A Study In Realism - 3DS Max

[Cutless009]

I've had a lot of people asking me how to do good renders, and it got me thinking, why not push my own abilities further, and help out the community as well.

For this study, I'll be using 3D Studio Max 2008 for my 3D package, and Mental Ray as my render. I will try to provide source files where I can.

This study will be broken down into these categories:


Lighting
A study of lighting, it's different moods, and how to achieve them.
Focus
A study of focus, replicating photography by implementing depth of field and field of focus.
Materials
A study of materials and textures. Once the mesh and lighting are done, this is the next step to photo-realism.
Post-Editing
A study of post-editing techniques to further you're final render's realism, including how to add bloom, adjust levels, and touch up your render.


If you have any questions along the way feel free to post up and ask. I hope that everyone can benefit from this, and that we will start seeing more people innovating!

I'll be adding all of the content very soon, and until then, here's a taste of what we'll be learning in the first two sections:

http://i188.photobucket.com/albums/z6/Cutless1/Realism/test1.jpg

[Cutless009]

reserved - lighting

[Cutless009]

reserved - focus

[Cutless009]

reserved - materials

[Cutless009]

reserved - Post-Editing

[bentleya]

i love you :)

[ZeniTH]

Great !!!! cutless009...
subd

[CrazyJoe]

i love you :)

What else can be said ... looking forward to the lessons !

[smee]

sweet!!! looking forward to this! :D

[Cutless009]

heres another little tease for you guys that I had rendering last night:

http://i188.photobucket.com/albums/z6/Cutless1/Realism/fitting1.jpg

[HESmelaugh]

Holy F**K! That is one hell of a sweet render!

Looking forward to your contributions here, even though I don't do renders myself.

[Langer]

As a student of 3D animation, and a certified Houdini animator I must say that you sir have game.

You must have studied 3dfx? - your understanding of lighting and rendering settings is very well honed.
If not then perhaps you should consider a career change, I went to school with a lot of blokes that didn't have your ability after 2yrs of study.

What is your field of work, if you don't mind my probing.

[bentleya]

wow that 45 is amazing :) can't wait to do something half as good :)

[Cutless009]

As a student of 3D animation, and a certified Houdini animator I must say that you sir have game.

You must have studied 3dfx? - your understanding of lighting and rendering settings is very well honed.
If not then perhaps you should consider a career change, I went to school with a lot of blokes that didn't have your ability after 2yrs of study.

What is your field of work, if you don't mind my probing.

I am currently attending Full Sail University in Orlando/Winter Park for Web Development and Design (basically web programing and interface studies/usability).

Ive been at 3DS max for uh.... well since R4, the first windows based version of max. :) lol.

[Langer]

Goodluck with that mate. I actually do experimental user interface and user experience development for my own career... a long way away from my film studies.

With all the cognitive and multitouch stuff out there these days it's an incredibly exciting field with MASSIVE opportunities.

I hope to one-day work develop systems like this: www.oblong.com <--- you'll love this
I do a lot of multitouch work, but the G.Speak system is too cool for words and I want a piece.



I did just notice that it looks like your alpha has a bit of noise in that last render. I may be mistaken but it looks like you can see the square edge of the texture map you used to get the bitspower logo.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v60/Langer/misc/fitting1.jpg

[Cutless009]

Yah you can, I couldnt figure that one out, its not alpha, its a sub-object map, so Im not sure what it is, its 255 white in that area so its kinda confusing. I fuddled with it for a few hours and then gave up lol.

[bentleya]

I did just notice that it looks like your alpha has a bit of noise in that last render. I may be mistaken but it looks like you can see the square edge of the texture map you used to get the bitspower logo.

on the top right corner? i wonderd what that was :o

[Langer]

I added a pic to describe what I'm talking about.

If you take a pic of your material tree I may be able to offer some advice, I usually work wit XSI and Houdini myself, but I'm fairly familiar with 3ds Max. But TBH I wouldn't worry about it too much.


edit - wrote the wrong word: Mental Ray <swapped to> 3dsMax

[bentleya]

*COUGH*

[Baleful]

The title of this thread should be renamed to "Pure Porn".

Awesome work man.

[Eridani]

Drool !!! :worship: :worship:

[bentleya]

*Cough* Still waiting :(

[Cutless009]

heh, yay classwork taking presidence over everything else :-/

[smee]

Hey man, Been looking forward to this as I want to get into this kind of stuff...
Could we get it done? :shrug: :D

[Cutless009]

Would love to smee, but honestly, Im a week behind on my classwork, my aunt is in ICU, my mom is out of town, and I have three active projects/builds going in my house atm that need to be done in < 2 months, so I'm a little swamped atm. When/If I ever catch up, this'll be back on track with a little jing action.


In the mean time if you have any specific problems/issues or need to know something specific instead of something broad like this just let me know.