First "real" project

[madcoo]

Hi guys!

Been away for a while - I had to work on a potentially first "real" (i.e maybe commercial) project.

I was tied to a tight deadline (3 days, which is very short for a beginner like me), so I couldn't do as much or as nicely as I wanted...


Anyway, I thought I would display it here and ask for some advice on how I could improve the view.

What bugs me most is that i just can't get a "photorealistic feel" to the materials, although I tried to apply bump/displace/spec maps.

So the question is...
==> how do you get a very realistic effect?
I tend NOT to click the "subdivide" button in Blendigo, but maybe I should?

Many thanks in advance!


Note: I'm awfully sorry, but the potential client insisted that I had to protect the render...

[dakiru]

Hi! What about bevel modifier? Tiny bevels help a lot. Plus there is no plants and/or trees. Camera position doesn't seem to be advantageous. You can add the water ripples + the texture inside the pool. And more details in the modeling

[neo0.]

Use tonemapping.. In large part photorelistic, deals with the subtle combination of brightness across your render.

[PureSpider]

Use tonemapping.. In large part photorelistic, deals with the subtle combination of brightness across your render.

Same as with the liquid inside glass thingie... we told you 100 times every png render is tonemapped...
Look up what you are talking about BEFORE you talk about it.

He probably ment you should use camera tonemapping and try some response functions, that may add nice contrast to the picture.

[madcoo]

Hi! What about bevel modifier? Tiny bevels help a lot.

Thanks Dakiru, I also thought about this, but -shame on me- my meshes aren't "clean" enough, i.e when I use bevel some walls get "cut in two" => my fault!!!
I'll have to select manually every edge, but indeed it will help.

He probably ment you should use camera tonemapping and try some response functions, that may add nice contrast to the picture.

If I understand well, I should start using Camera instead of Reinhardt or Linear... Maybe having a slight "out of focus" blur (especially on the roofs) may look better.
Thanks!


One more thing : I tend to make my own bump maps - I had a look at ready-made bump maps, and it seems that they never use 100% black in them... The darkest colour seems to always be a 85% black.
Do you know by any chance if this is true? i.e when you make your own bump maps you can use 100% white, but never 100% black???
Thanks again for your comms everyone!

[OnoSendai]

Try camera tonemapping, it looks pretty good.
100% black and 100% white in bump maps is fine.

[dakiru]

Hi! What about bevel modifier? Tiny bevels help a lot.

Thanks Dakiru, I also thought about this, but -shame on me- my meshes aren't "clean" enough, i.e when I use bevel some walls get "cut in two" => my fault!!!
I'll have to select manually every edge, but indeed it will help.

No no no! Don't select manually! You can select an object and use bevel modifier

Here is the cube 1x1x1x Blender Unit. Select the cube and click F9. Find the Modifier tab.

1.jpg (116.39 KiB) Viewed 7950 times

Find "Bevel" in the menu

2.jpg (122.67 KiB) Viewed 7950 times

...and input the value. Here it's 0.01 Blender Unit (1cm for Indigo). Don't forget to apply scale (Ctrl+A, 3) before tweaking the bevel value. Like I did not on the last screenshot, scale is 0.5, so if I apply it the bevel goes twice as bigger.

3.jpg (125.53 KiB) Viewed 7954 times

In case you need different bevels on the same object, you can do it with the bevel weights and this modifier. Check this for more info.

[madcoo]

Many thanks, I knew how to bevel objects, but the problem here is that my meshes aren't "clean" enough.
Here's my problem, and why I'll have to select manually the edges:
(sorry I'm at work, I had to use Paint to show you... I hope this will be clear enough)

[dakiru]

Now I see. You can play with angle limit, like on the screenshot.

4.jpg (175.3 KiB) Viewed 7928 times

[madcoo]

If I may ask...

Can you show me a screenshot of what result I could expect? (if that's not too much hassle for you of course )

[dakiru]

Sure With the modifier applied (I used big bevel to have the result visible, when a smaller used, the difference in width is not so visible):

5.jpg (101.5 KiB) Viewed 7907 times

[madcoo]

Wow!

Looks like it's just what I need!!!
I'll try that tonight and will keep you informed!

Many thanks!!!

[dakiru]

That's great!

[zeitmeister]

You should subdivide every corner twice! The "curve" ist been interpolated between the inner and the outer subdivision; if you only subdivide your edge once, the "curve" will be less precise.

[Zom-B]

==> how do you get a very realistic effect?
I tend NOT to click the "subdivide" button in Blendigo, but maybe I should?

Use more phong materials! The wood material for example... simple phong with IOR of 1.2 and the same texture as for diffuse used for exponent with b value of 96.

Even for walls using phong results mostly in a more realistic image... use here very low values like IOR of 1.1 and exponent of 32 (also with colormap as exponent map).


Exponent Maps give you a subtile change in exponent that looks like very very fine bump... I prefer it in some situations. Also try some more intens bump on your wooden floor... it looks so flat & perfect... ergo ununteresting ^^