Hahah, Gunilla you forgot to mention the bong, dude isn’t growing all those plants for nothing…
Really nice work Mark, I love all the little details. I was staring at that last picture for five minutes before I noticed the bike. George also sends his approval.
Hey Mark, great update buddy !! 
I´m exploring your space ship and is really awesome all the details, I love the marihuana leafs on the wings!! hahaha, clever and cool!! 
(and the oclussion map work beautiful !, again thanks for that great tip, you rock! :buttrock: ) The jeans and socks looks amazing ! Great and awesome work Mark 
Hey Mark… nice update man… if you do render it in highres, post it so we can have a look…
no comments right now… keep us posted…
ahhhh, I missed seeing the whole sugar coated shippy… I think I’d give the sattelite dish a whitish color, while putting some hippy design stickers on it randomly. Right now it gets lost within the silhouette of the ship a little. But maybe it’s just me :D, I wonder what those changes you’ve realized will be…
Art2
Hey thanks Marlon. Much appreciated mate
varma
Cheers Mathias. Your visits are always mighty welcome! I agree with you about the shader on the bamboo ladders. They’ll be tweaked in Photoshop during post work. Those bamboo bits actually look kind of nice at high res but they are far too sterile-looking at this stage. As for the background, well I’ve been playing with some options and at this stage I can tell you that the complexity of the spaceship details is ruling out too much stuff going on in the background too. Which might end up saving me a heap of work! Hahaha. I’ll be posting some more thoughts and experiments with the background a bit later on
Gunilla
Thanks buddy. Yep, things are still missing. I’ve actually done a guitar now so that’s not missing anymore but I can’t show it off yet because I’m rendering other stuff. I’m happy to report that I started doing full-resolution renders today and to celebrate I created a big new Photoshop file called ‘Final.psd’. Yes I know that’s optimistic. I invariably end up with a bunch of files called ‘Final2’, ‘Final3’, ‘Final4’, … ‘Final20’ etc But some of those missing elements are things that really needed to wait until the high-res version. Which means they’re on their way 
soapy
Hey soapy, thanks matey. I’m glad George sends his approval too. Please send my hellos to George from over here in Sydney
Ferx
Thanks buddy. Now I’m working in full resolution things should hopefully start looking closer to what I’ve had in mind all along. And if they don’t, well I guess there’s still time
icedeyes
Hey George. Thanks matey. Most of my postings from now on should definitely include full-resolution details
jeffparadox
Hey thanks Jeff. As always your comments are much appreciated buddy. You know, you’ve got me thinking about that satellite dish. Originally I did have it white but it kind of stood out too much. But I can compromise and have a bit of fun with it by having the paint peeling off it in bits, revealing the white underneath. Because I’m sure the hippynaut wouldn’t have properly researched his paints and surfaces. So I’ve written that on my list of things to do
This stuff is pretty subtle and I won’t be posting another update each time I do a bit more of it. You’ll get the idea.
I’ve started rendering this thing out at full resolution now (3636 x 2657 pixels) and that’s giving me something to play with in post work at last. I’m adding little bits of dirt build-up into some of the gaps between different components, and generally aiming to make the dirt look less like a bunch of stains and more like dirt - which has depth to it and sort of piles up in places. I guess I could have set up a lot of displacement maps to do this but I couldn’t face the idea of so much hassle, especially when Photoshop touch-up is so enjoyable
Hey mark!
Thanks for wishing me welcome to your thread, definitivt one of my “top three” favorites!
You got a specific style which I really adore, and I will always be on the lookout for your
new Ideas, and ways you convert them to 3d! After this challenge, I really hope I can spend some time and “trying” to learn this style, cause I got heaps of Ideas which can only be
materialised “your” way!
See you in “Pixar” soon!
:bounce:
Nice work Mark, those engines look super kool. You are dealing with that situation of crossing over between realism and cartoon which I am too. It is an interesting question of how far to go and when to pull back. I like how 3d gives one limitless options for stylistic control and hybridization.
varma
Hey Mathias, thanks again buddy. I’m really glad you’re liking my style
soapy
Cheers soapy. Yeah, it can be quite a tightrope balancing act - getting that right point on the spectrum between realism and cartoony. As you’d know that alone is a work in progress for me. My original plan was to go for something more cartoony but the level of dirt and detail I wanted seemed to favour an easing back slightly towards realism. With all the time we have on this challenge it allows me the luxury of some experimentation
Rendering at full resolution hasn’t been kind to the hippy spaceship.
It’s amazing what you get away with at Web resolution. But crank it past 3,000 pixels in any one direction and I’m suddenly writing a long list of things that need a bit of tweaking.
Some of the mistakes were due to clumsiness. For example, at high res I noticed that the bamboo posts were going right through the metal hull, and the metal brackets that the fence wire is tied onto were hovering a foot off the hull. Oops!
But some of the problems were just the kind of stuff that only a full-resolution render can reveal. For example, bump maps which looked okay at low res suddenly looking way too heavy. I find it fun watching the scene render, writing notes on all the things I want to fix as they become evident. I’ve now got close to 30 minor changes planned.
A large team of underpaid engineers with high blood sugar levels would sure come in handy around about now.
I’ll keep you posted
Hey Mark, hahahahaha this is a lot of homework !! and i´m very impresed with your caution with the details, great !!
you noticed some details i didn’t even see… great eye my friend… even though it still looks good as is, i am sure you can make it better…
Many years later, and I still regret why I dropped Sanscrit at school, could come in handy
now!
:argh:
This is one of the many reasons I’m drawn to “these works of yours”, your attention and your
planning for the details and their importance to the whole concept, as if all minor parts and
props are somehow connected!
Would love to see those changes you plan to initiate!
Go for it, Mark!
Ferx
Thanks buddy. Yep, a lot of homework. But it seems much more like playing
icedeyes
Thanks mate. I plan to do a fair bit of Photoshop post work on this so the level of detail should go up a little bit higher
varma
Cheers Mathias. Thanks for your kind words mate
Here’s how it’s looking with a few thing lumped together at last, and rendered at full resolution.
(You can click on the image to see it at its proper size)
There are quite a few things to do. For example I want to put in a beach umbrella and some more hippy stuff like perhaps a dream catcher. Then I’ll be painting a bit of dirt build-up in Photoshop
… and here’s a bit more. Once again you can click on the image if you want to see it at its proper size.
I’ve managed to work my way through my list of fixes so now I can get on with making a beach umbrella
Nice work Mark, I love that guy, he is just so happy and relaxed. We should all be so well adjusted.
Great looking close up! All the details shine - it’s the kind of scene you could look at for ever without spotting all parts. Awesome splendidness
Wow Hi-res detail is looking great! I guess you’re almost there now, I will love to see this on a nice space background and the photoshop touch added!
Maybe the rock looks a bit shinny, I don’t know…:shrug:
It’s real joy to see your creation in details, you have even modeled the cloth rope!
I like the way you add dirt and grunge to your textures! and those socks were very
clever to add, especially the red color makes a lot sense there!
Cheers!