rendering. Setting the depth shadows to "simple" often gives me faster results. Still, if you've got things working now, there's no point in twiddling around too much.

Your images are looking very nice. Best of luck -- I hope you finish in time!

[Leotril]

@vikram .. sup man.. im using the renderman for maya plugin .. yea it weird that those raytrace shadows work faster than deep map shadow (actually im using deep shadows it most of the lights and those are renderman ) but i think it was related to other probably geometry cause the rendertimes increase a lot im talking from an hour to 6 then 24 hours render but it changes when i use raytrace shadws for the light. wierd :) im gonna have to make time to finish probably dont sleep much :sad:

best luck to u also :thumbsup:

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170156700_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170156700_large.jpg)

This shader differs form the Stone shader i did early a bit i use procedurals for this ..trying to get that metal look.. Ill use this for the buildings in the city .. added displacement for tweaking the geometry a bit.. still in development .. im gonna do some modeling this mornig and ill come back to this afterwards...

[taavi]

The shader looks OK :)
The interior design looks massive and great, too :)

About postponing the deadline-it should be done! Otherwise many contestants are not qualified.... We all put too much effort and time int this project just to cancel because we need 1-2 extra days for rendering the animation...

[Leotril]

Ill support you 100% Taavi.. i already miss 2 weeks of collegue working on this and im a bit streess out.. a day or two would not hurt that much i hope we can get more people to support this..

thanks for coming

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170267096_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170267096_large.jpg)

Ill manage to add the stone pass to the composition but is not looking great i use mental ray for that and the composite back with the renderman passes ..

Ill be adding glows in post also a fog pass is coming .. thres still time to change teh composition a bit and add more things k .. hope they extend the challenge for 2 days to render the animation :)

[taavi]

I truly hope the same - that the deadline will be extended >>>a little bit<<< :)

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170286946_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170286946_large.jpg)

Ok heres my final render a litle bit rush out and could not use raytrace like in previous renders but i try to put the scene together in the last minute .. its been a long day.

..this challenge whas i great experience for me i applied everything i leard in 3d over the last six monts this conclude that journey .. now i need to get back to other importan matters like college wich i didn assist over a year hopelly im a senior now :)

ok whats next .. i work on a scene before Eon its kinda star wars scene in one of death star interiors the only problem is that i use models from scifi 3d and i need to ask them if they allome to use it but the scene is pretty nice and is almost done.. also ill be on the lightning challenges a lot :)

im gonna visit some of the challengers threads and congrats a lot of people that deserve to be even if they didn make it to the final.. i got 15 picks for the finalist [im not in it :)] is gonna be a tough choice

Note: i just notice that the glows are not present i dunno what happen trying to make image lest contrasty o h heck oh well no time :(

good luck everybody

[Leotril]

http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170287334_medium.jpg (http://features.cgsociety.org/challenge/entries/15/12448/12448_1170287334_large.jpg)

No composition i think is better . i havent time to see the images clearly ill look on the thread page..

[Klingberg]

I really like the models, but i don't think that this should be your final. There are too many black areas (few lights more should help) and try a higher camera angle. Don't use white lights, use some slight blue and green lights. If possible, use ambient occlusion. Afar from that its really nice, I like the shaders!

[mmoir]

Hey Leonidas,

Great job on finishing your image, it looks very nice.:thumbsup: I like the POV of the image and the general mood of the image. Glad to hear you are using all the skills you have learned over the last while and you should be happy with your image.

Good luck and see you in the next challenge.

[Leotril]

Thanks for the support guys.. its not final there's alot of stuff to work out but right now im taking a break from it .. i will let u know when is finish i promise :thumbsup:

@mnoir.. glad u like it, hope to see you around :)

@Klingberg .. i promise it will look a lot better when is finish with raytracing and all the effects is that i couldn finish it for the challlenge i enter i bit late and my experience modeling was zero to none..


cheers

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