Lighting Challenge #16: The Lighthouse

#101

thanks jeremy… here is an update…

#102

I played a little with the volume lights here’s mt first test what do you think?
i’ll add more fog later.

#103

Here’s mine. Not sure if I’m done with it.

It’s rendered with RenderMan. The rock and the sea shaders are completely procedural and written in the RenderMan Shading Language. Actually there are no texture maps used except in the sky, which is comped in Photoshop based on some cloud photos. I should write a shader for those too but I’m feeling a bit lazy right now. :slight_smile: The lighting setup is really simple, it’s just a few regular spotlights. There’s also no kind of GI. The whole thing renders in maybe ten to fifteen minutes.

edit: Should have checked the image with a real screen instead of just my laptop’s… the image came out much darker than I had expected. I replaced it with a somewhat brighter version. The original one I posted is here: http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/7445/lighthouse3bm0.jpg

#104

radianssi… cool rock shaders! and the surf almost looks like its real…

#105

:thumbsup: Ok I got crazy and added the trees and flowers and all, no house though I didn`t know where to put it, I hope this is looking better, I really like the way it looks now, my wife thinks it needs more color, hehehehe, I did not agree with the wife of course, that would not be normal… :wise::curious:

Here is the image
by the way I saturated the colors a bit more… :arteest:
CHEERS :buttrock:

#106

Hello everyone this is my last mini update is very subtle but there are changes trust me, I added a bit of mist to suggest a little bit a water splash, also added more dirt, flowers and a specular pass to bring the leves and values a bit up…

Here is the Image

CHEERS:buttrock:

#107

Dear sir, this is what i have done so far

http://picasaweb.google.com/astroanu2004/AnuradhaJayathilakaSProfile?authkey=_6qVelCpBE0#5246452400096410466


#108

InspireArt - Good start! I don’t see much in the way of shadows yet, try lighting it with one main light, and test-rendering to make sure everything casts shadows as it should, then add a little fill light. The textures and grass look good. The rocks in the foreground need some texture, or maybe some of them need to change shape or move away.

JohnPGiancarlo - Amazing! That’s stunning work! Any comments I make are trivia, but here’s a few minor thoughts. The leaves on the trees on the right seem to have a fairly consistent fill color, and never get as dark as the trunk, maybe the most deeply shadowed parts of the leaves could get a little darker, just to show shaping and depth. The diffuse color of the little white flowers could come down just a hair, just enough so all the white flowers aren’t completely clipped. The little white dots near the top of the lighthouse are a bit hard to identify. Did you say you were going to animate this??? The birds, the water, etc. all look very difficult to animate, if this is all being rigged or simmed for animation then I’m doubly impressed!

radianssi - I’m just floored today by the sheer awsomeness of what I’m seeing. That’s totally amazing! I think you’re going for “front page” quality work there. A few areas might merit another look. If you look down straight below the lighthouse, there’s a little inlet running to the left, and the water doesn’t seem well connected to the rocks there. The water seems too bright, as if it’s not getting darkened by the shadow of the rocks in that area. The water looks absolutely terrific. Sometimes people add some foam and spray layers on top of the water surface where the waves crash onto rocks. A little spray of particles could break-up the solidness of the water in the lower left foreground, otherwise that water lip heading up onto the closest rock to camera might need to get darker or more transparent. The rock shader is terrific, sometimes a water interface can benefit from a “water line” on the rocks, with dry rock higher up having more diffuse, and wet rock going darker but more specular. The rocks are looking great, though, so don’t change too much if you play with this. There’s one hard diagonal line in the rocks, the lower center area of them, that looks like a low-poly edge that could get smoothed or displaced. The top of the lighthouse looks good, if there were more of a sense of light inside the top room and interior roof, and more presence to the glass, that could add a bit of definition to that area.

RazorJack - Good start! Keep going!

herbertagudera - Nice work. The scale of the grass looks a bit big compared to the house. Some more light might move through the grass further along. The edge of the side rock looks strange, it seems a little low-polygon but has a glow around the edge of the rock. I think a better moon would add a lot to the scene.

psycosven - Nice! You could use more shaping and variation in your lighting. More parts of the fence could go darker. A square form like the fence posts shouldn’t usually have two sides with the same tone, one side should be darker than the other. The tree is better, you might lower the whole tree and the hill it’s on, just so you can see where the tree comes out of the hill and it isn’t hidden behind the fence. Even the tower of the lighthouse could use a little darker core, so the gray on the left side was the brighter part of a gradient that went down a bit before it got brighter again.

jmBoekestein - Good work, keep going. I think the rocks have too many regular geometry forms now, the squares and hexagons keep it from looking organic.

Voigg - Good start, keep going!

sklioness - Looks good, you could add light to most parts of it, choose some color or texture for the roof and foundation of the tower, maybe do something with the ground or vegetation once there’s enough light to see it, maybe work on the ocean surface if there’s going to be enough light glinting off it to see the water.

viko79 - Welcome! Nice, spooky scene! Maybe you could get a bit more light on the lighthouse, especially in the top around the area the beam is coming from you could use light on the glass, the area around the lamp, part of the balcony, etc.

rabidfox - Use whichever sky you want, I shouldn’t have worried you too much about lenses and such, just make sure if you’re showing a lot of scene, that there’s a lot of sky behind it. A picture you take yourself, find on flickr, etc. should be fine.

Spin99 - Both compositions are fine. Watch the edges of your frame and don’t put a roof right on the lower edge.

stef0506 - Looking good! What kind of ground are you going for, right now I can’t tell if it will be rock or moss or grass? You might get a little more light into some of the trees, if the sun is right there.

-jeremy

#109

I’m looking foward to this one, I’ll try my best!:slight_smile:

#110

Thanx alot. Ill resubmit soon with the changes made. :slight_smile:

#111

Thanks Jeremy! I’ve been trying to get that darker core shadow on everything… I’m learning a lot on the functionality of Vray and it’s render passes with this project. Let’s just say the render passes are very interesting, and very picky as to what they will work with (aka doesn’t work well with anything not specifically Vray)… I would go with scanline to get some better simple shadows, but the grass is the Vray Fur and I think I would lose that completely by swapping the renderer. :frowning: I’m sure I’ll figure something out though! :wink:

#112

JohnPGiancarlo - Amazing! That’s stunning work! Any comments I make are trivia, but here’s a few minor thoughts. The leaves on the trees on the right seem to have a fairly consistent fill color, and never get as dark as the trunk, maybe the most deeply shadowed parts of the leaves could get a little darker, just to show shaping and depth. The diffuse color of the little white flowers could come down just a hair, just enough so all the white flowers aren’t completely clipped. The little white dots near the top of the lighthouse are a bit hard to identify. Did you say you were going to animate this??? The birds, the water, etc. all look very difficult to animate, if this is all being rigged or simmed for animation then I’m doubly impressed!

Thanks Jeremy here is the Update it looks better now!

#113

Thanks for the comments Jeremy. Glad to hear I’m on the right track! I definitely agree with everything you said. It gets hard to see all the little details and flaws objectively after having stared at the picture for so many hours. :slight_smile: I think I’ll have a little break and post an improved version at some point in the near future.

#114

JohnPGiancarlo, that is perfect, really nice, how did you do the foliage? :slight_smile:
frontpage worthy even though its not your own model btw:P

#115

Thanks bugzor, the grass the flowers and the trees are all paint FXs done with maya 2008.

#116

Some very beautiful renders so far! Looking forward to seeing the finals :slight_smile:

I’m trying my hand at it too. I have a lot to try to learn. Hopefully I’ll get it done in time.

A note, not a criticism to radianssi vbmenu_register(“postmenu_5384233”, true); render…
You’ve created a beautiful scene and a very powerful work, however, the moonlight isn’t quite agreeing with the highlights on the rocks. Perhaps reverse the sky?

Great work everyone!

#117

Here is my entry so far…

I’m hoping to learn enough about texturing to get it done in time for the challenge deadline.

http://www.geocities.com/rhondawatson/challenge_005.bmp

I hate the rock jutting out to the right of the hill. I’m having a hard time getting the lighting right in that area.
My water is coming along but still needs alot of depth in texturing.
I’m still working on getting a good texture for the grass.
I’m fairly satisfied with the lighthouse light and sky and the over all composition.

Any suggestions or directions on how to add texturing are very welcome and greatly appreciated!

#118

I’ve been working on it this morning and have made a lot of changes.

Still needs a whole lot of work.

Input, criticism, suggestions are more than welcome!

I’m a new user and trying to learn Lightwave.

Thank you!

#119

Hi Jeremy and all. Great work everyone! :slight_smile:
I’ve had a cold the last week and this is all I’ve managed so far, Vue Studio render, the lighthouse is the one being lit. I’m still learning Vue and I’ve tried different rendering options trying to get the best one. I’ll play around it with some more or I might try it out in a different program. :slight_smile:

#120

I can not any pic’s uploading:buttrock: !