Lighting Challenge #13: Christmas

[Jacobo]

Step 17: Primary bounce coming from the fire place...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_lighting_st17.jpg

Step 18: Secondary bounce from the right side of the room...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_lighting_st18.jpg

Step 19: Tertiary bounce from the wood parquet...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_lighting_st19.jpg



Here's an animated gif to illustrate the steps more clearly...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_lighting.gif

All comments, crits and suggestions are welcome...

Take care;

AJ

[Jacobo]

And to boot, here are 2 close-up shots of th etruck with heavy bokeh...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_04.jpg


http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_03.jpg

[T-R]

Floze
I totally dig your DOF image, T-R, any chance of getting together a breakdown on this, for us mr users? :D

Yeah absolutely! I'll make a detailed one from start to compositing, I still have a few more days off work:scream:.
PS Floze, thanks for all the light and shading explainations you do, they have been very helpful.

[jojo1975]

@ Jacobo thanks for the highlight.. do you have also a renderer with higher samples ? (a bit too grainy the materials) ;)

[sepehr]

Hello,

Happy New Year everybody!
I see some really nice work here. I'm not happy with mine but thought about posting it here anyway to get some feedback.

I'm doing it in Maya. Rendered with Renderman for Maya 1.
I'm using GI on everything but the tree. It seems Rman on my machine can not handle the tree with GI and crashes everytime so basically it is a different layer. (I'm not sure where exactly the problem is coming from since Rman is known to be the most stable one) It goeas to half of image and then stops.

Anyway, I'm looking for a night time indoor lighting here:
http://www.cgtal.com/Temp/ChristmasLighting/test4.jpg

:bounce:
Sepehr

[jojo1975]

Probably a bit too much reflection on the walls but really great start ! I would like to start with renderman sooner or later ;) it seems good renderer ;)

[Biofreak]

Hello,

Happy New Year everybody!
I see some really nice work here. I'm not happy with mine but thought about posting it here anyway to get some feedback.

I'm doing it in Maya. Rendered with Renderman for Maya 1.
I'm using GI on everything but the tree. It seems Rman on my machine can not handle the tree with GI and crashes everytime so basically it is a different layer. (I'm not sure where exactly the problem is coming from since Rman is known to be the most stable one) It goeas to half of image and then stops.

Anyway, I'm looking for a night time indoor lighting here:
http://www.cgtal.com/Temp/ChristmasLighting/test4.jpg

:bounce:
Sepehr

Wow looks like overkill :)

[Jacobo]

@ Jacobo thanks for the highlight.. do you have also a renderer with higher samples ? (a bit too grainy the materials) ;)

Thanks jojo1975... Like I said, the renders I posted on the page all came out of fprime cuz I'm constantly changing things as I move along, hence the grainyness... The final images will be quite crisp and presentable...

[sepehr]

Hello!
Thanks for the feedback.
Here is update1

http://www.cgtal.com/Temp/ChristmasLighting/test5.jpg

[lighthunder]

hi everybody,

here is my little render test:):)


http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/6020/finalpv7.jpg

[L33tace]

Happy New Year everyone!

another update. added 3dAura to the light bulbs. also a light in the back to try and create some moon light. as before layered the render with a ambient layer.
info from the render
objects: 86; lights 5; master objects: 3; master shaders: 81; texture map surface: 4509 by 4509 pixels, 77.56 mbytes; took 11mins 44 secs to render; number of rays launched: 35107550.

http://homepage.eircom.net/%7Ecasstify/xmas_3.jpg

i rendered a scene with no 3dAura and layered it with the above image and created this animation in abode elements 2 :)
http://homepage.eircom.net/%7Ecasstify/xmas_3.gif

[bigbad]

Full HD version:
http://img81.imageshack.us/img81/9263/sno3di0.th.jpg (http://img81.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sno3di0.jpg)

A smaller version. For my desktop background.
http://img235.imageshack.us/img235/3238/treery3.th.jpg (http://img235.imageshack.us/my.php?image=treery3.jpg)

Blender 3D Internal render.
Mostly buffered shadows spot light and point lights.

Spot light with Haloint enabled, outside going thrue the window. It's supposed to be the moon lightning. The fog effect of it adds some depth.

Raytracing only on the windows.

Enviroment Maps for the christmas tree balls so no raytracing there.

The lamps shader has emit color. Added a vertice on every lamp with a halo effect, thats been in blender like forever and fakes optical illusions like stars and much more. Thats gives it it's glow. A point light on every lamp. Done very quick with the DupliVerts function.

Point light on very close to the ground where the moonlight hits. Fakes global illumination quite well. Also two big buffered shadows spotlight only shadows, that gives Global Illumination effect also. Soft thresholt on 100 so the shadows are very blured.

Post pro direct in Blender with nodes. Added an extra blur effect and some contrast and brightness correction.

Rendertime 4 minutes in full hd (1920x1080).

[Biofreak]

http://img81.imageshack.us/img81/9263/sno3di0.th.jpg (http://img81.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sno3di0.jpg)

Blender Internal render. Mostly buffered shadows spot light and point lights. Spot light with Halo outside going thrue the window. Raytracing only on windows. Enviroment Maps for the christmas tree balls so no raytracing there.


Rendertime 4 minutes in full hd.

How on earth something like this can be rendered in 4 min?

i am rendering my stuff in modo and it takes 7 hours, also my results are not even close.
sigh :(
http://i129.photobucket.com/albums/p208/Biofreak13/Picture3-1.png
I also get errors, damn

btw i like ur render a lot, very moody.

[bigbad]

How on earth something like this can be rendered in 4 min?

i am rendering my stuff in modo and it takes 7 hours, also my results are not even close.
sigh :(

I also get errors, damn

btw i like ur render a lot, very moody.

Thanks.
I start by rendering everything without raytracing (or global illumination). I had then 2 minutes rendertime. That way you can test render how manytimes you like.

I know modo has a fast renderer. Preview renderer I've heard. So use that to your advantage.

[Biofreak]

Thanks.
I start by rendering everything without raytracing (or global illumination). I had then 2 minutes rendertime. That way you can test render how manytimes you like.

I know modo has a fast renderer. Preview renderer I've heard. So use that to your advantage.

Thanks man, i'll try that.

[neoartec]

neoartec - Nice job. Some of the furnature appears to glow a bit too much, I don't see where that light would come from on the shelves?


Thanks Jeremy,
my lighting is not yet fully resolved, I settle this problem once every element finalized. It was just to get an idea of the atmosphere.

The I try to make a bed of coals with buche flared.

[Engys]

I thought time is up, but hey a new chance to make the images better. Here is my last Max8 default scanline with tiny raytrace reflections:

I clone referenced omnis to the positions of the lightbulps. Therefore the elements of lightbulps would be exploded with Editable Mesh. Then I center the pivot of every lightbulp to its object and use the clone and align tool for the omni references.

After doing some material stuff I thought that the window looks a little bit deep and start to rearrange the scene. Beside the lights for the tree there are 2 other omnis. One for the fireplace with shadow map and one for the bouncing roomlight without shadows.

Objects: 156, Faces: 1097777
Omni Lights: 42, Shadow Mapped: 41
Rendertime on a Vaio-VGN-FE21S without multi pass dof: 2:32 min
With 12 passes: 12:11 min

http://datlantis.org/xdlight2.jpg

[jojo1975]

@ bigbad hey that kick ass ! 4 minutes of rendering let me reconsider blender ;) I thoughtt it was an awesome modeller but with not so strong rendererer i will give again a try other then modelling ;)
great image

[jeremybirn]

bigbad - Nice job! It would be good to see a little more of the moon light and tree lights illuminating the pine needles and tree itself. Maybe you could fill in the black areas with a little bit of colored fill and colored specular highlights in places, just so more of the scene comes to life. The outside of the star topper could use some reflections or highlights too.

L33tace - Nice job. It would be nice to see more illumination on the pine needles and tree itself. The decorations (balls and star) could use less diffuse, but more reflections and highlights, to convey the idea of shiney metal. The room could use more contrast, going brighter in a few places but also with darker shadows and occlusion. The fire place seems to get its orange light from the outside, and should be lit more from within.

lighthunder - Good start! The room could use more contrast, going brighter in a few places but also with darker shadows and occlusion. If the fire is lit, it needs more light to indicate that. Maybe more of a glow can come from those lights on the tree?

sepehr - Looking good! The walls seem over-lit to me, maybe you could darken them in most areas, except where the tree or other lights would make them the brightest. I'd like to see more reflections and highlights on the balls and star, they are mostly black. I'd like to see more illumination from the lights onto the tree itself, it is black in some areas. There's a strange glow behind the dresser and along the bottom of the windows that could be hyper-active global illumination, try to tone that down or turn it off. If you're rendering the tree as a separate layer, include the gifts below it as a matte object, so that the tree stand and other lower parts can appear behind the gifts.

thundering1 - Looking good! The perspective of the light coming though the window looks like a point or spot light just a few meters outside the window, not a distant light like the sun. Maybe you could switch to an directional light for a more believable sunbeam? It would be nice to see more reflections, on the floor or other surfaces. Maybe the lights could have more color in them, and could illuminate the pine needles around them more?

mirmel - Welcome! That's a good start. Try to get more contrast on the set, going brighter in a few places but also with darker shadows and occlusion.

Jacobo - Nice job. I like the extra furnature and things. Maybe the wood shader (especially on the dresser and table in image 2) is too reflective. I think the shades above the windows should shadow or occlude the wall behind them more. It would be good if you could make some of the shadows of the tree a little softer. You are on a good track there overall.

beverens - Good start. The fire light should be much softer, with soft shadows, a decay with distance, and maybe a less saturated orange hue. The room could use darker shadow areas, especially in the alcoves to the sides of the chimney. The star looks like it was turned strangely, maybe we could see more of it?

-jeremy

[Kroni]

Hello

such a nice subject for a lighting challenge, would be a sin not to join ;) so here's my little entry (or at least a start of an entry). I always like watching shadows thrown by a christmas tree, dont know why, but all the lights and shadows give a warm feeling, dont You (CG Society) think ?

http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/3288/xmas2pp2ja1.th.jpg (http://img245.imageshack.us/my.php?image=xmas2pp2ja1.jpg)

Pretty much everything done in Blender (some post glow added in Artweaver).
A lot of raytracing: Area lights in windows for some minor star/moon light illumination, point lights on the tree and a little of Ambient Occlusion to show darker areas.
Rendered in blender internal on a Windows XP machine (Intel Core 1.8GHz, 1 GB RAM), about 20 mins, surprisingly fast.
Ill focus a bit more on materials now and hopefully post some update soon.

on a side note:
I dont know about other applications, but in Blender, unless You hide the needles on the tree (or move them to another layer), the 3d views are barely refreshing due to the polycount ;) i always break scenes apart and throw groups in layers, but in this scene it's simply a must to be able to work.

comments & crits more than welcome
- Kroni

[davidesign]

Hi everyone,
I see a lot of excellent lighters in the forum. Great stuff all of you, especially pbalsic, very good lighter.
My Scene setup: Didn't use GI, FG.
8 mr lights (1 outside, 1 illuminate tree, 2 fire lights, 2 ceiling light, 2 table lamp lights)
40 Christmas tree mr lights (including star) with glow
5 candle mr lights with glow

I render 720x480, with high sample rate (31mm lens) 2.5hours (very high settings)
Occlusion pass 16min

Software: 3DS Max, Photoshop
http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j286/sxxypolishgrl78/Christmastree.jpg

[Jacobo]

How on earth something like this can be rendered in 4 min?

i am rendering my stuff in modo and it takes 7 hours, also my results are not even close.
sigh :(

I also get errors

Biofreak says that he went very light on the raytracer, that's the main reason... Using light inclusion and exclusion to your advantage also helps. You should maybe consider going back to your starting point and try and aim for the a solution in modo that won't take away from the ambience you're trying to achieve.

[Jacobo]

Hi everyone;

Thanx Jeremy for the input. I agreed with all your crits and tried to implement the changes accordingly, except for the curtains :) They are made of fabric and they have a certain translucent quality to them, hence even the occlusion shadows they cast on the walls shouldn't be as opaque as solid objects IMHO, but nevertheless, I went ahead and toned down the translucency factor by 50%, and the curtains seem a little better now... I also did away with the pesky shadows on top the tree that apparently resulted from sloppy light inclusion/inclusion :) I toned down the translucency factor of the pine needles by %50, cuz it tended to look too bright...

I also made the revision I had in mind like toning down the bounced light that reflects onto the fireplace. I also did away with all of the shadow map casting lights and turned them into area lights, cuz at the end I have decided to render out the final images thru fPrime and it really does a great job anyhow :) I've decided to get the volumetrics out as pass plates and composite them onto the fPrime outputs.

As beautiful as it's render engine may be, unfortunately LW does still possess many limitations in terms of flexibility other software above its class offer by default, like point lights can't emit soft shadows, area lights can only be planes and only spotlights can emit mapped shadows... This hurts your workflow a lot and is also another important factor that affected the decisions I made which I mentioned above...

But all in all, I'm quite happy with what I've achieved so far, as it is what I had in mind when I started out.

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_06.jpg

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_05.jpg

[davidesign]

Could anyone explain to me how to get my image right on the screen instead that tiny icon to click on. Thanks

[davidesign]

Nevermind, I figured it out.

[beverins]

Thank you so much for the feedback, Jeremy! I continue to try to improve my scene - I'll certainly work on the suggestions you posted.

In the meantime, I tried a different camera angle to something a bit more interesting. Took two different angles, I liked them both.

I changed the bottles to something transparent, to see how the light would play on the glass.

I tried rendering this with and without radiosity. The first one is with radiosity at 37 passes in Fprime and the second one is without radiosity. I'm using fprime because of its quick renders and ability to refine over time. Right now I'm letting LW do an HD render and its telling me 9 hours left. Fprime made these 1024x768 renders in about 2 hours, but I can see some blotchiness. I know that for sake of speed, the render between LW and Fprime does differ sometimes, so we shall see what happens.

The lights are the same as in my previous image, all I changed is the camera angle.

The pine tree lights are point lights arranged around the bulb objects, using the luxigon feature in Lightwave (creates a light from each and every polygon you select). Since the bulb objects are built from quite a number of polygons, I ran a polygon reducer to get the number down to about 10 polys per bulb. I still wound up with 710 lights. :-D. While this does add to the render time considerably, I liked the way the colors blended on the walls.

To recap, the bulbs are represented by 710 point lights grouped where the bulbs exist, and colored to match the bulb color (though they are pretty intense and glow white anyway, they case the proper light, which is what I was looking for). Outside is a large Area Light for the window, though I see that I might be able to get rid of it as it doesn't seem to add much to the image. Not visible in this shot is the fireplace lit with a point light. I will work on getting the fireplace looking like a fire in there, and not like someone hanging a light inside. Ambient is set to 12%.

See what y'all think :-)

[lighthunder]

ok i will :thumbsup:

[lighthunder]

i will thank u for you'r responce on it :thumbsup:

[Jacobo]

beverins Hi;

I might have a few suggestions, if I may. I'm looking at our xmas tree right now, and the bulbs seem not to emanate as strong a light to cast such strong shadows onto the walls around it as in your work. I would decrease the intensity of those ornament lights and have them falloff quickly and then put individual lights around the tree that only affect the room to mimic the highly diffused and weak wash of mixed light colors that radiates from the tree's bulbs and take it from there...

take care;

AJ

[beverins]

I shall indeed try that idea! Thanks Jacobo :-)

In the meantime, here's another angle - playing around with unusual camera placement.

Trying Photobucket now so you guys don't have to click the thumbnail. I'm also working on making the firelight more like looking like a fire. Instead of 1 point light, I have 2 area lights in there to get that falloff and soft edges.

http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh72/beverins/xmastree05a.jpg

[jeremybirn]

Kroni - That looks good. Try to get the light from the individual bulbs to decay with distance, so you get fewer, softer shadows on each wall. The hard-edged shadows aren't very believable, I know soft shadows render slower but hopefully if there are fewer of them because of the decay that will speed things up again.[/url]

davidesign - Great scene! That looks terrific overall. Some of those glows look hyper-active, especially on the candle flames. If the flames aren't bright enough by themselves, make the tops of the candlesticks brighter, and you should be able to use a much more subtle, tighter glow around the flames. I think the blue light from outside might get cropped a little smaller, so it doesn't go into that thin line behind the gifts in back, and maybe doesn't go so far to the right in the middle of the floor.

Jacobo - Looking good! I think a few areas could still be tweaked. The fill/bounce light right around the window should be changed so that more of the fill appears to come from outside. If you look at the center vertical post in the middle of the screen-right window, for example, it gets a lot of bounce on the side facing the interior of the room, but much less fill or bounce on the surface facing the outdoors. The out-facing surfaces usually get more bounce and more fill from the sky, so filling in that "light from the sky" with really soft cool light should be a high priority, making something brighter and more important to the shading that the bounce light coming back from inside the room. The toned-down reflections on the wood look better, if you could get the reflections a little softer they could go a little brighter again. The handles on the dresser could use less diffuse, maybe more reflectivity to make up for it.[url="http://forums.cgsociety.org/member.php?u=52618"] (http://forums.cgsociety.org/member.php?u=204755)

bevernis - Interesting scene. For reflective chrome things (balls, star) the trick is to use very little diffuse, a dim base color on the shader, so the reflections and highlights account for most of the brightness. Some areas look like they are glowing from all sides, even the wood of the tree and the walls are getting brightly lit, so maybe the illumination from the tree lights could be limited a bit more. Making the bottles wrapped in tissue paper entirely into transparent things is certainly a novel look. In your later rendering below, you've got more of the light under control, except in the star, it looks like your framing will force you to do more work on the empty parts of the room if you stick with that composition.

-jeremy

[davidesign]

Thank you Jeremy,
You have the best advise so far. I 100% agree with you and will work on the changes. Funny I was thinking about the little line of light, behind presents, as well. This is an awesome practice and improvement of skills. Thanks for the challenges.

[Frances]

Here is my attempt to improve the fireplace interior. Thanks for the great advice Jeremy, and I hope it looks like I paid attention to it. I've had to do fires for interior design viz a couple of times in the past and they were never this good. Maybe I won't be afraid of them anymore. :)

http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/Christmas_scene_final_web_GB.jpg

[beverins]

I changed one of the area lights to a linear light, and then cloned it 3 times to get the underlighting from the fire. I also did the first texturemapping for this image, creating a firey procedural over the logs. Messed a bit with the values of the lights using Fprime as the interactive previewer until it looked better. I also messed with the intensity of the luxigon-lights on the lightbulbs, decreasing not the brightness but the falloff value to get a slightly dimmer effect.

This was rendered with Lightwave's render, with no radiosity. 1 hour at HD 720p.

I'll see about dressing up the scene some around the fireplace. Perhaps some of the stuff from the dresser. Don't want to waste the nice objects that are provided by Jeremy! :-)
Still a work in progress. Now to work on the star's texturing and lighting.

Quite a fun competition, and the feedback from Jeremy is invaluable!


http://i253.photobucket.com/albums/hh72/beverins/xmastree05b.jpg

[beverins]

Frances, I have to say that your renders are indeed masterful interiors. I've gotta long way to go. :-)

[Jacobo]

Jacobo - Looking good! I think a few areas could still be tweaked. The fill/bounce light right around the window should be changed so that more of the fill appears to come from outside. If you look at the center vertical post in the middle of the screen-right window, for example, it gets a lot of bounce on the side facing the interior of the room, but much less fill or bounce on the surface facing the outdoors. The out-facing surfaces usually get more bounce and more fill from the sky, so filling in that "light from the sky" with really soft cool light should be a high priority, making something brighter and more important to the shading that the bounce light coming back from inside the room.

-jeremy

As per your crits, which I found to be quite on the money, I made the necessary revisions, and yes, you most definitely have a point... The fill on the window frames made the whole thing cushier for the eye to look at thann before...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_08.jpg


http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_10.jpg




The toned-down reflections on the wood look better, if you could get the reflections a little softer they could go a little brighter again. The handles on the dresser could use less diffuse, maybe more reflectivity to make up for it.

-jeremy

I was aiming for a highly glossy lacquer finish on the wooden drawer, but I went a bit overboard before with the glossiness. Now, not only the reflections are toned down to a convincing degree, there's also an incidence based falloff on the environmental refl. I also tweaked the bronze material to have less diffuse like you said. The image that reflects these revisions is right below...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_09.jpg

[loramel]

I am trying here a different angle and I am not quite sure if it can still be considered to conform to the rules. ( well at least the tree is reflected in the tumbler ...)

Used blender and as renderer yafray, which is a pure raytracer. The lighting setup is quite the same as in my previous post. No GI was used in this setup.

I had access to a dual core 2.4Ghz 2GB machine and the render time for this one (originally 1200x600) was about 1.5 hours.


http://loramel.gmxhome.de/xmas/xmas_07,jpg

[MartinRomero]

Ok so here is what I have.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122032&stc=1

I used Maya 8.5 - MentalRay rendering I used volume lights on gifts, Christmas tree and floor, so maybe the total of 14 volume lights that are only emitting ambient, so diffuse and specular are turn off.

I am also using spot lights and point lights. I have turned on Raytracing to get some nice shadows.

I wanted to pretty much have the Christma's tree lights to be the source of illumination. I have a very similar set up in my home, so that kind of helped me see how much light could actually be emitted just from the tree lights.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=121993&stc=1

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122001&stc=1
The Second Image was done using Maya 8.5 and Final Render Stage2. I used Pysical Sky and GI. I have also added area lights to the scene. I put an area light on each window and I created a window on the right handside of the room just so that I could get more sky light.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122033&stc=1
Martin Romero

[amouse]

Hello everyone,

Here's my WIP. I used FG for the ambient lighting from the window and several spotlights to illuminate the tree. The glows of the christmas tree lights were added in post. Created this piece in maya/mental ray. Thanks! :)

http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/393/christmas1cf0.jpg

[T-R]

Hi,
Plenty of great renders in here!
Here is a shot breakdown for my previous render that was requested. Its probably more information than needed for most users but hopefully it might help some others. I apologize if there is too much yapping.

Maya 2008 and Fusion

Composition:
I had a reference pic for a close up on a Christmas tree when this challenge first started but had lost it along the way. I liked the composition of the shot so I arranged the camera to match it from whatever I could remember. I used an extremely wide lens (10) so the BG elements would feel farther away while keeping the 1st ornament close. I moved around some lights and branches and added the pearls. I switched all materials to Mia_mats, hi glossy reflectivity for the balls and low reflectivity with a high roughness value for the tree.


http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/4206/screenix1.jpg
Lights:

The Xmas tree lights were a catch 22. I wanted to get as much light out of the bulbs as possible but the higher the intensity the more blown out the immediate area got, so at this point I knew I needed to tone map. I used mia photographic, leaving the cm2 factor at the default and making adjustments only to the ISO and the F stop. Like shooting at night I went high on the ISO (800) and tried to get as low as possible on the F-stop which ended up being .300. I knew the image would lose contrast due to the tonemapper, but I chose not to crush blacks because I felt that between the occlusion pass and post work the contrast would return. I used an hdri for reflections rather than leaving the other objects in the scene because the ornament material was glossy so as long as something was in there it looked ok and rendered much faster. My key light ended up being more of a fill light as the intensity on it was quite low. With all the additional lights it didn’t seem necessary to have a strong key. For fill I added a directional light with no shadows or specular and pushed it towards blue.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/4923/keyfillzb8.jpg

I ended up using FG for addition fill from the HDRI knowing that it would be cheap in render time if I used a mid range accuracy (50) a really low point density(0.100) and a high point interpolation(35). I figured the occlusion pass would compensate for the low point density and hi interpolation. Final Gather calculation time was 13 seconds on the image(600x750). Hdri was a blurred version of Blochi's HDRI scene from CGTechniques(Anyone remember those challenges : )
http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/6645/hdrita6.jpg
Knowing that the render was going to take a beating in post I rendered it out as a 32 bit exr. Raytracing settings were quite low as well. I only used what was needed to help speed up render times.
http://img137.imageshack.us/img137/5957/raytracingde3.jpg

Rendering was approx 35 minutes total for color, occlusion and mask pass on
32 bit windows XP,
Athlon Dual core 2.40GHz

DOF:

I tried using mia_ lens_bokeh but it didn’t end up going with it as I couldn’t find the magic number to keep the close ball, tree branch and pearls to stay in focus while defocusing the background. I believe the problem was due to the wide lens I used on the camera. The FG branch was too far from the pearls and ball. I liked the composition so I opted for a depth pass. Well no luck there either. The depth blur was just not looking right, so I went with a mask instead. I rendered a matte for the objects I did not want to be blurred so I could use it as a mask on the defocus node in fusion. This was definitely the largest time saver as far as rendering goes as the mask pass renders out quick where as a 3D DOF would require high samples and much longer render times.
http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/9853/maskyi0.jpg
Compositing:
I used a keyer on the yellow so I could have the lights in a separate layer to adjust their brightness. I ended up duplicating that layer so I could add some more lights (for free) and move them where I wanted. I also added a glow on them with a tight spread to help enhance them.


http://img110.imageshack.us/img110/542/freebeeud4.jpg


Then came the DOF. I used the mask and defocused like crazy. Nothing special other than trying various settings until it felt ok.
http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/6641/dofqj3.jpg






Next was the color correction. I wanted the image to have warm colors to maybe have the sense that along with the tree lights the fireplace was still in the room. This is where the 32bit depth came in handy as the image never banded no matter what I was doing to it. I individually pushed the shadows, midtones, and hi lights towards different intensities of orange.
http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/8446/cconexv9.jpg
This looked ok already but I’m a big fan of contrast so I used another color corrector and increased the overall contrast, lowered the gamma on the shadows, increased the gamma on the highlights.
http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/7211/cctwotb2.jpg

I then used a temperature node to push the image to an even warmer feel. Finally I added a vignette and some grain for the final image.
http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/6320/cuxmastakecopygh5.jpg

All in all I didn't need to render too many passes. For ultimate control I should have rendered each light pass seperately as well as the shadows and reflection, however it didn't seem neccesary in this case. I would have liked to have a seperate reflection pass but its not happening with 2008 just yet.

Thanks and hope it was helpful to someone.

[davidesign]

Update: change of the candles and the moonlight

http://i83.photobucket.com/albums/j286/sxxypolishgrl78/new_tree.jpg

[andystopps]

There's been some great stuff going up on here in the last few weeks.
TR - thanks for giving us the breakdown on how you did this. Good idea adding the string of pearls to draw the eye in.
Loramel - Looks nice, though I think the glass is just a bit too reflective, especially at the base.
I haven't had a chance to do anything to this until now, so this is a bit preliminary. I used Mental Ray (in XSI), with no GI or FG. I did an ambient occlusion pass to control a tendency for the corners of the ceiling to light up bright, and used a couple of negative lights to the same purpose in the corner to the top right of the chimney breast ( to get negative lights, i.e. lights which cast darkness, in XSI you have to set the three colour sliders to negative values, not the intensity slider as you might expect ).
I replaced the tree lightbulbs, which were one piece of geometry, with seperate ones ( Model>Create>Poly.Mesh>Extract polygons) making it much easier to align lights with them, and did the same with some of the parcels, to make it easier to keep track of the materials applied to them instead of using clusters.
http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t118/andystopps/xmas_comp_02.jpg

Compositing was done in Shake, using the Defocus node to add some glow to the lights, and to blur the flames of the fire (which were made using metaballs applied to a simple particle system). Defocus works much better than an ordinary blur for this, though it has much lengthier rendering times. I also added a bit of DOF using ZBlur from a depth pass, and some grain to soften it up a bit.
http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t118/andystopps/xmas_shakeCropperCapture1.jpg

The floor certainly needs some improvement, and the wrapping paper for the parcels is a bit dull, so these are first on the list for attention. any other suggestions welcome.

[droidoz]

Hey everyone, great work so far!
This is the first time I'm participating in a lighting challenge and I have to say that I'm really enjoying it! Thanks for creating this scene for us Jeremy.

To light it I've used 3dsmax with vray. I did not use any GI or FG, only area-lights for the general coloring of the scene and some omnis to represent the lights in the tree. I tried to create the biggest possible contrast in color while maintaining a certain amount of believabillty.
I'm quite happy with the result, but to be honest, I've spend a lot of time on it so I'm probably missing a few points of improvement. I'd really appreciate some feedback. Thanks for viewing!
http://matjoor.com/lc/v07small.jpg

This is where I placed my main lights:
http://matjoor.com/lc/diagram.jpg

[Jacobo]

Hi;

Here's what I've got so far with the last changes and a few other tweaks + volumetrics comped in + color correction and a little bit of lens bloom...

http://www.ajlanaltug.com/files/AJ_XMAS_CHLNG_12.jpg

[Jacobo]

double post... sorry :)

[loramel]

Here is my final update for my second shot.
Added some DOF and scaled donw the glass a little bit.

http://loramel.gmxhome.de/xmas/xmas_10.jpg

[thundering1]

Thanks for the breakdowns T-R and andystops!

I have GOTTA learn Multi-Pass rendering...
Yes, I'm doing this as an all-in-one shot and it's taking forever which is why I haven't submitted another one yet! It takes a few hours to figure out it's not going the way I want it to, and then I gotta start all over again.

[lighthunder]

jeremy here is my update with altration u told :) http://img166.imageshack.us/img166/8785/final3kl7.jpg

[lighthunder]

jeremy here is my second update worked on tree :) http://img102.imageshack.us/img102/1948/final4qc4.jpg

[rameshganga]

http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/8468/nighteffectoa8.jpghi this rams and this image rendered by mayasoftware :)

[sepehr]

Hello,

Thank you Jeremy for the feedback.
Here is the update 3:

http://www.cgtal.com/Temp/ChristmasLighting/Composition2.jpg

I'm thinking about adding two light bulbs on the ceiling where I have those two strong lights (which are actually painted and are not real lights.)

Comments are really appreciated

Sepehr

[sepehr]

http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/6320/cuxmastakecopygh5.jpg


Hey,
I really like this work!

[AthorNZ]

Hi,
Plenty of great renders in here!
Here is a shot breakdown for my previous render that was requested. Its probably more information than needed for most users but hopefully it might help some others. I apologize if there is too much yapping.

Maya 2008 and Fusion

Composition:
I had a reference pic for a close up on a Christmas tree when this challenge first started but had lost it along the way. I liked the composition of the shot so I arranged the camera to match it from whatever I could remember. I used an extremely wide lens (10) so the BG elements would feel farther away while keeping the 1st ornament close. I moved around some lights and branches and added the pearls. I switched all materials to Mia_mats, hi glossy reflectivity for the balls and low reflectivity with a high roughness value for the tree.


http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/4206/screenix1.jpg
Lights:

The Xmas tree lights were a catch 22. I wanted to get as much light out of the bulbs as possible but the higher the intensity the more blown out the immediate area got, so at this point I knew I needed to tone map. I used mia photographic, leaving the cm2 factor at the default and making adjustments only to the ISO and the F stop. Like shooting at night I went high on the ISO (800) and tried to get as low as possible on the F-stop which ended up being .300. I knew the image would lose contrast due to the tonemapper, but I chose not to crush blacks because I felt that between the occlusion pass and post work the contrast would return. I used an hdri for reflections rather than leaving the other objects in the scene because the ornament material was glossy so as long as something was in there it looked ok and rendered much faster. My key light ended up being more of a fill light as the intensity on it was quite low. With all the additional lights it didn’t seem necessary to have a strong key. For fill I added a directional light with no shadows or specular and pushed it towards blue.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/4923/keyfillzb8.jpg

I ended up using FG for addition fill from the HDRI knowing that it would be cheap in render time if I used a mid range accuracy (50) a really low point density(0.100) and a high point interpolation(35). I figured the occlusion pass would compensate for the low point density and hi interpolation. Final Gather calculation time was 13 seconds on the image(600x750). Hdri was a blurred version of Blochi's HDRI scene from CGTechniques(Anyone remember those challenges : )
http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/6645/hdrita6.jpg
Knowing that the render was going to take a beating in post I rendered it out as a 32 bit exr. Raytracing settings were quite low as well. I only used what was needed to help speed up render times.
http://img137.imageshack.us/img137/5957/raytracingde3.jpg

Rendering was approx 35 minutes total for color, occlusion and mask pass on
32 bit windows XP,
Athlon Dual core 2.40GHz

DOF:

I tried using mia_ lens_bokeh but it didn’t end up going with it as I couldn’t find the magic number to keep the close ball, tree branch and pearls to stay in focus while defocusing the background. I believe the problem was due to the wide lens I used on the camera. The FG branch was too far from the pearls and ball. I liked the composition so I opted for a depth pass. Well no luck there either. The depth blur was just not looking right, so I went with a mask instead. I rendered a matte for the objects I did not want to be blurred so I could use it as a mask on the defocus node in fusion. This was definitely the largest time saver as far as rendering goes as the mask pass renders out quick where as a 3D DOF would require high samples and much longer render times.
http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/9853/maskyi0.jpg
Compositing:
I used a keyer on the yellow so I could have the lights in a separate layer to adjust their brightness. I ended up duplicating that layer so I could add some more lights (for free) and move them where I wanted. I also added a glow on them with a tight spread to help enhance them.


http://img110.imageshack.us/img110/542/freebeeud4.jpg


Then came the DOF. I used the mask and defocused like crazy. Nothing special other than trying various settings until it felt ok.
http://img230.imageshack.us/img230/6641/dofqj3.jpg






Next was the color correction. I wanted the image to have warm colors to maybe have the sense that along with the tree lights the fireplace was still in the room. This is where the 32bit depth came in handy as the image never banded no matter what I was doing to it. I individually pushed the shadows, midtones, and hi lights towards different intensities of orange.
http://img89.imageshack.us/img89/8446/cconexv9.jpg
This looked ok already but I’m a big fan of contrast so I used another color corrector and increased the overall contrast, lowered the gamma on the shadows, increased the gamma on the highlights.
http://img245.imageshack.us/img245/7211/cctwotb2.jpg

I then used a temperature node to push the image to an even warmer feel. Finally I added a vignette and some grain for the final image.
http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/6320/cuxmastakecopygh5.jpg

All in all I didn't need to render too many passes. For ultimate control I should have rendered each light pass seperately as well as the shadows and reflection, however it didn't seem neccesary in this case. I would have liked to have a seperate reflection pass but its not happening with 2008 just yet.

Thanks and hope it was helpful to someone.

Hey T-R really great work! You rendered with mentalray? What system did you use for the passes and to render out in a 32bit EXR?

[giraffe3d]

hi :)
I want to join the contest too. I started working on it today.
I will post when I have something worth posting.

T-R: did you use same tree in the model provided?
The needles seem thinner than mine.
btw I like your work a lot!

[T-R]

sepehr
Hey,
I really like this work!
Thank you!

Hey T-R really great work! You rendered with mentalray? What system did you use for the passes and to render out in a 32bit EXR?

Thanks!
For the passes I used Maya's native render layers. I'm not sure how familiar you are with them, but they are great espically when you use layer overrides which allow you set variables for each layer. An example of that would be you wouldn't want final gather or the tonemapper to affect the occlusion layer, so you are able to create an override simply by right clicking on an attribute and choosing 'create layer override' and then 'break connections' or whatever the attribute calls for(number, dropdown menu) It works on almost all attributes. Your best resource for maya's render layers are definitly the docs.

To render to 32 bit exr you need to choose OpenEXR from the image format in Render settings and then on the mental ray side choose 4x32 from the data type in the framebuffer.
http://img182.imageshack.us/img182/1683/exrew7.jpghttp://img503.imageshack.us/img503/4607/32bitzb8.jpg

You can only batch render to 32 bit. So you wouldn't render on screen and then save that image thinking that its 32 bit. You would also need to set your compositing package's current composition to 32 bit unless you are using Photoshop which will automatically pick it up.

[T-R]

hi :)
I want to join the contest too. I started working on it today.
I will post when I have something worth posting.

T-R: did you use same tree in the model provided?
The needles seem thinner than mine.
btw I like your work a lot!


Hi giraffe3d.
Thanks!

Yes same model. The forground ones became thinner because I smoothed them to 2 divisions. I used Maya's native smooth instead of mental rays approx editor. This gives the option to turn 'Keep Border' on or off. I turned it off which thinned them out to the result in the render.

http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/5788/smoothye4.jpg

[giraffe3d]

Hi giraffe3d.
Thanks!

Yes same model. The forground ones became thinner because I smoothed them to 2 divisions. I used Maya's native smooth instead of mental rays approx editor. This gives the option to turn 'Keep Border' on or off. I turned it off which thinned them out to the result in the render.


thanks for the reply. I thought of this too but my scene crashes if I apply meshsmooth :(
I am using 3dsmax+vray.
my camera angle is close to the tree, but also many needles are seen.

[jojo1975]

if you are using vray use Vray proxy it will really help you ! (and BTW anyone know if also mental ray has something similar ?)

[jojo1975]

sorry dup post

[giraffe3d]

if you are using vray use Vray proxy it will really help you ! (and BTW anyone know if also mental ray has something similar ?)

thanks a lot :)

[Jacobo]

hi :)
I want to join the contest too.

Awesome! I'm a great admirer of your ouvre...

PS: Gitti birincilik hayallerim :) just kidding teehehe :)

[Frances]

Frances, I have to say that your renders are indeed masterful interiors. I've gotta long way to go. :-)
Thanks! :)

@elif - glad to see you on board, even if there goes any chance I had...:wavey:

Here is a minor update, still tweaking the brick, and I think the glare is better.

http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/Christmas_scene_final_day_web.jpg

[bigbad]

Hi again.
An update now. Now I'm going for a even more softer and more uplighted look. The way I remember my christmas from childhood. Only thing missing are the sparkle thingys.

Added blender internal GI now an render time was 40 minutes using only one core on my amd 4000+ X2. The other one playing Counter Strike :). The Global Illumination gave it more blueish look.

I had to add an extra layer of light for the tree.

Seperate layer for the presents also. With seperate lightning and shadows.

Blured the picture in Photoshop and color correction also done in photoshop.


http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/5540/winterli5.jpg

[giraffe3d]

hi fran :) thanks friend.
your image looks great and the fireplace. very realistic lighting and textures :)
I have no crits. maybe you can try a little different color on light bulbs than daylight color. maybe you can try cast shadow of the tree towards camera side so that it takes more part. but I am not sure if this will be good in termes of lights and darks or if adds to composition. was just an idea that I thought when see ur image :)

jacobo: thank you very much.

[Frances]

Thanks elif. :) I am trying a quick study with changing the sun location so that the light comes in from right to left. I'll post it as soon as I get something nice. I tried multi-colored lights for the tree, but I wasn't happy with the results because I couldn't get the color intensity I wanted. When I tried the white, I really liked it.

Here is another little update and a night version:
http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/Christmas_scene_final_day_web.jpg

http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/Christmas_scene_final_night_web.jpg

[Frances]

Here is a very small preview render showing the updated sun location. I like it very much because the sun dappling the wall and floors makes it more interesting and helps to define the object in the lower right as a rug. Also the inter-reflection on the large gold-wrapped present is very nice. Thanks for the suggestion Elif. :) I should have thought of it myself, but I guess that is what separates the good from the great. ;)
http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/new_sun_test.jpg

[jojo1975]

Hello Frances Getting better and better.. I also rendered some images I will post tomorrow. I've also used whotte materials ;) hope you don't mind ;)

[giraffe3d]

hi frances!!!thanks so much for ur words :blush:. very much thanks.
I think this looks so much bestter and so nice!!
I think u can decrease sun intensity.
and then the fireplace walls can look less flat. or maybe you can tweak shader. so that walls near window gets more light and more brighter and fireplace less brighter.
and maybe some soft shadows of needles of tree, falling more contrasty can underline presence of tree more. so that it gets more included inside scene though we see small bit of it. its shadow can do much work :)

[giraffe3d]

what resolution will we submit our final images?

[greyother]

Just got back from break. Now I can begin working on this again.
http://img152.imageshack.us/my.php?image=compmy8.jpg
http://img221.imageshack.us/img221/5070/compnf0.jpg

I think I am going to start over again in Maya and just use a simpler approach. The render times with my current Max setup are just too much.

[jojo1975]

@ Jeremy As always thanks for your wise suggestion. I've decided to use this two candidates, (the close up will need more details and My max crash when I try to apply meshsmooth and since I'm not using Vray I cannot use proxy also when I render in passes the max resolution my PC can afford is 800x600 so I should do multiple renderings etc. etc.. and so I prefer to concentrate on this). the one on top look more dinamic.. I know this should be a quiet scene but really I dont' know what to choose. I changed the wood material in the wall and also used "better" (thanks to France) material. I have to amit that also mental ray is cool ;)
I've tried to install also a trial of Maya and I've been fascinated by the better integration of MR. Same scene render with the Fpoint without any probles and it never crashed :(
I think I should start learning also Maya soon.
Feedback as always appreciated before rendergin the "last" one
http://www.webalice.it/giorgio.luciano/CGTALK/XmasToptFinal.jpg
http://www.webalice.it/giorgio.luciano/CGTALK/XmasFrontFinal.jpg

[giraffe3d]

hi jojo, maybe you can crop left side of image for the first one.
I like the glow.
how did you make it?

[jojo1975]

the glow wasn made using camera effect (in render panel) glare.it was 2.2 considering a sun at 11.00 (using skylight portal)
;) thanks

[pipjor]

here's my image.. i wanted show how the view might look thru the eyes of my 10month old..
3ds 8, Brazil 2, Photoshop..

I learned alot from T-R's work, that dude is really good..

[lighthunder]

Super.....................

[rajeshav]

Hi super images and great works,I would like to post my entry also but I dont know how to post my entry,afcourse we can post it as attachment but I would like to post it like the image appear big as jojo and frans and others did.plz somebody help me to do so. and Frans ur image, it looks great friend, nice texturing and lighting , did u done any modification in fireplace model?

[giraffe3d]

hi, rajeshaw,
please look this thread:

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=185&t=319005

[giraffe3d]

hi :)

I am sending my wip for challenge.
I created one image with dof and without dof.

I will explain how I made my image in next hour.
please crit my image.

best wishes

http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/wip01_dof.jpg

http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/wip01.jpg

[toontje]

@ Giraffe: This looks so photorealistic ... it's so hard to believe it is a CG render. And the composition and texturing are right on target too. 5 *'s

[greyother]

Giraffe: Wonderful render. I think the DOF is a little high IMHO. Looking forward to your breakdown.

[Frances]

Exsquisite work Giraffe. Hard to believe it is a WIP. :) The only things I see to crit are the aliasing on the tree lights and the undeveloped fire lighting (I'll bet that's the WIP part).

@rajeshaw, I did remodel the fireplace to have it be more compatible with brick construction. The original didn't import very well into Max. I've seen some people do some nice stone treatments though!

Here is my milk and cookies shot:
http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/Christmas_scene_Cam_02_web.jpg

[PhantomDesign]

I'm a little too distracted by some of my other projects to participate, but I've been enjoying watching everyone's work. I collected a few reference images for everyone....

http://bryanmills.net:8086/gallery/photos/Technology/sony_dsc_s85/christmas_tree_lights.jpg
http://www.mikeoconnor.net/images/christmas/100_1116.JPG
http://www.kennethbrowndesign.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2006/11/xmas-tree-039.jpg

The first has some asesome splash-light & glow effects I wouldn't mind seeing more of (T-R captured it nicely). The second has a fairly dark environment & shows some nice lense-flares & how the colored light have a bright white core. The third one has some asesome bluish lights on it.

Anyway, put the reference to good use!

[giraffe3d]

hey thank you so much :)

@frances: I think milk and cookie adds much to the atmosphere.



and here is my stages about my work:


1. camera angle
first I set my camera angle. trying to give much christmas time feeling and focus on objects.
I like the cold winter daylights from outside and warm fireplace lights inside rooms. I like this contrast a lot. both in meaning and in physical look.
so I tried to show this.
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/01.jpg


2. main light is window light
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/key.jpg

3. fill light
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/fill.jpg

3. candles
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/candles.jpg

4. fireplace
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/fireplace.jpg

5. bulbs
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/bulbs.jpg


I rendered this passes seperately.
I used vray. I used GI. my render settings are "very low" preset
. and AA settings are QMC sampling min:1, max:2. this is kind of lowest, but to see how materials look with AA.
all passes take around 1-2 minute time.

I added render passes in photoshop using screen-mode layers.

I color-corrected the bulb light layer and tweaked a little.
I also masked bulbs and copied and put some blur for some glow. I am not sure if they look good enough. I always like this effect when I see on renders and read various ways to make it but can never get a good result. if anyone can give me tip, I will be so happy.

I decreased opacity of fireplace layer. so it looks less intense.

I added the DOF in photoshop with lens-blur.

thanks a lot.

[giraffe3d]

hey thank you so much :)

@frances: I think milk and cookie adds much to the atmosphere.



and here is my stages about my work:


1. camera angle
first I set my camera angle. trying to give much christmas time feeling and focus on objects.
I like the cold winter daylights from outside and warm fireplace lights inside rooms. I like this contrast a lot. both in meaning and in physical look.
so I tried to show this.
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/01.jpg


2. main light is window light
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/key.jpg

3. fill light
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/fill.jpg

3. candles
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/candles.jpg

4. fireplace
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/fireplace.jpg

5. bulbs
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/bulbs.jpg


I rendered this passes seperately.
I used vray. I used GI. my render settings are "very low" preset
. and AA settings are QMC sampling min:1, max:2. this is kind of lowest, but to see how materials look with AA.
all passes take around 1-2 minute time.

I added render passes in photoshop using screen-mode layers.

I color-corrected the bulb light layer and tweaked a little.
I also masked bulbs and copied and put some blur for some glow. I am not sure if they look good enough. I always like this effect when I see on renders and read various ways to make it but can never get a good result. if anyone can give me tip, I will be so happy.

I decreased opacity of fireplace layer. so it looks less intense.

I added AO.
and the DOF in photoshop with lens-blur.
http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/wip01.jpg

http://giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/wip01_dof.jpg

[lighthunder]

giraffe good workflow :)

[lighthunder]

Frances good and amazing work liked it :thumbsup:

[hueman]

Hi,
I am new to cg talk (or any other forum).I took a shot at ongoing challenge. I used final gather.
I used a dir light for moon light , an area light and spot for fireplace, a spot for the tree. and point light in -ive intensities to bring out the shadows .
I would really appreciate if you pros could take your time to review my work so i could improve my skills.
Thank youhttp://i272.photobucket.com/albums/jj161/blueman_2008/christmas_lighting.jpg

[CGmm]

There are great renderings with the breakdowns posted already
by giraffe3d, Frances, T-R, and many others. Thank you!
I prepared mine simply to show how I put the renderings together.
Please take a look.Any comments are welcome.

http://www.seijimm.com/breakdown01.jpg
http://www.seijimm.com/breakdown02.jpg
http://www.seijimm.com/breakdown03.jpg
http://www.seijimm.com/xmasTreeInFocus.jpg

[rameshganga]

Hi. again this is rams and this is image rendered by MENTALRAY
http://img170.imageshack.us/img170/1241/final1xp7.jpg

[rajeshav]

Hi giraffe,

Thanks friend, but still I have a confusion,it tells about attaching files and it will appear as a
thumbnail and the people need to clik on that to view it.But I would like to know how u r image is appearing as a full image otherthan a small thumbnail,if u dont mind and if u have time plz tell me about that.Your images in ur website is simply marvellous and I have gone through the interview in the animation exp, and this image the xmas lighting challenge is getting better and better every day and hoping to see more breakdowns and tips and tricks from the very good artists participating in this challenge.

[hueman]

Hi CGmm,
Nice breakdowns buddy.I never did my work in layers and composited them in photoshop. Thus I would be greatful to you if you could shed some more light on the subject.
As you advised I would be viewing other members posts too.Thanks again for your time and shring your work.

[giraffe3d]

hi raje, thanks so much.
in that link, it also tells how to put images like I do. if you read carefully.
it explains the both ways.

let me simply explain here.
to put images in that way, 1st you need to upload ur image to web. there are some sites that host images. for example www.imageshack.us
you will upload there, and then give link of the image in your post. that is all.

[rajeshav]

Thank u very much giraffe,in two days I will upload my image and as I am new to this there will be a lot of corrections,plz help me to improve myself,thanks agin friend

[mirmel]

Thank you very much giraffe3d!!:) Great!very useful!!
and I really like your image!!

Thank you Jeremy for your feedback!
So I try go on with render layer to create more contrast between
light from fire and moonlight.

Here's my draft passes:

ambient light
http://img69.imageshack.us/img69/2640/ambientfg3.th.jpg (http://img69.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ambientfg3.jpg)

Light and specular from fireplace
http://img110.imageshack.us/img110/3940/test01sh9.th.jpg (http://img110.imageshack.us/my.php?image=test01sh9.jpg)
http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/9193/firedxkm9.th.jpg (http://img120.imageshack.us/my.php?image=firedxkm9.jpg)

from the moon
http://img410.imageshack.us/img410/4749/moondxkg4.th.jpg (http://img410.imageshack.us/my.php?image=moondxkg4.jpg)

composition:
http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/450/christmastest3ay3.th.jpg (http://img524.imageshack.us/my.php?image=christmastest3ay3.jpg)

what do you think?
I'm waiting for your crit!!

thank you all

m:)

[greyother]

There are great renderings with the breakdowns posted already
by giraffe3d, Frances, T-R, and many others. Thank you!
I prepared mine simply to show how I put the renderings together.
Please take a look.Any comments are welcome.

http://www.seijimm.com/breakdown01.jpg
http://www.seijimm.com/breakdown02.jpg
http://www.seijimm.com/breakdown03.jpg
http://www.seijimm.com/xmasTreeInFocus.jpg

Nice breakdown (02 is especially interesting) but I think your final image is too dark. (So is mine though - so I guess I can't judge too much :( )

mirmel (http://forums.cgsociety.org/member.php?u=307673): Nice warm and cool colors but the bright corner reflection on the framed picture really draws your eye there over anything else in the scene.

[swag]

update and think final
rendersoftware maya 3delight 7.0 (yeahhh baby its renderman - all hand made :) )

image was rendert in 4k

http://www.swag3d.com/cgtalk/christmasChallenge.jpg

here is a 100% crop

http://www.swag3d.com/cgtalk/christmasChallenge_closeup.jpg
will post a breakdown later ...

[giraffe3d]

@swaq: I like the warm feeling of your image very much. is that shadows coming from windows from sun? or from moon? I always thought your scene as night scene. but I think that part look like sun.

@mirmel: I think contrast colors of blue and orange light is very good idea.

[swag]

no there is no sun - the light comes from the street lights - its a snowy fogy day

[MinaRagaie]

update and think final
rendersoftware maya 3delight 7.0 (yeahhh baby its renderman - all hand made :) )


Yeaaahhh Baby 3delight rocks :)
Been testing it with that scene for the first time... is that the first time you use it too??

-Mina

[ienrdna]

look at my Dof!

[TLobes]

swag - Amazingly great job with the fireplace. The bottom left quarter of your render just looks... perfectly real. Im surprised no one else has really fixed the flatness of their own ones.

Ill go left to right. I'm sorry in advance, I'm not really familar using a renderman-style program, all I know is mental ray. Best I can do is give you the theory of a possible solution.


- The stocking that is farther away looks off while the closer one looks great. The further one has a sharp edge, not sure if it's being caused by the light or focus, but it doesnt blend well with the reality you've created. I would recommend adding some translucency or trying some subsurface scattering. The inside of the stocking is just too dark.

- Besides the fireplace, nothing else seems to have wear and tear to it. The gifts seem very bland. No miscrinkles here and there. Try adding a laid back fractal or noise bumpmap node to the surface to see if that gives you more variation between the gifts and a less "perfect" lighting.

-The floor looks good but is missing some specular highlights. A minor thing really, the fireplace and floor go hand in hand in looking badass, so maybe keep the idea on the backburner.

- As you go from the windowsills to the wall, the edges look unnaturally sharp. I would play a bit with the lighting and see if you can create more shadow around the wood trim and windowsills. Try adjusting the occlusion settings so its produces more shadow during your occlusion render.

- It looks like each drawer on your dresser is using the same texture. Mix things up a mix, maybe inverse one or create a slightly different texture using the clone tool. Also, the color of the trim on the dresser seems very linear, almost like a cartoon. Again, I think I more intense occlusion layer could help this.

- The reflection of the christmas tree lights in the window looks good, but the lack of those reflections in the rest of the scene makes it awkwardly stand out too much. Try giving the wooden textures int he scene a slight reflectively and then introduce some heavy refraction on the rays.

- Just an overall crit, the wallpaper doesnt seem to be in scale. The UVs of the plane facing the viewer looks a lot smaller than the rest of the walls, aka, the image is being scaled disproportionately. Try resizing them by eye or use a checkerboard texture.

- The color of the light cords seem a bit too green. I can't really afford a good panel right now for photowork, so, maybe someone else could chime in, but, the green seems very unnatural.

[swag]

@TLobes
thanks for your time and good crits - i agree with most of it - texture work was a fast rush and i spent not much time with it - the goal was not to great photo-realistic rendering (maxwell or fry render is there better render tool to make photo-realistic stills) i want a stylish toon touch on it like pixar stuff - think the fireplace is too much and dont fits the rest but i want some displacement in it :)

@jeremybirn #354 post
thanks iam happy you like it - its far from perfect and crits are a reason why iam here :) i see the problem with the light thats comes from the streetlight too - i want some interesting shadows going on but it confusing a bit and dont fits 100% with the outdoor lighting
reflections yes :) the whole image is without reflection ... renderman is much faster without hehehe - i did only a pass for the xmas balls and the windows

[jeremybirn]

ienrdna - Nice scene, but it looks like you forgot to focus your camera! Try arranging a scene so it has some depth to it, and focus on something, and then you can let the rest fall out of focus and show the nice bokeh and everything...

swag - Magnificant scene! I love it! The balls and lights and really the whole Christmas tree are spot-on. I love what you did with the fireplace. The model of the fireplace had been looking somewhat incomplete as I made it (if I had more time in modeling I would have covered it with rocks), but you managed to make it look really convincing somehow. If there are any critiques to be made (none really are needed, but I try to discuss issues with people who post, even when the work is terrific already) I don't find the light coming through the window to be a perfect match with the background image. It looks very dim and gray and overcast outside, but there's this really focused light coming through the windows seen on the floor and the side wall. It's hard to tell if that light is supposed to be sunlight, or a bright lamp outside, or what. Also, the exposure of the indoor scene, and the brightness of the little lights on the tree, makes it seem as if it should be quite dark outside. Maybe the outside could be more dark and blue, and the light coming through the windows could be dimmer, but softer and cooler to match the outside? Another issue is the lack of reflectivity on a lot of shaders. It seems like a lot of the paint, the wood, the ribbons, the metal fixtures, etc. could be reflecting their environment a little more, the way the window glass does, but a lot of surfaces appear to have a reflectivity of 0. I know this is convenient, especially compared to the render times needed for soft raytraced reflections, but still it does become an issue in some scenes.

mirmel - Nice scene! I like the bold use of color and overall dark tones. I think the lighting on the top of the doorframe reflects the fire too much, it's brighter than the firelight near the fireplace. There's a strange bright line along the top of the wall to the left of the tree, see if you can debug that. To make a surface like the star topper look reflective, try giving it a very dark base color or dark diffuse value, so that the reflections and highlights make up most of the brightness.

rameshganga - Welcome! That's a good job. SOme of the lighting looks very uniform. Try to create gradients on the walls, so that the wall on the left gets darker as you move away from the window, the wall on the far right fades off into darkness in the upper right corner, the ceiling above the windows gets darker as you approach the corner, etc.

CGmm - Nice job! I like your scene, and the breakdown is really interesting. I think it's too dark overall -- it just looks underexposed. I took your final image into Photoshop and checked the levels, and pretty much the whole thing only uses the lowest 30% of the tones available. When I correct for that, the scene looks a lot better, although brightening things does reveal that the shading and brickwork on the fireplace needs some work.

hueman - Welcome! I think the tree looks very uniformly bright, as if it were lit everywhere instead of just at the lights. The electric cord between the lights looks about as bright as the lights themselves, see if you can make the lights look a lot brighter and darken the rest of the tree. The set lighting is interesting, there's one place on the wall to the left of the tree where a semi-circle looks too sourcy to me, too much like a spot light aimed there.

giraffe3d - Awsome work! I love it! Congratulations! Thanks for posting a nice breakdown, too.

PhantomDesign - Thanks for reference pictures, hope you get a chance to try this scene sometime.

-jeremy

[CGmm]

>hueman
I separated the pass by creating new render layers
and apply the "useBackground" shader to everything
other than tree or boxes. (Hope this will help, if you are using maya.)
I guess this is the simplest, but not the only way to do.
I only wanted to change the brightness of those, so that was enough.

>greyother
Thanks for the comment.
I will try if I can make it look better with brighter tone.

>Jeremy
I'll check and fix the levels.
Now I see how dark it is. Thank you!

[Frances]

Here is a candlelight version:

http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/Christmas_scene_candlelight.jpg

[giraffe3d]

@jeremy: thanks so much!! I am happy you like.

can you give crits to me too? how can I improve?

[amouse]

Created another piece from a different perspective. Wanted to try rendering in layers and compositing it in photoshop. (thanks to T-R and giraffe3d for sharing their methods:thumbsup:). I am trying to create the feel of photographs taken from plastic cameras like Holga.

http://img264.imageshack.us/img264/7195/christmas2qs1.jpg

[lighthunder]

here is my another render, check this ! all comments r welcome :rolleyes: http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/3862/chrimas3forpostdo5.jpg

[thorsten hartmann]

Hi

this rendering is make with 3dsmax2008 & mentalray. I have use a Bokeh-Map.

http://www.infinity-vision.de/service/christmas_lighting_challenge_b.JPG

mfg
hot chip

[tuffmutt1]

Hi guys, here's an Update....3dsmax 9 Vray

http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/3780/xmas13kadkademoonlitmw1.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

[MaryamNademi]

Hey Frances,
You have done a super job,your image is so alive.this is a real home.i would suggest to add vray fur to those lamp wires,they look too thick.

Hey Elif,
Your image is so pleasant that i dont want to move from my seat.
Very smart shot.....!You are so good at what you do.


.........Ladies keep rocking:scream:!..........

[nitz3D]

Hi All,

Here is my first attempt for this Challenge. I have used 3Ds MAX 9, VRay 1.5 RC3.
I have just started mny work on it. This is approx 3 Hours work. Will get back soon. Critics and Comments are most welcome.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122302&stc=1
(http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122302&stc=1)

[jeremybirn]

Frances - Nice job. Maybe you could do a little glow around the lights, and also make the lights in the tree illuminate the needles? Some reflectivity in the window glass and picture frame glass and in the wooden mantle might help brighten and add sparkle to the scene as well.


giraffe3d - OK, if you're really asking for it. ;) The light bulbs look very uniform and flat-shaded. Bright bulbs that get over-exposed go to a constant white of course, but these bulbs aren't that bright. They might have a gradient in their illumination brighter towards the fillament. Or they might reflect the bright window light next to them - if the red balls reflect the window that brightly, you'd think the glass of the lightbulbs would at least reflect it a little. The stocking doesn't really read, maybe add a kick of light from the window, or a little rim from the fire, or both? From that camera angle, you might really see the flames of the fire itself.

amouse - Welcome! Interesting image. Maybe that bottle shouldn't go so bright on the top of the dresser, nothing else is that bright and it doesn't seem to be bouncing any light onto the dresser top. The bulbs have a strange look, as if they were clear glass with no color, turned off, but then the fillaments in the center are bright white instead of black?

lighthunder - Nice scene. It looks very flatly and uniformly lit. Try making the walls into gradients that are only bright where there's illumination, moving into darkness away from the window or in the corners where walls meet. Be selective to only light the places that are motivated by natural sources like light bulbs or the window, and use shadows.

thorsten hartmann - Nice shot. I can't really see the bokeh, bokeh stands out best when there are small bright highlights against darkness that fall out of focus. See if you can put more interesting scene into the reflection on the ball. The pine needles are faceted looking, they'll need more subdivision for the close-up.

tuffmutt1 - Nice scene, nice colors. It needs some occlusion to darken things near the corners. The lights on the tree look strange, the way they get bright on the outside edge and dark in the center, see if you can fix that. Maybe the balls and star could be more reflective.

nitz3D - Welcome! The lights on the tree need more work, if they are supposed to be turned on they should illuminate the needles, and have a little glow around them. Maybe the whole scene doesn't need so much ambient light, that could go darker. The far left architecture looks like it's missing some of the boards on the lower wall.

-jeremy

[rajeshav]

Hi friends, I'm new here and this is the first challenge I'm taking on.
I want to learn more about lighting/rendering so I thought this challenge would be a good place for me to try out some stuff.I have rendered this image using maya software renderer.No GI or final gather.I used two main lights, one is from the window and the other is from the fire place and added fill lights where there is needed.I have rendered this scene in different layers, they are,two colour layers for both tree and the room,one layer for the fill lights, one occulusion layer,one reflection layer and a shadow pass.I have composited the layers using Photoshop keeping the occulusion layer in multiplay mode.I have one more layer for the bulbs,I duplicated it and put in top of tree layer and blured it to get some glow effect on the bulbs.I am hopefully waiting for the valueable comments from the very good artists out here so that I can imrove my image and by that I can improve my skills.I request all out here please have a look at my image and give me comments.Thanks in advance........

http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg82/rajeshav/xmas_challenge2.jpg

RAJESHAV

[pratheesh]

awsome workk................

[lighthunder]

thank you for the feedback jeremybirn i will work on it :thumbsup:

[rajeshav]

hi
good start light thunder,hope to see more from u friend.

[rajeshav]

hi nitz, nice start man,ur meterials looking good especially that on the ribbons.

[rajeshav]

hi,
I have done few corrections in my image,changed the reflection on the balls on the tree, added some glow . Please check my image and give me your valuable commets.
thanks!http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg82/rajeshav/xmas_challenge5.jpg

[abhianim]

hi,
I have done few corrections in my image,changed the reflection on the balls on the tree, added some glow . Please check my image and give me your valuable commets.
thanks!http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg82/rajeshav/xmas_challenge5.jpgVery very nice Rajesh...awsome

[jojo1975]

the glow effect is very coold. but I dont' understand because in the scene it seems there is a light both in the left wall (that doesnt' come from the fireplace) and one on the right that seems to come fron the windows but in opposite position. Are you sure you don't have tow parallel that light the scene ?
jojo

[rajeshav]

actually there is three light sources,one from window,other in the fireplace and the tree illumination.in the left wall light falling directly from the window so I thought there will be more light than the opposite side because it is in the shadow from the fireplace,and the light is only from the tree illumination,and I didnt understood the question about the two parellel lights, could u explain plz.........
thanks for the comment.........

[TLobes]

@ raj - I love where you are going with this. Purple is not a color you expect to see in a christmas scene but you have just enough of it to make it look good. Your background and outside light source is great. It fits the color scheme nicely. I would love to see a high resolution of this with a lil bit of dof. Also, these are some of the best gifts I have seen. It looks like a family wrapped the gifts and not an ad agency for a magazine. Awesome job. Now for comments, left to right.

- Overall, are you saving the jpg at maximum quality? It looks like there is some quality loss going on. Can't tell if its the render or the jpg compression.

- The fireplace's bricks don't seem to have a uniform height to them, generally, right above the mantle. I could be wrong, maybe this is how your reference was, but it looks like a simple texture scaling issue.

- The fireplace should have "burn" wear and tear inside the chamber itself that fades as it comes out of the chamber. Otherwise the fireplace looks new and unrealistic.

- There is a lack of any sort of specular light on all the wood surfaces, the grooves of the fireplace brick, and the gift ribbons. I think if you add that and tweak it, it would take this render to a new level without losing the feel that you have created.

- The orange/yellow ornament bulbs on the Christmas tree look very out of place. It's as if you stamped them in after the render. I'm not sure if the light is affecting these objects properly or if that is your intention. For me, it just looks out of place. They are taking focus away from the purple lights.

- Play with the camera a bit and try working the purple as a focus for the scene, if that was your original intention, of course. Try for some different interesting angles and focus.

I really think this has the potential of being one of the best renders in the challenge. Great job, Raj.

[tuffmutt1]

hi rajeshav
I think you could crank up the lights a bit. especially the fire place light. the handles on the drawers are a bot too shiny considering how dark the overall room is. also if you could soften the shadows cast from the moon light it would really be dramatic. and the glossy reflections of the bulbs on the wax wooden floor would really add to it... keep at it.... good luck.

[jojo1975]

I will put save the image and do a small overpaint to show better. sorry for not explaining better in words :( but beautiful image indeed

[Fex]

back again...
with something experimental using free Houdini Apprentice with
its new path tracing render feature. Iam not so experienced with this piece of
software. This one has lots of grain from undersampling... not finished yet :)
Rendered with Mantra 9 using two area lights, dof and an extra bulb pass
comped in Shake

http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t271/fexa/Xmas_A.jpg

[rajeshav]

Hi all,
Thanks abhi,thanks jojo,thanks tuffmutt and a special thanks for Tlobes for spending time to have a detail look at my image and give me comments.I will try my level best to achive a better result than the present one by doing the corrections,as per the comments.You mean depth of field by dof right?Actually the the ornaments reflecting the fireplace light.Thanks tuffmutt I will defnitly look at it.ok thanks agin every one .hoping to hear more from you all out there.

[Frances]

Rajash, you've gotten some very good feedback already so far, so I'll be brief. :)

I like the purple lights a lot. It's my favorite thing about the image. I also like the way the light from the fireplace illuminates the stockings. I agree about the packages - they are my favorite out of all the images submitted so far. :)

Other points:
The fireplace itself might make more sense if it was constructed of natural stone as some others here have shown. If you have a good map for color and displacement, you could try that. Also, and I'm not sure how you would do it with your app, the fire light itself needs to be defined. I showed flames (opacity mapped surface with an actual picture of fire, self-illuminating), and the actual source of light was from small areas of the log mapped with an emitter material. If you can, paint onto the log some glowing portions and then use standard lights from your app for the illumination. What you have so far is a good start.

There could be more specular highlights on the room's surfaces - but not too shiny! I like the warm feeling you've created (even with purple lights!). Having things too shiny might make things look less inviting. I'm pretty sure that with Maya, you can create materials that use roughness maps to control areas of more and less shine. That makes a huge difference and gives a pleasing effect.

Illumination needs to be brought up a little. You could try (very carefully) to have a fill light behind the camera, as though it were coming from a light in the hallway and spilling into the room. You don't want to lose contrast by just upping an ambient value somewhere.

I hope this helps you!

[JCBug]

Hello everybody, I'm very impressed,
there is a lot of wonderful pictures !
All the artists are great !

I haven't got time at this moment to try this challenge
seriously, but I've made a test picture,
with 16 lights, 4 textures,
1 hour to render in Cinema4D
and a postprod in PShop.

I know that's completely out of the question,
but It's just for fun. :-)

http://www.arctique.fr/production/Christmas-00.jpg

Maybe I'll try another render if I've got time.

[Fex]

nice stuff JCBug :)
now have one more with better sampling and my first fluid fire in Houdini
hope u like it..

http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t271/fexa/Xmas_B.jpg

[JCBug]

I have just seen all posts of this challenge,
and I would congratulate :

giraffe3D (wow !!!), Masterzap, Fex, T-R, pbalsic, Tuffmutt, Frances,
M. Wilde, Jojo1975, CryingHorn...

And of course, thanks to Jeremy !

[mirmel]

Hi!!:)
Thank you Jeremy for the feedback!!
I worked on it and this is the result of the composition:
What do you think about? I'm waiting comments and suggestions from all of you!!
How I can improve it?
Thanks!!
m

[/url][url="http://imageshack.us"]http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/720/comp2vq5.jpg (http://img143.imageshack.us/my.php?image=comp2vq5.jpg)

[nitz3D]

Thanks Jeremy for your advice. I have not worked much on it but will sure take care of what you have said. Will get back with my latest Image asap.

Rajeshav:- Your image is looking OK. You are on a right track of getting a fantastic image. Your Tree lighting is looking good so far, but i think you need to work on over all lighting a bit.

[tuffmutt1]

JC bug, awesome... love that angle.its a first i think in this challenge.

hope you get time to finish it.

[giraffe3d]

@jeremy: thanks so much :) I will post an update and I will try to take care of things you said!!

@raje: sorry for reply late. I look at your wip and what I first notice is that it is darker than that is needed. (in my opinion). I think if you have focused light on tree and rest of scene gets more light, it can be more showing.

@mirmel: I like your angel since beginning. but is such angle that always make me feel like someone is watching the inside. so it can be nice, if you include one shadow of the watcher. I think it can be more alive.

@maryam and jcbug: thanks a lot :)

@fex: how do you make the flames?

[rajeshav]

hi all,thanks for the feed backs,thanks nitz,thanks giraffe thanks frances for ur valuable suggestions,I will definitly look in to it and try my level best get a better result than the present one,thanks again and expecting continued support and feedbaks from all my friends out there.

[nitz3D]

Hi All,

This my second post with a bit of corrections. Please have a look at it and suggest me whatever you can. Critics and Comments are welcome.

Thanks,
Nitesh

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122437&stc=1

[jeremybirn]

nitz3D - Nice job. I think the bulbs themselves could have a bit of a glow around them. They should light the part of the tree near them, but the center trunk doesn't need to be lit. You might even rotate the tree so that the more detailed front side is facing the camera. The package on the left side has a very dark bow on top and dark tape, they could use lighter shaders. The electric cords between the lights don't need to be that bright, usually they are dark green plastic. The balls have an interesting look. The one ball on the lower left looks almost transparent, even though that's probably an illusion and it's really just reflective.

mirmel - Nice job. The fire light on the upper left of the doorframe looks a little too bright, especially compared to the fire light near the fireplace. The lights on the tree barely look like they are turned on, see if you can make them brighter. It would be great if the tree had different colored lights and illuminated more of the walls, to get variety from that blue color. To make the star topper reflective, it should have a darker base color and darker diffuse, but bright reflectivity and specularity.

Fex - Nice job! See if you can do more with the lights on the tree to make them look like they are really illuminating the tree and the rest of the scene.

JCBug - Nice test. We need to be careful with these old-fashioned-style Christmas lights! The perspective on the star is a little extreme (for a shot without any barrel distortion) but I guess these are the creative options we get on the computer.

rajeshav - Nice image. I think the lights would be more convincing if they actually illuminated the pine needles near them (not just a glow effect, but with actual light.) That might help light some of the walls near the tree, as well.

-jeremy

[a7madfat7y]

a noobie here - to thsi site and to CG :D - , downloading the scene now .. i have an idea in my head , lets see if i can get it out in a good shape with my very little experince - just been 8 monthes since i created my first box in Max :S- ..

oh BTW .. amazing work by many ppl here, i am really impressed , well a lil bit envying you guys/gals too :P :D .. j/k

[tuffmutt1]

tuffmutt1 - Nice scene, nice colors. It needs some occlusion to darken things near the corners. The lights on the tree look strange, the way they get bright on the outside edge and dark in the center, see if you can fix that. Maybe the balls and star could be more reflective.
-jeremy

Hi, Thanks for the critic jeremy. it must be exausting for you to keep track of whose scene is going where and responding to it. Thanks for doing it though.
Here's an updated version with Vray dirt map added to parts of the scene. also added a light on the star and gave it an SI material. added glow and volumetrics in post.also added displacement to the fireplace wall. (not the right map ...will work on it more).

http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/6923/xmascorrectedudaykadkadgj4.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

and here's playing with variations in photoshop...added a ton of red on it ;)
http://img47.imageshack.us/img47/829/xmascorrectedudaykadkadfq2.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

[RazorJack]

And here's small update from me :twisted:

I know this is a lighting challange and the geometry is not that important but i decided to change the model of the tree because i had a nice christmass tree model lying around ... :)

http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/8136/cgchallenge13tc7.jpg

The render time was about 3 hours on Q6600 @ 3300mhz and all because of the glossy reflections

[jojo1975]

Cool very good model of the tree.. if you change just a bit the texture of the end it would become perfect :)

[davidesign]

So Jeremy, how do you judge the challenge. Do you collect all the pictures or you just browse trough all at the end and decide? It's been here for a while. At the end it is only a mini-challenge.

[amouse]

Thanks for the comments Jeremy. Here's an update with the corrections made. C&C appreciated. :)
http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/5073/christmas31qh2.jpg

[vjaramillo]

Going to be posting something soon. Late starter.

Vince

[vjaramillo]

Here's my first wip. Trying to achieve the look of a cloudy winter day. Comments are more than welcolmed.

Thanks,

Vince

[faultymoose]

Amouse, that's gorgeous! Beautiful take on a difficult challenge!

[vjaramillo]

another update.


Thanks,

Vince

[JCBug]

@ Jeremy - Thanks for your comments. The perspective is extreme, that's fun.
I think that I'm going to try another test with more visible balls and bulbs lights,
anyway, I am careful about electric shock. :-)

@ giraffe3D - Your picture is really wonderfull, would you like to render a bigger size ?

@ vjaramillo - Very clean and white ambiance, I like it. How is made the pine tree texture ?

[tuffmutt1]

So Jeremy, how do you judge the challenge. Do you collect all the pictures or you just browse trough all at the end and decide? It's been here for a while. At the end it is only a mini-challenge.

I believe it's going to be on till the 31 of Jan. so two more weeks to go til we move on to the next challenge.

[andystopps]

Wow, I think this challenge has attracted some of the best contributions yet.
On this page:
Nitz3d: Looks great, it might be nice to add a bit of depth blur to the room's corner in the background.
tuffmutt: I'm not so keen on the reddish cast, but the other one's great. The right hand stocking looks like it's transparent and the joints in the chimney breast are showing through (I think it's just a coincidence of the pattern in the stocking, but it caught my eye).
RazorJack: Love it; full of festive cheer. Maybe a bit of bump to catch some specularity on the hand and make it look less plasticky.
amouse: Looking nice; I'd prefer less blur, especially on the foreground, but maybe that's the kind of look you want? Also, from this angle, the floorboard chamfers look a bit extreme, like something you'd see on the decking of a boat. Maybe a little remodelling here would help, or replacing the floor with a simple textured plane.
vjaramillo: Nice restrained look, keep at it.
I haven't been able to spend that much time on this, beyond adding final gathering. I usually try to avoid FG, because of the rendering time, and fake it with arrays of lights, and ambient occlusion. Still, it's worth keeping one's hand in with these things...I should really repaint the displacement map for the chimney, the edges of the stones are too rounded, I think. A few extra odds and ends on the mantlepiece and on the carpet would help too.

http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t118/andystopps/xmas_comp_04copy.jpg

[jeremybirn]

a7madfat7y - Welcome. Anyone can cook. Just post what you make.

tuffmutt1 - Great job! The warmer one is much better, it gives a nice balance between cool outside colors and the warm interior. The glow on the ceiling above the tree looks fake and harsh, tone that way down. The star on top doesn't look reflective because it has too much diffuse, give it a much darker base color and the reflections and highlights will dominate. The stocking looks transparent with the horizontal line running through it that also runs through the brick behind it, maybe you can get rid of the line on the stocking? Some places seem to be lacking in shadows/occlusion, especially under some of the gifts, or connecting the picture to the wall. Underneath the center part of the window, there's a light leak of some kind that needs to be blocked illuminating the wall.

RazorJack - nice job! You need some scattering (or pink fill to fake it) on the hand. The tree looks good. The light bulbs look like they should be super-bright, but then the illumination from them and the glow around them doesn't look as bright as you'd expect from the bulbs themselves. The gifts look nice, although the shading on the ribbons is a bit less believable.

davidesign - On or around the deadline (Jan.31) I'll go through and make the gallery and judge. I'm sorry that I'm behind on making galleries now, in terms of the gallery from the last challenge not being on-line yet, but I'll try to catch up when I have time.

amouse - Nice job!

vjaramillo - Awsome, great image! I think the star topper could be more reflective, less diffuse shading, and that would make it more interesting. The balls on the tree could use more highlights from the lights as well, and the back wall (behind the cameara) needs to be brighter to make convincing reflections in those balls. To make the stockings look more like cloth, try giving them some translucency, so the interior gets lit a bit, and recompute or smooth the normals so they don't look so faceted. I love the overall look of the white christmas scene.

andystopps - Nice job! Some of the lights need more shadowing or occlusion, especially that blue light that hits the edges of the baseboards and the sides of some of the gifts. The star topper could be less diffuse and more reflective, maybe with that red center being lit-up? The reflections in the glass windows could use more reflections of the lights. The mirror could use more presence as a mirror, maybe some specularity or a little texture or something to make it look glassy, and maybe more than one light could reflect in it? More than one highlight could hit the frame of the mirror, too. The flames of the fire could go much brighter, right now they don't look any brighter than the stockings next to the fire, and aren't nearly bright enough to motivate the light around the fire, or those bright warm highlights on the gifts.

-jeremy

[nitz3D]

HI All,

Please have a look at my latest image with some lighting, material and modelling corrections, and this time i have used Photoshop also a bit for getting the DOF. So please check and critics and comments are most welcome...

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122478&stc=1http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122510&stc=1

Thanks,
Nitesh

[davidesign]

Thanks for reply Jeremy.

[jojo1975]

@amuouse one of the most realistic i really like to shaders and the colors chosen. how much did it take to render with DOF (or is it rendered in passes ?)

[T-R]

Thanks for the comments Jeremy. Here's an update with the corrections made. C&C appreciated. :)
http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/5073/christmas31qh2.jpg

Hey amouse I really like the compositing style in this picture.
Great job!

[tuffmutt1]

here;s a bokeh attempt :rolleyes: not at all happy with the cam angle, especially no treeballs visible. displaced the bulb for a bot of interest. will do more variations.
http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/6974/bokehudaykadkademk4.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

[vjaramillo]

JCbug: Tree texture is very simple. White: 240 with 20% self-illumination. While be posting an update.

Vince

[vjaramillo]

Here is an update. I need to texture the stockings, and make the tweaks jeremy recommended. I increased the scale on the trike. Looks better. Added a fill light behind the camera.

Thanks to everyone that have given me some go crits. Much appreciated.

Jeremy just bought your book. Great stuff.

Vince

[faultymoose]

vjaramillo, that's looking amazing! I love the subtlety of your lighting, and the coolness of the overall tone. Beautiful!

[RazorJack]

ok i tried to address some of the issues and put a background :)
i hope this will be final :)

http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/9682/cgchallenge13oj2.jpg

[tuffmutt1]

Here's another ver. new cam angle...fake bokeh in pshop lens blur and some funky CC on it.

http://img442.imageshack.us/img442/326/bokehudaykadkade2sf9.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

[nitz3D]

Here is my latest image with some changes and some photoshop works.
Please have a look at it.
http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122511&stc=1


Thanks,
Nitesh

[tuffmutt1]

hi nitz3D, nice job over all. i really like that cord material.
two things though, the star seems to be just hanging in the air.dont think it would be visible at all from this angle. and the treeball ornaments sort of look like a lemon. maybe more shiny might help?

[nitz3D]

tuffmutt1:- Thanks for your valuable comments. Will take care of that and will get back asap. Thanks again..

Nitesh

[Nehak]

Great work everyone!!

I had taken the first test render out before sleeping last night...This is a quick touch up image done in photoshop on that test render. I have used 3d max & vray for rendering. There is not much time left to complete the challenge, I will try to complete a more serious attempt later on. C & Cs are most welcome :)

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122512

[nitz3D]

Hey Neha...

Cool Job ya... all the best..

Nitesh

[Buca]

Update......
http://img174.imageshack.us/img174/2456/01kopieds0.jpg

[Nehak]

Hey Neha...

Cool Job ya... all the best..

Nitesh

Thanks Nitesh :)

[amouse]

andystopps - Thanks for the comments.:thumbsup: The floorboard chamfers do look extreme. I'll try to mess around with the floor models and see how it goes

jojo1975 - Glad you like it. The DOF is created with a seperate zdepth layer in post using photoshop's lens blur.

T-R - Thanks! :)

[tuffmutt1]

and here;s another version , (fishyballs revisited.):)
http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/6879/doffedfishukkc8.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

[nitz3D]

Hi All,

Here is my new image with a bit of changes and some photoshop works. C and C are most welcome.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=122550&stc=1
Nitesh

[rajeshav]

Hi all, thanks for the crits and suggestions.I have made some corrections according to the feedback I got from all my friends out here and especially the forum leader jermy.I tried my level best to improve the quality of my image.I have corrected the uv of the fireplace,added fire,added lights which illuminates the tree,added some specularity etc.please check this image and please give me your valuable feedbacks so that I can improve my image .Thanks in advance.http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg82/rajeshav/xmaslightingchallenge_new.jpg

[Frances]

@amouse, about the floor boards. I'm using Max 9. I went into sub-object mode, selected all elements, and scaled the boards up a little in length and width. Since each element has its own transform, they act individually. The bevels overlap a bit, but that serves to decrease the gaps and lower the bevel amounts. I hope this is helpful. :)

[rajeshav]

hi nitz now ur image looking beautiful,good work man.Hi tuffmutt nice work.

[doodlerboy]

Man I miss doing lighting challenges! Only 21 more months left till I can! Good Job everyone. Jeremy I just wanted to say hello!

[CGmm]

Hi, Here is my update with a little change around the fireplace.
I'm not sure how brighter I can go, (maybe more?)
but I wanted to keep the quiet night time mood with dim lights.
Any comments are welcome, thank you.

http://www.seijimm.com/xmasTreeInFocus02.jpg
(Maya MentalRay Photoshop)

>tuffmutt

I like your bokeh, DOF effects.
Maybe you can make the bulb smaller?
So we can focus more on the fishy ball.

[lighthunder]

jermey check this i worked on what u said and thank u for suggesions :rolleyes:

http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/7847/chrimas8forpostbu1.jpg

[nitz3D]

hi nitz now ur image looking beautiful,good work man.Hi tuffmutt nice work.

Hey Rajesh.. Thanks ya... trying to make it better.. let see. All the best ya..

Nitesh

[mirmel]

Hi all!:)

Thanks Giraffe3d for your comments and suggestions (I like your idea,...I'll try it!)

Thank you Jeremy for your careful feedback!!
I tried to follow your indication:
I have add some coloured light on the wall behind the tree, and add glowing of the tree lights, and I have correct the intensity of the bounce light on the door frame.

comments are welcome!!!

thanks!!
have a nice time!:)
m

[/url][url="http://imageshack.us"]http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/7900/composizione3jj2.jpg (http://img208.imageshack.us/my.php?image=composizione3jj2.jpg)

[Halford]

finally I had coupple of hours for me yesterday and I use them to evolve the previous post...

still searching...but a little ambiance is starting to be there...at least I think..

any C&C are more then welcome...and yes, there are lots of errors...they'll leave soon I hope :)

http://www.eyeillusion.be/temp/compo3bis.jpg

[mirmel]

Hi!!
this is another upgrade... more colors and glow

http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/9716/composizione4ge4.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[nitz3D]

Hi all, thanks for the crits and suggestions.I have made some corrections according to the feedback I got from all my friends out here and especially the forum leader jermy.I tried my level best to improve the quality of my image.I have corrected the uv of the fireplace,added fire,added lights which illuminates the tree,added some specularity etc.please check this image and please give me your valuable feedbacks so that I can improve my image .Thanks in advance.http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg82/rajeshav/xmaslightingchallenge_new.jpg

Hi Rajesh..

Your image is looking much better now.. but one thing [what i feel] that is the tree is looking a bit washed out in the whole image. try to make is more sharper.. as in the purple effect of the bulb is scattering all over.. try to make it effect only is some part of tree.. this way the level of brighter and the darker part will get define.. and i think your tree will look much better.. This is all in my opinion... All the best..

>> Nitesh

[rajeshav]

thanks nitz I will look in to it,thanks agin.

[TLobes]

@ Raj - Looks like you fixed a few things up. Great job. My concern now is that you are losing the focus of your piece. The purple seems to be bleeding onto everything now. I would tone it done a bit and make it more defined and isolated. Like nitz said, the image does tend to look a bit washed out now.

If you can fix that, and save the cheerleader, your image will look great!

[loramel]

Here is the final image of my first shot. Tried to go back to a more darker image. Also made some background visible through the windows. ( Snowy tyrolean mountains :D )

Blender internal render engine.
Rendertime: 40min at 1600x1200 with 8 oversampling on a dual core 2.4Ghz 2GB RAM.

http://loramel.gmxhome.de/xmas/xmas_11.jpg


While playing around with new camera angles and investigating blenders SSS setings I came up with the following idea.


http://loramel.gmxhome.de/xmas/kamin_01.jpg

Rendertime was 35 min at 1600x1000 with OSA 8 on a dual core 2.4Gh

[rajeshav]

hi tim thanks man,I will correct it and post my image as soon as possible,thanks friend for ur immediate reply.hoping to have more support from all my friends out there.

[tuffmutt1]

Hi, fixed the leaks under the window and layered it with an occlusion pass. also added a knoll lens flare on to of the tree. CCed in Pshop.
http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/5223/moonlit10occlusionpassxua2.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)

http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/1873/moonlitcorrectedredvd5.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)

and here's the blue ver.
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/9097/moonlitcorrectedzi3.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)

[omega3d]

Sweeeeet competition! Sorry I couldn't continue. Got bogged haha.

grea twork guys and gals!

[wellsichris]

I very rarely post on cgtalk, but decided to do this challenge as well as do a little tutorial on what I did to get the results. Thanks Jeremy for the challenge it was fun.

I did 3 renders. one with GI, one with just area lights, no GI or AO. Then one with Spot lights, using Shadow maps and AO. If you want to see the tutorial go to

http://www.chriswellsfx.com/Lighting.html

Here's the GI one, if you are interested in seeing the others they are on the tutorial site.

The details are Lightwave, fprime, Fusion for some touchup/post work.

Thanks,
Chris

[OrganisedChaos]

argh im always too late for these things.
ill give it a shot but i can guarantee it wont be done on time..

[Nehak]

Here's my serious attempt on the scene. I have used 3ds max & vray for the scene.

http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/7907/nehawip02gv0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


I have used vray sun, sky & physical camera, and area lights for the tree & fireplace. I rendered the image in seperate passes & composed it in photoshop.

The base image showing diffuse color:
http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/3483/diffuseho0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

I added two lighting passes, the GI & basic lighitng as a soft light layer in PS.
Image showing the lighting setup:
http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/5100/rawlightingbk3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Pass showing GI:
http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/1761/gizx6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


Next, I added reflection, refraction & specular passes.
Reflection:
http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/538/rawreflectionbb2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Refraction:
http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/6430/rawrefractionxf8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Specular:
http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/5892/specularhighlightsei2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


Next, I added DOF using gaussian blur masked with a Z-Depth pass
http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/7448/zdepthrx7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


This is the basic image composition. In the end I added colour adjustments, contrast & brightness adjustment layers, added glow for bulbs using gaussian blur and some trimmings in photoshop on the base composited image.

Thanks for reading through. C & Cs are most welcome :)

[xxbinxx]

very nice mood Neha I'll be watching you :D

[Nehak]

Thanks Bin :D

[jeremybirn]

nitz3D - Nice job! I like the way you have the star hung-up so it's still visible from this angle. I think for the elements in the foreground (tree and gifts) you might increase the contrast. You could use more darkness and shadow on the gifts, maybe with less light coming from some directions or some color variation in the fill from the different sides. On the tree, those bulbs could use a glow around them and could light-up the nearby parts of the tree more, but the tree doesn't need to be bright all the way through to the trunk. In the background your posts have been evolving brighter, and maybe the far background could fade darker with distance, expecially as you move beyond the fire?

tuffmutt1 - Interesting test (post #408), maybe you could get the pattern more evenly applied to the bulb so the facets are similar sizes? In #413 the ball is looking nice, although it needs something more to reflect, and the pine needles need some smoothing for the close-up. The fish balls (#422) look great, I love the colored irredescent quality. Your latest (#439) is terrific. I think the light from the fire casts light that stays pure yellow on the right wall of the fireplace, that's probably something bright enough to go desaturated in places, and that could stay a little darker towards the corners.

vjaramillo - That's really terrific! What a great look! I think (as of post 410) that the only fix needed is to the stockings, if you could just get the normals smoothed out on those and add a cloth texture.

RazorJack - Nice job!

Nehak - That's great! The one in post #417 looks just like a Christmas card. I also like the newer one in post #443. I think some of the balls look too diffusely lit, the way the lower white balls are overexposed on one side doesn't look completely realistic to me (the reflection pass makes them look better than that before all the other passes are added.) Maybe the carpet could be a darker tone, to help give more depth and contrast compared to the lower gifts.

Buca - Welcome! It'll be interesting to see what you can do from that angle. Maybe you can get some more contrast into the lighting, some real dark tones in between the bright areas? Reflections on the windows and maybe the floor and certainly reflective balls will all add to it.

rajeshav - Terrific image! I love it! I think the reflections in the window could show bright little highlights from the tree lights. Instead of being uniformly bright, the star topper could look more like reflective foil with little highlights and reflections on it, or maybe the center part is a light and it has internal glows and reflections from that radiating out? I like how some of the gifts on the right get rim-lit in blue, maybe some of the gifts on the left especially some of the top red bows should also be in a darker space?

CGmm - Nice image. I think it looks a little too Photoshopped, with the black edge to the right of the chimney. Maybe the candle light above the fireplace could look softer and dimmer. I like the lights on the tree, and their nice reflections in the windows. The composition could probably be tightened up, maybe from a slightly lower camera angle it wouldn't see so much space above and below?

lighthunder - Nice. I think it needs shadows and occlusion, especially at places like the edge of the fireplace or under and between the gifts. Maybe you can reduce the amount of ambient light that appears on every surface, so only some places go bright, and other parts of the scene are darker?

mirmel - Nice job. Maybe the lights on the tree could be brighter (right now they don't look any brighter than the balls.) There could be reflections of the lights in the windows and on the floor, too, that might liven-up the whole scene. The other version adding more colored fill light is nice, you don't need too much fill light though.

Halford - Nice job. With all the light around the windows and fire and tree, you could probably get a little light onto parts of the walls. The windows look interesting, but I can't tell where the light is coming from, it almost looks as if the light is inside the windows, like light coming up from the window ledges?

loramel - Nice scene! The wider shot holds-up better. The close-up could work, but you need more subdivision on the ball and better displacement on the fireplace and the coals seem to be floating or not in good contact with the fireplace. Since the candle wax glows so brightly it could light a little of the base under it.

wellsichris - Welcome! That's a nice scene! It seems as if a lot of things are very brightly lit by a light behind the camera and a little to the left. It makes the ribbons of some of the gifts look brighter than the windows, and the two bottles on top fo the dresser are glowing brightly from it. Maybe if this light were toned-down a little on some of the giftwrap and things on the dresser, but reflected more in the christmas tree lights and balls and star topper, it would help focus more attention on the tree. The lights could also be made a tiny bit more translucent, especially since they are back-lit by such a bright light, and maybe the window light could add a little more rim or kick onto the pine needles themselves.

-jeremy

[Frances]

Here is my final entry. :)

I've included a couple of mini-wee-small tutorials on how I created my fire lights.

Here is a link to a larger version:
http://www.surrealstructures.com/Fryrender/Christmas_scene_final_day_med.jpg

[tuffmutt1]

tuffmutt1 [/b]- Interesting test (post #408), maybe you could get the pattern more evenly applied to the bulb so the facets are similar sizes? In #413 the ball is looking nice, although it needs something more to reflect, and the pine needles need some smoothing for the close-up. The fish balls (#422) look great, I love the colored irredescent quality. Your latest (#439) is terrific. I think the light from the fire casts light that stays pure yellow on the right wall of the fireplace, that's probably something bright enough to go desaturated in places, and that could stay a little darker towards the corners.

-jeremy

ok, here's the corrected version with less sat and illumination in the fireplace.also added a bit of texture to the logs. added a reflection pass on top of the treeballs to kick em out a bit.(may be too much?) here it is anyways.

http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/6138/moonlitcorrectedred2ee2.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)

I m still not satisfied with a decent cam angle to really make the bokeh shot cool. so gonna play with it a bit.
here's my inspiration for the displaced bulb idea. although your intention was probably not to have led bulbs to begin with.
http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/4030/ledchristmasvh5.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)

[lighthunder]

thanks jeremybirn i really agree with u & i will go ahead with you'r comments :)

[JCBug]

Nehak - Very nice picture ! I love it.

tuffmutt1 - Interesting work on the bulbs ! It gives me ideas.

wellsichris - Great ambiance !

nitz3D - It's going better and better.

Frances - Very good final job !

Jeremy, I've just tried to render with lense spherical and chromatical aberration,
but it doesn't works very well.

http://www.arctique.fr/production/Christmas-0B.jpg

[rajeshav]

http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg82/rajeshav/xmaschallenge_final.jpgThanks jeremy,I have done few corrections according to your comments.I tried my level best to
achive the best I can.I know there is a longway to go to make it the best.Thanks again,and here is my latest image.

[nitz3D]

Rajesh >> Looking much better now.. but i still feel that the purple color is effecting so much to the tree... but still, its getting better now.. Good Job.. Just one more thing.. Balls are very much invisible in the whole scene.. may be because of dark reflections.. try to highlight it a bit more.. it will effect the whole tree.. All the best..

Nitesh

[JCBug]

Here is another test, with minor corrections,
on pine tree textures and lights. Renderer with Cinema 4D,
on a Mac G5 bipro 2x2,5 Ghz and postprod in PShop.

http://www.arctique.fr/production/Christmas-01.jpg

[rajeshav]

Thanks nitz,I will check it out,and I will try to correct it,thanks again.

[jojo1975]

well finally I guess I've found the correct angle.. comments are wellcome
http://www.webalice.it/giorgio.luciano/CGTALK/anothertry2.jpg

[snoopyBG]

c'mon it's a christmas tree, not a neon ad.

[jojo1975]

uhm the image is too dark in this one I will try a renrder with a fill light

[tuffmutt1]

well finally I guess I've found the correct angle.. comments are wellcome
http://www.webalice.it/giorgio.luciano/CGTALK/anothertry2.jpg

hi, jojo1975
its a high contrast render, and i am the first guy to say i love it. especially the burn effect on the windows. sure them cords look like neon , but i think considering all the new stuff out there , its brilliant that u did play with that.
my only gripe whith this imqage is that u cant say that thing on top is a star. may be u can rotate ita bit towards the cam , so its more legible. also if them light cords are neonish , may be they caninfluence some illumination on the pine leaves. just my 2 cents.

[jojo1975]

thanks for the comment I will fix the material here's another more "normal" angle. I will prepare a contact sheet with all the variation as soon as I will be home (should be this weekend) and then basing on feedback I will do composite rendering of that. Thanks for the feedback.This is the best challenge since now. but in 10 days we will see the other one ;)
http://www.webalice.it/giorgio.luciano/CGTALK/HalfSunjpg.jpg

[cosmonaut]

Here's my latest attempt, this time using blender and indigo:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2112/2211264524_9f6f8bc0c2_o.png

[giraffe3d]

hi all friends :)
here is final images.
I think I will not have another chance to make new renders but your crits are ALWAYS welcome!
thank you all.

http://www.giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/final.jpg



image with DOF:
http://www.giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/final_DOF.jpg


image in RED
I was playing with color balance and made this one. so I wanted to show you :)
http://www.giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/final_red_DOF.jpg





in image below, I tried anothor DOF attemt. I know it has problems. but I liked the sweet highlights! and I wanted to share.
http://www.giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/final_dof02.jpg


and this last one is my play with filters.
I liked this one. is like tree is coming to be real out of a painting. so I wanted to show.
http://www.giraffe3d.com/w/xmas.challenge/final_under.jpg

[tuffmutt1]

giraffe3d,
WOW! u kick nutt on this one. amazing work.
my favourite is the image in red. really awesome.

[vjaramillo]

Giraffe, why do you have to make us look bad:thumbsup: Amazing as usual. Here is my final image. No more time to play.


Vince CCs are always welcolme. It's been real fun participating.

[wellsichris]

Here's an update. Thanks Jeremy for the feedback, I think it has helped. I added some more stuff as well. a texture on the presents, a subtle texture on the walls, just a little to not make them feel so uniform. I ended up reworking the shader on the tree itself. it's actually got some SSS going on in the needles now. I also added a couple of props to areas that I felt needed more interest. the sofa and tricycle are from lightwave's content. with some shader help. :) and then the frame and shelf I just quickly built, taking pieces of the tree for the greenery.
http://www.chriswellsfx.com/demo/cgtchriswellssmall.jpg



also here is a 2560X1600 version if anyone wants to see the full render

www.chriswellsfx.com/demo/cgtchriswells.jpg (http://www.chriswellsfx.com/demo/cgtchriswells.jpg)

Thanks,

Chris

[L33tace]

Thanks Jeremy for your comment. I ended up spending too much time on the textures and I'm taking a break from it to see can I get some fresh inspiration, nothing whatsoever to do with your wonderful scene. :love:

Wonderful images everyone. :)

[Halford]

Thanks Jeremy for the comments..I'll look up to it.

Here is a small update...not much time lately...I hope to have some this week end.

all C&C are welcome as always.

Hal.

http://www.eyeillusion.be/temp/compo4.jpg

[KelvinChen]

Hi everybody,this is what I have so far..This is my first contribution in CGtalk challenges too.


http://lh5.google.com/kelvinchen83/R5izykxO9bI/AAAAAAAAAWY/5zemJwy3fnI/s800/ChristmasChallenge_kc.jpg

[jojo1975]

giraffe 3d your work is amazing ;) I will try this week to do the last renderging
This is on of the greatest competition ever :)

[snoopyBG]

Hi all, here I go with my image. Not very much in the established mood, but who says they all should be the same.

http://aycu19.webshots.com/image/39298/2004204511453782581_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2004204511453782581)

software used:
3dsmax 9 64bit
Vray 1.5
PhotoShop

rendered on a core 2 duo @3.36Ghz 4GB DDR2 with the help of 3xQuad Core @3.2Ghz 4GB DDR2. It took about 6hrs only because of the displacement, which takes a lot of time when rendering a large resolution.Originally rendered in 1500x1500.

I used 2 extra passes for additional effects:

-volume fog
http://aycu18.webshots.com/image/40377/2000561125332929453_th.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2000561125332929453)

-and z-depth
http://aycu24.webshots.com/image/40943/2000531245701500449_th.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2000531245701500449)

Actually one more was used to mask and tweak some colors and levels. I used PS to merge it all together and fine tune it.

Light setup is as follows:
http://aycu15.webshots.com/image/41294/2001934532493282230_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2001934532493282230)

1. Fill light behind camera
2. VraySphere light for the shadows on the left wall.
3. Direct light used only for the volume fog pass.
4. Vray Plane light illuminating only the tree.
5. 3 Vray Plane lights at the windows for room lighting.

It was rendered with Exponential color maping.

Hope you like destruction :)

[mirmel]

Hi all!!
Thank you Jeremy for your feedback!
This is my final image, .. I think I'll have no more time to do other version.
But I'm waiting for your comments and critics.

there are so amazing works! complimets to everybody!
Thank you!!
m


[/url][url="http://imageshack.us"]http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/5625/finalmt8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[ARTECmedia]

Here We go !!! :)
Another image from our team.
Original Artist: Svetlio Mihaylov
SW: 3DSmax9x64 + Vray 1.5sp1 + PhotoShop

FINAL IMAGE

http://www.artecbg.com/images/3dbg/1/cgtalk/Xmas_svetlio_SMALL.jpg
FULL resolution http://www.artecbg.com/images/3dbg/1/cgtalk/Xmas_svetlio.jpg

BLURED OPTION

http://www.artecbg.com/images/3dbg/1/cgtalk/Xmas_svetlio_lensblur_bleachbypass_SMALL.jpg
FULL resolution http://www.artecbg.com/images/3dbg/1/cgtalk/Xmas_svetlio_lensblur_bleachbypass.jpg

PURE RENDER

http://www.artecbg.com/images/3dbg/1/cgtalk/Xmas_svetlio_render_SMALL.jpg

ADDITIONAL PASSES
VRayAtmosphere
http://www.artecbg.com/images/3dbg/1/cgtalk/VRayAtmosphere_resize.jpg

VRayZDepth
http://www.artecbg.com/images/3dbg/1/cgtalk/VRayZDepth_resize.jpg

Please, be courteous and polite :)

[giraffe3d]

hi friends :)
thanks u very much for nice words!!!
I am happy u like.

I see very good works from everyone.
I mean it was really very fun and interesting that all of us work on the same scene- with many different ideas and different ideas, approaches, camera angles!!! this is so interesting and amazing.
it was really so fun for me to join this challenge and I learn many things.

thanks everyone and jeremy to make such challenge.

[kanooshka]

Spectacular work everyone, this is quite the competition. I haven't updated in a long time but choosing to not use GI it's hard to keep up :D Here's my new update and breakdown.

http://www.dockay.com/LightingChallenge_Christmas/Christmas_06_composite.jpg

I'm using maya with mental ray for my renderer. No final gather or GI.

My lighting setup includes

51 Volume lights, for the ambient lighting pass
12 pointlights in the fireplace and fluid for the fire itself
3 spotlights for the backlighting pass
3 spotlights for the bounce pass
3 spotlights with mental ray arealights and 1 cool spotlight on the window pass
81 volumelights for the christmas tree

I then took the passes composited them in photoshop and did some minor color corrections.

http://www.dockay.com/LightingChallenge_Christmas/Christmas_06_breakdown.gif

[giraffe3d]

jojo1975:
I was looking at your dof in post 455.
what kind of blur did you use? if you are using photoshop, you can use lensblur filter. I think it makes nice results.

and on post 459:
I like this angle but maybe exclude right and left sides of image, and excluding the empty wall and (changing the room a little) make the fireplace come to front and become visible.
just an idea :)


snoopy BG:
you have very different approach:)
I think it can be good contrast if you make old dirty walls darker and tree in light.

best wishes

[seminalsoul]

hey guys... my second attempt at lighting in maya.

just 2 point lights in the scene. was trying to set a mood (i hope its set).
if u need any details on how i lit it, just shoot the questions.

rendered using maya software, added lil contrast using pshop

i din't knw how to make the flames in maya, so i din't make em.
someone please help with the flames :p

check it out:
http://www.seminalsoul.com/christmas.jpg

[snoopyBG]

giraffe3d (http://forums.cgsociety.org/member.php?u=46012), nice idea. Here, I tried it out:
http://aycu15.webshots.com/image/41414/2000029025339802547_rs.jpg (http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/v/2000029025339802547) vbmenu_register("postmenu_4909408", true);

It definitely contributes to the idea, but I still don't know which one I like the best. I'll leave that to you guys to decide.

[withego]

Hi to everybody...!
Even if a little late, I'm posting my contribution to this interesting Lighting Challenge created by Jeremy Birn.
To create this Image, I used Maya 2008 with MR Physical Sky/Sun & Mia X Materials, except for the Milk in the carafe and the glass for which I used the Misss Fast Skin Material.
For the lighting I used 2 MR Portal Light, one behind the windows for the cold winter enviroment, and one behind the door for the warm interior ambience.
The Physical Sky enviroment is connected to both Portal lights using the enviroment slot.
A Mib Blackbody with a temperature of 6500 K is connected to the Light colour slot of the WINDOWS Portal Light.
A Mib Blackbody with a temperature of 3200 K is connected to the DOOR Portal Light colour slot.
The Light emitting from the Wall lamps, the Chrismas Tree lights and the Fireplace is achieved through the additional parameter of the Mia X Material to which I connected Mib Light Surface shaders.
Finally I rendered an additional AO render pass, and another slight additional lights fog pass with software maya renderer, and composited all in PS.
Hope you like it...!:shrug:

Cheers,

Alex Sandri
http://www.samui3d.com (http://www.samui3d.com/)

http://www.samui3d.com/gfx/christmasmaya2008.jpg

[snoopyBG]

Your camera is too wide and twists and teeters objects really badly in the corners.

P.S. It would be nice to model your own objects when participating in a challenge, not just take them from evermotion.

Lesno e da se redi

[seminalsoul]

Your camera is too wide and twists and teeters objects really badly in the corners.

P.S. It would be nice to model your own objects when participating in a challenge, not just take them from evermotion.

Lesno e da se redi

which render are you talking about? :)

[seminalsoul]

ok here's a lil update on the scene with some pshop work on the og one.

just added a lil contrast with gaussian blur

have a look:

http://www.seminalsoul.com/christmas2.jpg

[snoopyBG]

well, the last one before my post :)

[seminalsoul]

well, the last one before my post :)

ahh, alright. i got confused a bit :)

[withego]

Your camera is too wide and twists and teeters objects really badly in the corners.

P.S. It would be nice to model your own objects when participating in a challenge, not just take them from evermotion.

Lesno e da se redi

Dear snoopyBG, I noticed this Lighting Challenge just 2 weeks ago and if I had to model every single mesh, I could not meet the 31 January deadline.
Since this is a lighting challenge and 3D model is already provided by Jeremy, I think that to model every mesh is completely out of the scope.
Considering the very high level of the artworks displayed here, I suppose that every 3D artist posting in this thread is able to model any kind of mesh, if given enough time of course.
Please also note that if you use Maya as I do, you often are facing the task of fixing normals orientation, tassellation and sometime remodel from scratch some mesh imported in the Maya package.
So there is always a lot of 3D modelling involved with Maya, which is good to improve your own skills.
Regarding the camera angle, I decided to go for a very wide angle (which brings some distorsion at the corners) to embrace as much as possible of the scene provided.
This to show how several objects interact each other with the ambience lighting present in the room.

Back to the Challenge, I forgot to mention the MR render settings I used to create this
image:

AA: 0.041 0.041 0.041
Filter: Mitchell 4 4
Ray Tracing: 4 4 8
GI Accuracy: 500
FG: Accuracy 250 Point Density 0.400 Point Interpolation 50
Reflection 5
Refractions 5
Max Trace Depht 5
Secondary Diffuse Bounces enabled

About rendering times.

Since that my Quad workstation is always busy rendering 3D jobs, for this Challenge I used my old Athlon 2.8 single processor with 3 Giga of Ram.
Considering the huge size of the scene (198 MB) I had to render half of the scene first, freeze the FG map and render the second part of the scene, with the FG map previously created.
Half section of the rendering took roughly 8 hrs. to render, so total rendering time was 16 hrs.
:eek: I know 16 hrs for a rendering is simply outrageous, but with the Quad system render times should be less than half of that.
I guess by reducing the AA to 0.1 0.1 0.1 and working on the BSP settings, render times should be shortened.

Ciao...!

PS. Please keep this thread constructive, so many young 3D artists could learn from it!

Alex Sandri
http://www.samui3d.com (http://www.samui3d.com/)

[snoopyBG]

Don't get me wrong. I know you don't have to remodel what Jeremy Birn supplied for the challenge. I didn't remodel mine. I was talking about the models you took out of evermotion to put in the room. I'm not saying it's cheating. After all it's a lighting challenge and we shouldn't care about modeling. It's just that when I see a room full of models taken out of a collection I suddenly lose respect to the efforts the author made.

Isn's there in Maya a feature doing the same as camera corection in max to straighten things up?

[RazorJack]

I decided to play a little more with my image.
Here is my previous attempt:
http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/9682/cgchallenge13oj2.jpg

Now i added some frost on the windows with these maps:
http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/9125/frostwebbk4.jpg

I also added DOF through Z-depth pass and tried to imitate some kind of Kreutz photo filter for the lens flares.

And here's my final image:
http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/8021/cgchallenge13cp9.jpg

[Andi2008]

Hi

im new to this forum. I see all these beautiful renderings and now i decided to
take part.
Great idea to do this challenges, i watch the others too.

I´m using 3dsmax with mentalray, and do the postwork in Photoshop.
I´m realy new to mentalray, used brazil before.
But with help of the german mental ray forum, i´m getting better and better.

Enough words for today, here is my picture.

Greetz
Andi

http://project-k87.de/einstein/work/clc_santa.jpg

[andystopps]

Here's my final attempt at this, I haven't got time to do more, so there's a few things which could certainly do with improvement, particularly sorting out the chimney UVs so that the texture actually wraps round the corners, and the glass in the windows is pretty dodgy; oh well...
Great work everybody.

http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t118/andystopps/xmas_new0001.jpg

[shoox]

here is my start ,C&C are Welcome :) I'm using maya 2008 with mental ray
http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q137/ahmedyousry/ChirstmasTest01.jpg

[Nehak]

Jeremy...Thanks a lot for your inputs :) I have tried to include everyone's suggestions in this udate. Here are my final images:

The main image:
http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/4773/finalwborderok8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


Whenever I think of Christmas, the first impressions I get on my mind are bright lights, red & white colors. So, I made a red & white stylized version of the image:
http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/2664/stylized01tp8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


Although I spent very little time on my fist image, I like the way it turned out like a Christmas greeting, also it probably shows bokeh better than the main image...so I would like to include that as well over here :)
http://img219.imageshack.us/img219/5562/stylized02wk6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)


As this was the last weekend before the challenge closes, I doubt if I'll get to post any more updates, but like always, C & Cs are most welcome!!

Thanks Jeremy for the great challenge, it was good fun to follow everyone's works :D

[neil09]

Nice job Neha, very impressive :thumbsup:

[seminalsoul]

nice work Neha. but, all your renders are close up's. if you can, make post a full scene render, nothing like it.

In the 3rd render, the lighting is looking a bit off. the yellow and red light falling on the boxes below, are looking out of place a bit (unless thats how u wanted it).

[mirmel]

Hi!:)
I had chance to do few changes on last posted image, I gave more color to the tree lights
so this is my final attempt on challenge!

Razor: I really like your work:good materials and very realistic lights !!
but I think the glow is too regular and the poor girl's skin seems like plastic.

Nehak: good work! I agree with your color concept of Christmas!

I'm glad to have attended in this great challenge!!
Thank you very much Jeremy for this opportunity!

http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/4016/finaljy6.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[Nehak]

nice work Neha. but, all your renders are close up's. if you can, make post a full scene render, nothing like it.

In the 3rd render, the lighting is looking a bit off. the yellow and red light falling on the boxes below, are looking out of place a bit (unless thats how u wanted it).

Thanks :) I will release the complete render tonight, though I'm not sure if I'll be able to complete the image before 31st. The third image is actually something I did in a very short time as a test image before starting the actual work...there is something I like about the way it turned out so posted it here :D

Nice job Neha, very impressive :thumbsup:
Thanks Neil :)

[shoox]

here is my second attempt :)
http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q137/ahmedyousry/ChirstmasTest02.jpg

[jojo1975]

ok this should be almost the final one..Chaged angle from INSIDE the fireplace ;)
http://www.webalice.it/giorgio.luciano/CGTALK/LCXIIIFinalAngle.jpg

[snoopyBG]

Having objects so close to the camera means the should be very detailed. The part of the fireplace which is in the frame is way too simple to be so close. Think about a way to enhance it so it doesn't look that unfinished. Also try to put some color variance in the picture. It's too uniform. Maybe different color of the walls or the wooden frame oughta do it. The material of the floor also could use some tweaking. Just look at some of the other floors here.

[seminalsoul]

Thanks :) I will release the complete render tonight, though I'm not sure if I'll be able to complete the image before 31st. The third image is actually something I did in a very short time as a test image before starting the actual work...there is something I like about the way it turned out so posted it here :D

looking forward to the render. :)

[shoox]

here is another test of my render
http://i135.photobucket.com/albums/q137/ahmedyousry/ChirstmasTest03.jpg

[jojo1975]

thanks for the feedbackl I will try an update before the end ;)

[tuffmutt1]

Hi all, got some time yesterday, so did a couple of bokeh shots. To optimise the needles i detached a few that were going to be close to the camera and turbo smoothed only those to avoid smoothing the entire mesh and in the process killing mental ray.:rolleyes:

some passes included in this post. 3dsmax9 and mental ray. post done in photoshop.

MR render
http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/7440/redballsmrrenderbn0.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)


lensflare
http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/4507/lensflareqr0.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)

Glare pass_ i excluded the blubs for the glare pass as they only burnt the bump texture on the bulbs.
http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/8050/glarepassiv8.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)
Z pass
http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/9234/zpasscz8.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)
Composite
http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/1951/xmasukredballsredoc8.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)

and here's a greened out version.
http://img525.imageshack.us/img525/6841/xmasukredballsgreennq1.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)
I rendered out a spherical HDRI render of the room to use as reflection map.

and here's a similar render with fish in the ball.:twisted:
http://img182.imageshack.us/img182/7220/xmasukbokehkh5.jpg (http://imageshack.us/)
By uday_kadkade (http://profile.imageshack.us/user/uday_kadkade)