Week 10- Continuing my image for October

To start this week I decided to do more work on the trees and so began by creating a leaf. To do this I used the line tool to draw the spline and then extruded it slightly to create the third dimension.

When I was happy with the shape of the leaf I cloned it several times and arranged the shapes in different positions and at a range of angles. I then used the gradient tool in Photoshop to create different colour combinations and saved each as bitmaps ready to be used as material maps. I tried to create several different colour combinations so the leaves were in a variety of colours.

I then applied these bitmaps to the leaf shapes randomly as I felt this would make the trees more interesting when I placed the leaves on the branches. I had to edit the coordinates slightly to make the bitmaps fit the shapes well and to do this I used planar for Object XYZ setting and set the map size to 1 for the width and height. When I was happy with the colour arrangement I grouped the objects.

The next step was to place the leaves on the trees. I cloned the shapes I had grouped and arranged them on the branches. I decided to fill the tree completely as I was trying to depict autumn and so wanted to place the image half way through the transition. To get the leaves in the exact positions I wanted I used the move and rotate tools to change the angle and position. It took quite a while to get the arrangement I wanted on all the trees, but eventually I was happy with the appearance of the background.

At this point I felt the best thing to do next was add the materials to the rest of the image. Firstly I created the colour on the wall. As this is not an important part of the image I did not want the colour to make it stand out and so chose to use a very pale yellow. I used the anisotropic shader so I could apply a slight gloss to the wall and so set the specular level to 40 and gloss level to 10. I was quite pleased with the image at this point but did wonder if it was too bright and would steal the focus from the rest of the image. At this point I decided to go onto another material and come back to this later if I still felt it needed changing.

Next I went onto the window frame. I though about using a wood effect or plain white frame, but felt the wood would be more suitable as the white might be too bright and take the focus away from the subject matter in the background. I used the wood preset and made the 2 colours of the wood a darker shade of brown so the frame would not be too much of a focus. I was quite happy with the window frames appearance and so decided to continue with the image.

Afterwards I created the colour for the window ledge. For this I used another plain colour, but this time in white. I chose this colour as it is a common colour for a window ledge and even though it would be bright I feel the small area it covered would not overpower the image. I wanted to try to create a reflective painted surface and so set the specular level to 200. Then I rendered it and was very happy with the way the bevelled shape was apparent due to the shadow.

The last step for the window was to create the material for the window handles. I wanted to create a reflective metal appearance for this and so used the anisotropic material. I chose a dark grey for the colour and then set the specular level to 100 while leaving the gloss level at 10. I was pleased with this and so went onto another part of the image.

I then went on to create the materials for the Diwali lamps. I decided to create two different materials for these as there are two different designs of lamps. I started by creating the material for the middle lamp which I wanted to have a transparent quality. To do this I used the transparency shader and applied a red ambient colour to try to continue on the colour theme of reds and oranges. I set the opacity to 90 to create the slight transparency I wanted. I then created the material for the other lamps. I tried to create a material which looked like a painted metal as I imagine Diwali lamps could be decorated like this. For this I used the anisotropic shader and applied a dull purple for the colour as I felt it would create the painted surface I was looking for. I then set the specular level to 300 and gloss to 50. I was quite pleased with the appearance of these and so will work on another material.

At this stage I went on to add lighting to the scene. To begin I added an omni light to the foreground to create a ceiling light in the room. I chose the colour of the light as white and reduced the intensity to 0.5 as I plan to make the background the focal point in the scene and therefore the light source brighter. Next I applied an omni light to each of the Diwali lamps. I chose to use an omni light once again as it would recreate a candle light source well. I changed the colour of all these lights to a shade of warm orange for two reasons; firstly this is the colour a flame gives off and it links to my theme of oranges and reds. I then lowered the intensity of each of these to 0.3 so they did not overwhelm the image. Lastly I applied the light source in the background. I left the colour setting as I wanted to try to recreate natural light and kept the intensity at 1 as this light highlights the background which I want to make the focal point of the image. Once I applied shadow to each of the light sources I was pleased with the outcome of this image.

At this point I was not completely happy with the appearance of the background and so edited it. I did not want the colour to be too powerful as it could take the attention away from part of the image. I found an image on the internet for this which I felt would work quite well.

When I set the image as the background I was really pleased with the scenes appearance as it worked subtly.

Next I applied the material to the ground. For this I used a bitmap I created. I chose to create my own bitmap for this as I felt it could be the best way to get the random arrangement of fallen leaves which I wanted.

I applied this as a diffuse map and changed the size of the map to 0.22 to try to get the leaves in proportion to the leaves on the branches. Once I made these changes to the settings I was pleased with the appearance and so went on.

Afterwards I created the material for the curtain pole. I chose to use the anisotropic shader for this as I wanted to suggest it was made from metal. I set the material colour to a medium grey and increased the specular level to 450 while leaving the gloss level at 10. When I applied it to this part of the image I was really pleased with its appearance as it was just like I wanted it to be.

At this point I decided to go back and edit the material on one of the Diwali lamps as I was not happy with its appearance. I decided to remove the transparency setting as it was not creating the effect I had hoped it would and so replaced it with the anisotropic shader. I wanted to make the outside look similar to the other lights and so used similar settings. When I rendered the image I was happier with the lamp and once I increased the intensity of the orange lights I was quite please with the image at this point.

When I looked at the image carefully I felt the background was lit too much as it was too bright in comparison to the sky. Due to this I reduced the intensity of the omni light and feel this works better as the lights in the window highlight the focal point of the scene.

I then worked on the texture for the carpet as I felt it was currently too smooth. To do this I used the blinn shader and chose a deep shade of red to continue the colour theme of red and orange. I then used the preset bitmap of noise and set it as the bump map and set the output value to 10 to suggest different strands of fibre.

I then added bark to the trees. I use one of the preset maps for this as a diffuse map and reduced the map to a size which I felt was proportional to the trunk. I was quite pleased with this and so went on to another part of the image.

Afterwards I added a paving effect to the plane by the house to suggest a patio area. I drew out this bitmap and used it as a diffuse and bump map. I made sure the sizes of the maps were exactly the same so they aligned properly. I set the bump value to 150 to get the depth I wanted between the paving slabs.

Lastly this week I made some minor alterations to the trees in background as I felt the current layout was to cramped in some areas. After a little while I was much happier with the arrangement of the trees.

I am reasonably please with the progress I have made so far but feel I still need to make some improvements to this image. Firstly I feel the background needs to be lightened slightly as I have made it a bit too dark. Also, I may make some changes to the trees if I have time as I feel the brown is too bold and quite unrealistic.

Week 9- Starting my image for October

For October I have decided to base my image around a colour theme. When I think about this month the first thing which comes to mind are the colours of red and orange, and as this is what I based my moodboard on I feel it is the most appropriate area to work on. For this 3D image I have decided to link the two areas of October which I included in my moodboard, these being the leaves changing colour in autumn and Diwali, the festival of light.

To start the image I decided to work on the background and so created the ground. For this I drew a plane and used the soft selection tool to create hills for the landscape. To create the hills I changed the falloff value of the soft selection tool from 60 to 200. I feel this went quite well and so will continue with my image.

I felt the next stage of the image was to create the trees for the background. I decided to create a tree with bare branches and then add in leaves for two reasons; firstly so I could apply leaves of a variety of colours and only place a few on the tree and a lot on the ground to symbolise the transition from summer to winter which occurs during the month. To begin this I created a box and then increased the number of segments in each dimension. I then converted it to an editable poly so I could create the branches. To get the initial transition from trunk to branch I selected vertex’s at different points around the top of the box and dragged them out to different angles and positions. From this point I selected the polygon icon and the extrude tool to continue to extend to branches from the base of the tree. Once extruded, I used the move and rotate tools to arrange the branches at different angles which looked realistic. At this point I felt the tree was coming along quite well, however when I went on to add extra branches coming from the side of the ones I had already extruded I found the whole side panel moved with it. After some time I found that I could add extra vertex’s to the extruded parts which allowed me to create a tree with a more realistic form. However, at this point I was not completely happy with the trees appearance and so decided to move on and come back to this later.

At this point I decided to edit the trunk of the tree to get rid of the pointed edges. To do this I used the soft selection tool and moved some parts of the trunk inwards and others outwards. To do this I set the falloff value of the soft selection tool to 20 so I could edit the trunk in small sections.

I then went back to working on the branches. For this I used the same technique as before, but still felt it did not look quite right so decided to once again move on to another part of the image.

I felt this next stage was to create the roots of the tree. For this I selected several of the polygons at once and moved them away from the trunk. I chose to use this technique as I felt it worked well on the beginning of the branches. I was pleased with the appearance of the roots at this point and so decided to move on to another part of the image.

At this point I felt it would be a good time to work on the foreground of the scene. To do this I began by creating the walls by using two boxes with the same width of 55 and then cloned each one to leave a hole for the window. When I arranged them I did feel the hole left for the window was too small and so increased the height of the middle blocks to correct this.

I then went on to create the window ledge. To do this I used another box and then used the bevel tool to extend the sides as they are rarely just boxes. To keep the size of bevel consistent around the window ledge I set the bevel height to 1.5 and output amount to -1.5. I was pleased with this and so went on to another part of the image.

I then went on to add the furnishings around the window. For this I started by creating the curtain pole. I used a cylinder with dimensions of 5 for the radius and the height of 374.365 so it went right across the window. I was happy with these proportions and so created the stoppers at the end of the pole. I chose to use spheres for this as this is a popular end for a curtain pole. I made the radius of the sphere 10.454 so it was noticeably larger than the pole. When I was happy with the size of the sphere I cloned it and placed one at each end of the pole.

After this I began to create the curtains. For the curtains I wanted there to be folds in the material as though they had been opened. I felt the best way to do this would be to draw a spline and extrude it. For this I used the line tool to create a snake-like curved shape and converted it to an editable poly. I then selected the polygon icon and extruded the shape before capping the end.

I then placed the curtain in the scene and cloned the object so there was one each side. I made some alterations to the size of the objects using the scale tool including increasing the height so they completely covered the window and decreasing the width so the material folds were closer together. At this point I did need to increase the length of the curtain pole as the curtains covered too much of the window and the objects in the background could not be scene properly.

It was at this point that I felt the land in the background needed to be worked on again as it was too small and the edges could be seen. Due to this I created a larger plane. I then increased the number of segments in each dimension and used the soft selection tool as I did before to create the hills. This went quite well and so I am pleased with the appearance of the background so far.

I then created the floor in the scene. To do this I used another plane and placed it in front of the wall. This went well and so I went onto another part of the image.

Afterwards I went on to create the window frame. For this I decided to use several boxes as I felt this would be the best shape for creating the frame. I started by drawing one box and setting the height to the full height of the window. I then used the bevel tool to create a more realistic shape. For each bevel I made the height 1.5 and output amount -1.5 as I felt this would be a suitable amount. When I was happy with the shape and size of this box I cloned it three times and placed them across the length of the window. I then used the exact same process for the top and bottom of the frame.

At this point I felt the window frame looked incomplete and so I added handles as though the window would open. To do this I used a cylinder for the base and capsule for the handle itself. I made the cylinder quite short and wide with the radius of 10.391 and height of 14.777. For the capsule I applied a radius of 10.643 so it was only slightly larger than the base part and the length of the capsule 90.079 as I felt that this length would be in proportion to the rest of the frame. I am reasonably pleased with the handle and so decided to go on and work on another part of this image.

I then decided to create the Diwali lamps which I planned to place on the window ledge. For this I felt the most appropriate technique to use was the lathe technique and so I started by using the line tool to draw the shape of the lamp.

I then went to the modifier menu and selected lathe from the list. This took a few attempts as I did not know where to move the pivot point to, but eventually I was pleased with the result.

At this point I wanted to add decoration to the lamp. I decided to used the Boolean technique as I felt this would be effective when a light source was placed inside the lamp, however when I tried to do this during the tutorial several weeks ago I was unable to complete this task. Due to this I looked up how to do Boolean first. I then drew a sphere and changed the radius until it was the size I wanted and then cloned the object several times and arranged them around the lamp evenly.

Then using the Boolean tool I managed to remove the circles all the way around the shape. I was very pleased with the appearance of this and so cloned the lamp twice and placed the objects on the window ledge.

Lastly this week I went back to do more work on the tree. I added a few more branches and made some more alterations before adding the mesh smooth modifier.

As I was reasonably happy with the trees appearance I cloned each of them and placed them in the scene. I tried to arrange them to make the composition look quite interesting, but also have some realism.

I am pleased with the progress I made during this week. I plan to continue working on this image next week. To do this I will firstly create the leaves and add them into the scene before adding the materials to the objects and also adding lighting to the scene.

Week 8- Continuing my image for June

To start this week I went back to my last blog for this image and saw that the willow tree needed more work. Therefore I started this by adding some more branches and changing the current arrangement. It took some time to do this as I tried to keep the leaves in the same position in relation to the branch, but eventually I got the branches in a position which I was happy with.

At this point I decided to add the roots to the tree and to do this I used several cones. I made each of these different dimensions but still tried to keep them in proportion. I also applied a bend to several of these shapes, each with a different angle and in a different direction.

Afterwards I went on to create the wildlife as I also listed this as a task for this week. I started on the butterflies and so used the line tool so I could complete the spline technique.

I then converted this to an editable poly, selected the polygon icon and extruded it before capping the edge. However, when I rotated and moved the object I did find that the shape became elongated and so had to use the scale tool to correct the proportions. When I was pleased with the shape I decided to create the butterflies body and to do this I used a capsule. I made the capsule quite long and narrow as butterflies bodies usually are, especially in comparison to the wings. After this I used a cylinder to create an antenna. For this I used a very small radius so it was a lot thinner than the body and made the shape quite long. I then applied a bend as I felt this would help to make it look more like an antenna. When I was happy with the appearance of the body parts separately I placed them together, cloned the wing and antenna and placed them parallel on the other side to make it look symmetrical and placed it in the scene.

I used the exact same process to create the second butterfly. For this one I used a different shape of wing as different species of butterflies are different shapes. I was quite pleased with the outcome of these, even though they did take quite some time to complete.

Next I worked on the dragonfly. To do this I started by creating the body. For the middle section I decided to use a capsule as I felt this shape would suit the dragonfly’s body well. I made the capsule length quite long in comparison to the radius to try to make it in proportion. Then I added a sphere for the head. I changed the radius to 3.829 once I had drawn it as it would then be in proportion to the body. The last stage of the body was to create the tail and for this I used a cone. I made the dimensions of this 26.487 long and the smallest radius 0.33 so the tail went into a smooth point. At this stage I was happy with the appearance of this so I went onto the next part of the dragonfly.

I then started to create the wings of the dragonfly. I decided to use the spline technique to do this as I felt it was the best way to create the shape I wanted. To begin with I drew the outline using the line tool and converted the shape to an editable poly.

I then extruded it slightly to get a third dimension and capped the open side. When I aligned the shape with the body I found the wing was too large and slightly out of proportion and so I used the scale tool to correct this. When I was happy with the proportions I cloned it and placed it underneath the other to create the double wing. I then cloned both of these together and used the rotate and move tools to place them symmetrically on the other side.

Finally I added eyes to the dragonfly. I felt the best shape to use for this would be a sphere as it would be realistic. When I was happy with the dragonfly I placed it at the front of the scene.

Afterwards I went back to the heron as I felt it needed a few additions. Firstly I added cones to the top of the legs to improve the join between the body and leg. I decided to use a cone for this as I felt it would be best to get a gradual decrease in size which would lead the viewers eye from the body to the leg.

I then decided to add the bird’s eyes. To do this I used a sphere as I felt it would be the best shape. I made it quite small as I felt this would be a realistic size and then placed one either side of the head.

The final step on creating the heron was to add the feathers to the head. To do this I used a long, slim cone with a fine point. I created this with one radius of 0.549 and the other of 0 with the length of 13.018. I then applied a bend at an angle of 84. Afterwards I aligned the cone at the back of the head and when I was happy with the shape and size I cloned it several times and arranged them using the rotate and move tool. I was pleased with the appearance of the heron at this point and so decided to go on and work on a different section.

Next I decided to add the surroundings of the lake to the scene. For this I chose to used a plane and place it under the lake. I increased the number of segments to 40 in length and 40 across the width. I then made it into an editable poly and used the soft selection tool and increased the falloff to 100. I then used the soft selection tool to create hills and dips in the land. This took quite a while as I had to make minor alterations to the plane and other objects in the scene to make them all visible and properly aligned with one another. Eventually I got the scene to look how I wanted it to; however from this I have learnt that it would be better to create and edit the plane first.

Afterwards I went on to adding materials to the scene. To start I applied a material to the lake. I chose to use the transparency shader as I felt this would work well. I chose the material to be pale blue and with a specular level of 0 and a gloss level of 10. I then set the opacity level to 66. When I applied this and rendered it I was not happy with the appearance and so will need to work on this further at a later date.

Next I went onto the textures of the bird. I started by creating the eye texture. To do this I used the anisotropic shader in black. I set the specular level to 80, gloss level to 20 and anisotropic level to 50 so there would be a slight shine to the eye as I thought this would look quite effective. For the beak and legs I used the blinn shader as I did not want the finish to have a shine. I set the specular level to 0, gloss level to 10 and softness level to 0.1. I was pleased with how this looked and so decided to continue with the image.

I then applied the material to the trunk of the willow tree. For this I used an image of bark from the internet as I felt this would be the best option as I would not be able to create a realistic bitmap myself and I could not find anything suitable in the material editor.

I used this image as the diffuse map and bump map as I felt this would be the best way to get the texture I wanted. I reduced the size of both the maps and selected the bump amount of 200. When I rendered the image I was very pleased with the appearance of the trunk.

After this I tried to add a bitmap to the trees in the background. For this I used a bitmap image I drew of a leaf pattern.

I used this bitmap as a diffuse and bump map to try to get the colour and texture. When I applied it to some of the trees and rendered the image I was unhappy with the appearance of this as I felt it was quite unrealistic. I made alterations to the coordinates to change the bitmaps size and changed the bump amount, but despite this I could not get the look I wanted. Due to this I went onto another part of the image and plan to come back to this later.

I then wanted to create the texture for the top of the reeds in the lake. For this I once again used a bitmap image, but this time only as a bump map.

I had to reduce the size of the bitmap as the spheres were too large and made the objects look unrealistic. I used the blinn shader for this as I did not need to add any specular level to these objects. I chose quite a pale brown as this is the colour I always imagine reeds to be. I set the bump output value to 150 to get quite a depth and allow the shadows to show the uneven surface well.

The last step for the reeds was to create the material for the stem. I used a similar shade of brown as I did for the top of the reeds so the two sections linked to each other. Also, I used the blinn shader again with the same settings as the other part of the reeds for the same reason. I was pleased with this part of the image and so decided to continue.

For the butterflies I decided to draw out my own material bitmaps to be used for the diffuse map on the wings for two reason; firstly I would be able to get the exact wing pattern I wanted and also I could create it to fit onto the shapes I drew for the wings. However, I did look on the internet at images of butterflies and tried to create the ones I chose quite realistically. I tried to pick patterns which would contrast the background to help them stand out as they were quite small.

When I applied these bitmaps to the wings they did not align as I had planned, despite spending a lot of time changing the coordinates. In the end I did get them in reasonably suitable position, but I will come back and change this if I have time.

I then went on to create the texture for the butterfly’s bodies. For this I used one of the preset materials as I felt I would easily be able to create the texture I wanted and therefore did not need to create my own. I used the dent preset for the bump map and applied a slight bump of 40. I applied this on the blinn shader as I felt that the butterfly’s body would suit the matt finish and used the specular value of 0, gloss level of 10 and softness level of 0.1. I am very pleased with the appearance of the butterflies and so will move on.

After this I created the textures for the dragonfly. To start with I drew a bitmap for the wing.

I added this to the diffuse map, but like with the wings of the butterflies I could not get it to align properly. When I applied the transparency shader and set the opacity to 80 I was pleased with the affect it created and so decided not to make any other alterations.

I then went onto the dragonfly’s body. On the tail I created a striped bitmap as when I looked at images on the internet they had these patterns. I decided to use a bold blue and black for these stripes as I felt this would make it stand out from the rest of the scene.

I used this as a diffuse and bump map. I changed the coordinates of these maps carefully so that it was in the exact position I wanted to make the tail look realistic. I then set the material to a blinn shader with the specular value of 40, gloss level of 10 and softness level of 0.1 so I could add a slight shine to the surface. I then used another material sphere to apply the exact same settings apart from the bitmaps for the rest of the body. Lastly, I applied a material to the eye. For this I used the same material as I did for the bird’s eye.

I then went on to apply the colours to the body of the heron. For the main part of the bird I applied the blinn shader with white as the colour. I used the settings to get a dull surface by applying a specular level of 0, gloss level of 5 and softness level of 0.1. I then went onto the head feathers where I used the same settings for the body, but set the colour to black instead. For the wing I used 3Ds max preset of the gradient bitmap for the wing as I felt this would look quite effective. I did make some changes to the bitmap settings to get it how I wanted it. I am please with the appearance of the heron as a whole and will now go onto another part of the image.

At this point I decided to go back to the material on the lake as I was not completely happy with its appearance. I did some research and found that the raytrace material may be effective here. I selected this from the material list and left the preset of the phong shader in place. I set the ambience to black, the diffuse colour to blue, the reflect colour to white and the luminous and transparency colour to black. I used the specular level to 50, gloss level to 40 and softness level to 0.1. I made the reflect value 500.

At this point I felt that the lake looked quite good, but a bit to flat for a lake. Due to this I added the wave bitmap as a bump map. I then reduced the bitmap settings wave length and wave radius. At this point I did find that not all the grass blades and reeds met the water and so I corrected this. When I was happy with the ripple appearance I decided to go onto the next part of the image.

Afterwards I went onto lighting the scene. I decided to use and omni light as I felt this would recreate sunlight well. I placed one in the scene, but when I rendered it the front was in shadow. I did add another at the front to highlight the reeds and grass, but I am still not happy with the appearance and so I decided to go on and come back to this later.

Lastly this week I went back to work on the background trees. I removed the diffuse map and increased the bump values to try to improve how they looked. I felt this did look better as it no longer stands out too much and so applied this to all the background trees, but just in a different colour and the second had a lower bump value.

I am not completely happy with this image at the moment and still plan to make some changes. Mainly I feel the lighting needs to be improved as the front of the scene is too dark.