Hi,

One of the things that makes your images jump off the page is your use of colors as well as lighting. Many of the examples here and at 'Rotica have a great depth thanks to the color choices, making key details jump out as well as setting a particular mood.

I thought this would ba a good idea for a tutorial topic.

since my color pallet jumps around a lot, is there an image in particular to discuss? (or series)

Doug

Let's start off with two that you posted in our free area.

The Who's Afraid and Laura Croft images make strong use of the color blue to highlight the models and surface details. It also makes the drama in the images stand out.

Perhaps an explaination of the angle you light from, percent of fill and other techniques would be of help to other artists.

ok, "who's afraid"

Done with two poser pro renders - one with every element, and one with a different light source for the girl. The two renders were composited in PhotoShop and I just erased out what I liked on one vs the other.

The fog was all PhotoShop, along with the drool, fur details, and eye gleam on the wolf.

I think I had about 6 different blue lights pointing down at the wolf and in the distance.

I'll see if I can find the original .pz3 and take a screen capture of the wireframe.


The Laura Croft image was much simpler, I would frequently light a scene the way I wanted, and then would add a key infinite light, with the shadows turned off. I'd make two renders, one with the key light and one without - and then composite them in Photoshop, just using the highlights that I dug the most.

see a trend yet? Multiple renders/multiple light sets. composite in PhotoShop.

The new "glow worm" from Daz is suppose to do the same thing - but I just couldnt get my brain wrapped around it's interface.

Doug

Not only did I track down my original Poser files for "Who's Afraid", and make screen captures of the light settings...

but I also uploaded another half dozen or so archive images!

So if you checked out the gallery a couple days ago, now THERE'S MORE!

Billy's new powers was always a favorite of mine... just screaming to become a story.


Doug

thanks for tip off. very generous of you.

Thanks for posting that new batch of images! They resolve a number of post production and workflow questions I've had for some time.

And I believe that Doc Robo would be more than happy to take a long and careful look at the Billy's New Powers folder.

Some fantastic work all around!

I do two or even three renders all the time.

One of my current tricks that I shared with Timo was:

Render one - just to capture the foreground characters - to use the alpha channel


ALL OF MY IMAGES ARE EXPORTED AS PSD's - Special note


Render two - to capture the foreground figures with the background intact - usually hair fibers will show through if I don't

Render three - just the background

Then composite in photoshop

Copy the background layer - blur one of the versions and use a layer mask with a gradient to simulte depth of field

alpha mask the figures in the foreground and I end up with a convincing fake DOF.

Doug

A simpler trick is what my HyperZoom packs do - just render the background.
Export it. blur it... then import as a background image.


Doug

How right you are, and I like what I see already. That is some fantastic rendering. Great stuff all around!