Grand Space Opera 3D Entry: Elben Schafers

#41

Glad you asked about the vines. I was actually trying to go for a sorta fleshy alien-like material, little different then a typical vine. I also chose the color to keep the viewer from associating it to strongly to a specific earth like material.

#42

I’ve never had such a hard time rendering. At first I tried to render the whole scene, but couldn’t do it due to page faults? So I bought more RAM, didn’t work, cut up the scene into pieces didn’t work. Finally seperated the main scene into multiple scenes based on foreground, mid and background then lasso rendered each image. Just finished comping them all together in Photoshop.
This is getting close I think, but crits would be welcome.

#43

this is coming out very nice. :)! how about a speculiar map to give it an alien and oily feel, but if u want to keep it mate i thinks then it is good this way.

those machines are great and the humanoid models too:thumbsup:!

#44

The foreground pilot and machine are very well done.

#45

great work! I only think that the stars are too big. I would see more of them and much smaller.

#46

I’ve changed the stars a bit, and pulled the further globe down to not pull the eye as much.

I also worked with the closest walker’s smokey section to give the idea of smoke in front of bright lights and toned down the glow on the front lights to not draw as much attention.

Not much done in Photoshop besides compositing.

#47

good job so far! but do u render vines and mech in seperate layer? it’ seem there are no shadow and light from orange laser contact to the vines , maybe u can add it for more dynamic,
good luck !

#48

The forground plane is perfect(the bot and the guy)
The middle is ok(maybe too gray)
but tha background …I don`t like it much. Try to make it more contrast against the forground.
maybe a galaxy, vortex, something…

#49

That’s what I love about critiques, someone always finds something you didn’t think of first.

monsitj - totally correct on the laser light thing. I have a number of lights at the laser begining, but they’re not throwing enough light on the right vine. Having more lights along the laser path, will end up blowing the glow too high. I’ll find a solution though.

As for the shadows, they’re all there, but due to the number of lights and the position of the camera, they’re not showing up too dramatically.

I didn’t render the vines seperate from the mechs, instead rendered seperately foreground, mid and back included with the vines. Then took the alphas for each and used them for masking in Photoshop with some editing of the alpha.

Darkone2652 - thanks for the comments. I considered making the background more elaberate, but I’m really trying to avoid having the background draw too much attention. I even deliberately toned down the background elements, so when I squint they almost fade out. I do see your point though and will experiment with some very faint background elements, …of course out of focus. :slight_smile:

arturro - hope the stars look better. :slight_smile:

igorstshirts - thanks I hope the background will be more for your liking.

yunisirees - I figured oily and specular would end up drawing too much attention to it.

#50

I was looking at my last image and I felt it wasn’t doing enough for me. I always loved the widescreen look, so I went back in and tried to frame the most important parts better. I’m a lot more pleased with this look, but would love to hear some critiques before I submit.

#51

I think that the tentacles, the brown thing, have a low detail, or low resolution texture on it.

#52

i personally like previous (no widescreen) version better. not because i do not like widescreen but there (in prev. vers) is more sense of environment. now i feel like looking throug keyhole,
see some action but dont know what it is about (or where). in my opinion more colors and brighter (maybe in homeworld way) space background may add some depth. and gentle fog can help too. anyway, cool vehicles and overal idea, i like that kind of stuff. good luck

#53

I think you have a chance to win… The contrast and composition is fine. The opposition invader is the only thing missing to give the full story as to what’s goping on… I know it might be too late but… Maybe just one bad guy sneaking up on these soldiers from behind could finish off the “story” of this pic. Maybe a reflection of the bad guys in the dome of the blaster vehicles could be pulled off in time. This is one of my favs so far. Good luck.

#54

Like the widescreen trim, it seems to add a little more focus to the firing pod in the foreground. Looks like you’re about there, well done.

#55

A friend recomending rotating the closest walker so it’s shooting towards the camera more. I thought I would give a go and see if will add a little more energy. Any crits?

#56

the last one have perfect vision , like it.look like movie poster.

#57

Just added some minor changes to the back planet so it doesn’t stand out so much. Might experiment a little further, but should probably submit my final before the deadline.

#58

Excellent image :buttrock: Great work here. Love the detail in your ships. This one really caught my eye. Good luck. :applause:

#59

Hey Elben,

Your image is very nice, high quality stuff and its very accessible image.
Good luck .
Mike

#60

great work! great facial expressions, and great machinery. :applause: