Haha yar!! 
DMP Mini Challenge_009 - April 2015 - Skyline Vista
Drewsen
#6
I finally have my new rig all up and running, it will be nice to get back into these competitions, I can’t wait!
MaiAnhTran
#9
Hi,
Just asking to make sure… :
It is written in the brief : ‘‘This is a modern day cityscape skyline’’
Does it really have to be at Day ? Or can we make a night shot ?
Ackdoh
#10
Great question Mai! The brief said to keep with the lighting direction, but time of day is up to your interpretation
izidro
#11
Hi guys,
I’m a newbie here in the forum and Im having a little problem on posting my images.
I’ve tried posting from a project in my portfolio and also from a external one (deviant art) but neither of them appear on my thread : (
Can anyone give me a little word of wisdom, please?
Many thanks
Felipe
Ackdoh
#13
Tinypic is a great suggestion, also try photobucket.com, imagshack.com or imgur.com for other free hosting options. You don’t have to post it inline, just a link will suffice and we can look at it from there.
Ackdoh
#15
And the winners for April 2015’s challenge are…
1st: Andrew Burles
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=370&t=1270508&page=2&pp=15
David’s comments: This to me was a a very solid piece technically and realistically matching the plate, brief and lighting. Great job with the atmosphere all together with strong contrast in the foreground and blue hues of the haze. Lovely handling of all matte edges. Adding just a little more weathering on the top bits of the ledges would be cool. Those taggers, can’t stop em even way up high!
Milan’s comments: This is a solid Matte Painting, based on provided geometry. Very well done. The only thing that slightly irritates me is the sky. It feels a bit too much like straight out of the box. The clouds are possibly somewhat too defined, creating more visual interest then you might want. Even though it’s a realistic premiss, you can still manipulate the viewer and lead the eye with little tricks, such as reducing detail noise in an area
Jason’s comments: Great end result from Andrew this month. What strikes me is how realistic the image feels overall in terms of colour and lighting. This has a feeling that we are looking at a real city view. Andrew has managed to balance the levels of contrast very well, and graded the colours together paying attention to the atmospheric perspective from foreground to the horizon, resulting in a good sense of depth. It’s good to see this done without resorting to the airbrush tool, which I see people use too much, and when the airbrush tool is over used it gives a stylized and unrealistic result. Because Andrew has pulled this off convincingly his entry was easily the first choice for me. Well done.
2nd: Mai Anh Tran
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=370&t=1270081&page=2&pp=15
David’s comments: I really love your creative direction here in a dusk type lighting scheme where it’s just dark enough to start glowing off some of that neon light in the darker parts of the environment. I can feel it being pretty modern, but still being a large city set not in the Sci Fi future, but a very near future of an Asian country such as Shanghai. I think seeing just a little more cloud detail in the left side of the sky would give more interest, something subtle just like what you have on the right hand side in spots.
Milan’s comments: It was really creative of you to change the mood. You have great artistic sense and impressively tackle huge undertakings with such wonderful enthusiasm that it is inspiring. You are also willing to take risks, which you demonstrated here by significantly changing the silhouetted shapes in addition to the mood. I assume you ran out of time though, as your final submission does not feel completely photo-realistic. It works but is a few steps away from a finished Matte Painting. To get visual cues of how to push this to final, I recommend looking at photography of really humid cities in summer with a fair amount of air pollution. Almost there.
Jason’s comments: An interesting take on the brief from Mai. The choice of architecture works well, and it was good to see Mai deviate from the grey render but still keep the composition working. I like the overall colour choice, especially the little red and green colour accents throughout. It’s all very sensitively handled. I would have probably played down the strong sun a touch, especially as it’s just clipping the edge of frame, as this is leading the eye out of the image, and the “god rays” are a bit flat and don’t look like they are coming in to the landscape correctly. But apart from those small changes i would make i think this is a very strong entry.
3rd: Dylan Pierpont
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=370&t=1269302
David’s comments: Great job on the hazing here Dylan! It really works now and fits with your more divided, more industrialized city in the BG and more dilapidated FG precinct. A nice cohesive atmosphere, but maybe going just a tad more blue of a hue in the distant Z so it’s not too monochromatic. I think the sky could use a stronger gradient where the sun would make the right side of the sky more bright than the left a little more.
Milan’s comments: I really like your piece. One thing bugs me though. Even if it’s correct and intended, the skewed tag on the ledge in the foreground screen right brakes the visual flow for me. Change the angle to improve the rhythm of your image. A similar thing is happening in the sky, where the contrast line is kind of parallel to the top of the frame. Try changing up some angles to get your cityscape more lively. It’s some little things here and there but overall, I can tell you have worked hard to get it right. Good job. Just experiment a bit more until things feel harmonically comfortable.
Jason’s comments: It’s good to see Dylan turn this entry around relatively late in to the month. Earlier work in progress uploads had me worried that it was heading in the wrong direction, as it was looking very misty and unfocussed, but the final post works well. I like the rusty weathered look to the rooftops. There is something lacking in the composition now with the addition of taller buildings screen left and removal of some of the prominent buildings screen right, resulting in a composition that is not as strong as it could be. The grey render could have been followed a bit more as a guide. Great to see the progress throughout the month though.
The winners will be getting:
1st Prize: 1 x CGWorkshop, 1 xCGTOD, 1 x Ballistic Book of Choice, 1 Year of CGSConnect Membership
2nd Prize: 1x CGTOD, 1 x Ballistic Book of Choice, 1 Year of CGSConnect Membership
3rd Prize: 1 x Ballistic Book of Choice, 1 Year of CGSConnect Membership
Honorable Mention: 1 Year of CGSConnect Membership
Congrats to all! Thanks to everyone for joining, and we hope to see you next month for April 2015!
Drewsen
#19
Congratulations Mai and Dylan, great work as always.
Thankyou everyone for your comments and assistance, it really means a lot to me to win one of these.
DylanPierpont
#20
Thanks everyone! And major congrats to Andrew and Mai. You both crushed it. Very humbled to be included with the pair of ya :bowdown:
izidro
#22
Congratulation to the winners!
Your work looks great, and very inspirational. Its great to see how different results can be having the same starting point.