Cockatoo's 3D Stuff

[Cockatoo 2,257]

I used renderable splines so I'd be able to adjust the thickness easily. I made a base piece that I could array in the XY direction to make the chain-link area as big as I need it to be. The hard part was making that base piece able to tile in all three directions, not just two. It took some working out.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

That's a smart choice, it's easier that modeling it.

[Cockatoo 2,257]

Just added a noise modifier using soft selection (which can be applied directly to an editable spline!) to add some warping to the fence. I can just adjust the numbers if it’s too much/ not enough.

Also used the building generator for some buildings in the background.

[art128 4,622]

> render time 6 hours

holy cow.

[Amthaak 1,501]

And Cockatoo creates the new surrealism! Magnifique!

[Cockatoo 2,257]

Haha, thanks Amthaak. These renders do have a sort of surreal feel to them. I'm playing around with more ideas for final renders, again as like last time, these are just previews and obviously more needs to be done/ stuff needs to be fixed in each image. I plan to light up the city and the bridge for some night renders too.

What do you think of the ocean water? It's essentially just a blurry blue-green bitmap (to give the water a hue) with Fresnel reflections, reflection falloff and a smoke map in the bump slot. Waaay simplier than the water I used on the last project yet it seems to give better results.

(yeah I had to get creative with the names on the containers... )

[Hamish 1,370]

Really nice renders. The Containers are quite believable. And the water looks pretty good. Better in the first image with water in your last post than the last image, looks a bit glossy in the last one, and the waves are maybe a tad big for how far away it looks, but the first looks good.

The warping on the fence looks good from far away, but probably a bit too much when it gets up close.

The mountain and the sky is really nice.

Looks really good though, I'm liking this series

[Cockatoo 2,257]

A little more work... any thoughts as to how I could make these come alive a little more?

[harishna 847]

Rubbish! I mean is really nice but you could try adding some rubbish, maybe a piece or paper, a cup or a plastic bag here and there and you could also reduce the amount of plants in some areas (that is for the first scene) the second one not sure if the city lights are too bright given that there seems to be a bit of fog...

[paulvmontfort 617]

Everything looks great render-wise but I can't help to think that the road deck of the bridge should curve a little. This is normal for suspension bridges this size. I don't know how you modeled it, but maybe you could pull up the middle of the deck and the cables with some soft selection

[darn42 1,268]

Wowee, great job there Cockatoo.

I love the effect this piece gives. My advice though is to make the lone container in the first render have some more character. It's sitting by itself in the middle of an overgrownish fenced off shipping thing, it's not going to look brand new. I'd add some wear and tear and waterstains and such to it. Especially since it's dead center in the middle of the photograph and framed by everything else.

Also, the fence could use some usage. It again looks brand new and very cgi. Add maybe some distortion to it using soft selection if it's one piece, or do something to it so it's not planes of chainlink put together.

Then last thing I see is that the water in high angles doesn't look very watery. On the bottom left corner I'm not sure if that's just water that got messed up because of the angle or something else, but I'm leaning towards the former. I'm not sure how you'd fix it though and it doesn't really detract from the image much.

Really spectacular job you've done here cockatoo. Good luck with the rest of your projects.

[Jasoncw 11,941]

I think the plants are too dark, and they have too much visual contrast with what's around them. If you cover up the bottom part of the render (where the plants are) with your hand, the render overall has this low contrast muted appearance, with a lot of big sweeping interesting shapes/lines. The aesthetic is very unified. Then if you cover up the top part with your hands, the bottom part has a lot of really tight lines/shapes, and a high contrast between the plants and the pavers.

So yeah I think the solution is to make the plants brighter. They could also be more blue. I feel like this render already has a strong style to it, it's not just a straight realistic render. So I think it's ok if the plants aren't actually green, it's in service to the image as a whole. I also think that you could remove a lot of them (especially in the background) to make the texture/shapes of that area broader and smoother like the rest of the image.

It's looking really nice.

[Cockatoo 2,257]

All good points, thanks everyone!

Paul: It should!! I know, it's bugging me too!!! But I just modelled one 20m long section for the deck (pretty high poly) and then instanced it a few hundred times in a row. If I collapsed it all into one object so I could try bend or use soft selection or something I'd kill my PC. Maybe I can do it in post... hmm have to have a think.

Darn: Read two posts above, I applied a noise modifier + soft selection directly to the renderable spline. Can just adjust the numbers to increase the bumpiness. Hamish thought it was a little too much in that render though and I tend to agree with him.

Jason: The original render had a uniform contrast, that was the result of me forgetting to do something in post. Easy fix. I'll reduce the number of plants slightly.

I know the city looks bad in the first render, that’s on the fix list. Will try and dirty things up a bit too, that’s what it needs. Also, there are over 9000 ants on my computer desk as I type this… annoying little buggers.

Cheers!

[T Wrecks 10,210]

The scene looks amazing (even without ponies ), but somehow the plants themselves just don't look right to me. I guess it's because it's just not the type of vegetation I'm accustomed to seeing in joints between pavers. I would probably have expected moss and grass, some dandelion, thistles and whatnot... often rather than flat instead of standing tall. If the area is generally deserted, then maybe some broken and/or non-level pavers might look realistic.

[Gn_leugim 858]

omg such perfection

Can you render Scarlett Johansson plz

[ComeTogetherOverMe 4]

Are you continuing to do one of HK buildings? Well, I have a request: Can you BAT the Revenue Tower which is a twin to the Immigration Tower? Well, the only difference is are the advertisement signs. Immigration Tower bears the Philips sign while the Revenue Tower bears the SKAL International sign. Are you going to BAT it or just plop 2 Immigration Towers.

[Cockatoo 2,257]

^ Sorry, not going to do another. Just plop two down side by side. I’ve seen some people who’ve done HK recreation CJ’s Photoshop the sign red and try to change the letters.

[Toothless Stitch 2,901]

To be honest, I become depressed when I see that someone is able to create a whole scene and then compare it to me who is happy if he gets a simple building done!

[darn42 1,268]

That's not true though sky. Making a building like the one you are making is pretty much as complex as a scene like this. A similar amount of time and details are put in to this compared to a quality building. They are just two different kinds of scenes. You could probably do scenes like this if you put work into it, it's not much different.

The thing I'm impressed with is the quality of the rendering and the scene overall. Cockatoo, you have done such good work with this scene.

[Cockatoo 2,257]

Didn't really feel like I was getting anywhere with the bridge scene so I started a new one. Still lots to do... extra prizes for anyone who can tell me what the buildings in the BG are.

The lighting in this scene is incredibly complex and is only going to get more so. VRay gives you the ability to turn geometry into actual lights. This is because the VRay light material (self illuminating material) kinda sucks in comparison. So all those lights inside the buildings are real lights. But still I'm getting some splotchy areas I'll need to fix...

[T Wrecks 10,210]

Someone in the city sanitation department should be fired; the raingutters don't seem to work at all. But seriously, the wet asphalt with those deteriorated road markings looks fantastic! So do the buildings - can't wait to see it textured so it's not all grey in grey.

[shinkansen1 84]

Isn't the background building on the right the standard chartered bank building?

[paulvmontfort 617]

and left is Emerald Plaza

[Cockatoo 2,257]

Still working on this one, but getting there. The insides are proving difficult, but hopefully will look a lot better with textures.

[Aaron Graham 4,417]

Looks good.

[shinkansen1 84]

Reminds me of my wonderful home, Seattle. These are now my two most favorite images from you, Cockatoo.

[Ceafus 88 1,845]

Wow! Stunning.