|
The Commander Series is a Sci-Fi tale of Grant (The Commander), and Leen, some unsavory pirate types who travel the galaxy, inevitably stirring up chaos wherever they go. I wrote a very short story about it once on another site, but I may clean it up and post it again here.
Anyway, The Commander Series was not one of my main projects, so I thought I would test the waters with some different techniques. After learning about Blender and Daz Studio (see my previous article), this seemed to be the perfect match-up, especially since these were free programs and I could invest time and not money into it.
The first picture (above) was not all that I had hoped for. At the time I knew this wasn't the best that could be done, but I lacked the skill to really understand how to do it better.
The ship I had created in Blender, and I was fairly happy with it. Since it was for the most part made of basic geometric shapes, it was easier to get what I wanted. The 3D figures were a different story.
For those, I turned to Daz Studio and a couple of their free models -Victoria 3 and Michael 3. I loaded them up in Daz, used some stock poses, and literally just hit the render button. I had to add the red suit to the Leen in Photoshop, since I didn't have a suit to put on her in the 3D program. Grant had his white temple hair applied in Photoshop. Again, I wasn't happy with this but it was my first outing.
As you can see, these figures have what is a pretty common problem with a lot of the 3D art out there these days. The skin looks rubbery and they look like cheap 3D models. No artistry is applied to them at all.
My failure was that I did not use the lighting and material that is possible in Daz 3D. As it was, the flat default lighting allowed it to render, but not very well. In my next image, I would try some lighting.
Finally, I generated the space background myself in Photoshop, and I didn't really care for it.
This next outing (above), I tried experimenting with adding different types of lights, but it actually turned out worse than the first image (at least to me).
This time I screwed up in Blender and in Daz. While I was experimenting with the materials applied to the ship in Blender, I accidentally changed it to something resembling plastic, instead of metal. So now it looked like a child's toy was hanging there in space. At the time, all my attempts to fix this just made the problem worse, because I didn't understand the principles or the details of how Blender was applying the textures.
Then into Daz, to try out the figures. This time I did light them, but with the wrong kind of lights, and not positioned in a very good places for the effects that I wanted. You really need to apply the principles of photography to your models, since Daz Studio is pretty much a digital photo studio.
Despite working at a photo studio for many years now, I failed to understand this and flubbed it up. So again, I got some pretty lifeless models in my renders. And again, I tried to inject some life in Photoshop but really to no avail.
It became apparent to me that you've really got to understand the lighting and the materials to get the best possible image out of your 3D render, so you won't have to put so much work into Photoshop "post-processing" as it's called.
The backdrop this time is from a Hubble telescope image. Even these don't work as is, so I put a lot of work into enhancing it and making it look more dynamic. Sometimes the real image is not as vibrant as I would like.
Still, this image I regarded as a failure.
A lot of time went by between the last image and this next one (above). I had actually spent a lot of time in Blender recreating actual physical objects, learning on the forums, and reading books on the subject. Plus I put in a lot of time on the Daz forums to figure out where I was going wrong there.
This time in Blender, I was able to undo my screw up with the ship, and apply a different metal texture to the model, plus add in some more details on the surface.
The tiny ships were some free 3D models I got from another website and brought into Blender. This one I had a lot of fun with, since it's generally easier for me to work with Blender than Daz. I set up the shot, and the lighting and let it render.
Now, dealing with Daz. This time I wanted to make sure my figures were a bit more dynamic, so I avoided the stock pose for Leen and this time armed her with a gun, one of many free guns I found on the Daz freebie site.
Posing the figures in Daz is sometimes a bit time consuming, especially based on the speed of your computer. Mine is not a powerhouse by any means, so the program runs sluggishly. You can't really expect more out of free software, I guess.
I felt like I got some really good lighting on her this time, but I ran into yet another limitation of my machine. Depending on the power of your graphics card, Daz will limit you to only so many light. In my case, my computer can only handle 8. To find out how many yours can handle, choose Help>About Your Video Card, and it will tell you exactly what features you can and can't use.
It seems like 8 lights would be a lot, but when you're trying to get the perfect lighting, I hit the limit fast. You can add in more lights if you want, but they won't render, so there's no point to it.
Anyway, that was unfortunate, but there was nothing to be done about it. When I brought in Grant to render his shot. I wasn't happy with the skin texture on the model, so I set out to find a replacement texture that I could use. I found some skin texture, and I replaced the default file the model was using. However, I didn't bother to tailor it specifically to the wrap of the model, and it shows as much. I think the skin sample was too large and could have been customized more.
Still, there was more detail there than previously. I put in a lot of work on the eyes as well, as I was tired of the 'lifeless' look some of these models have. When I brought all the elements into Photoshop, it seemed to work well, using another hubble background that I reworked to make it more vivid.
The latest one I did (above) has worked out the best so far. Mostly because I was using the latest free model from Daz. I replaced Michael 3 with Michael 4. This model already had a more lifelike face and skin textures, even the eyes.
However, I opted to spend a little money at this point. I paid $20 for a red bodysuit for Leen that I could apply different textures to, instead of doing it all in Photoshop.
I hit the 8 light limit real fast with Leen again, so the image of her didn't come out how I planned, but still pretty good. I think from now on, I will do 2 or more different renders with the lights in different areas, then I'll merge them all in Photoshop for a kind of 3D HDR image.
Doing Grant's face was very easy this time, and I was able to nail the lighting using only my 8 lights without a real problem.
The ship was almost the same as from the last one, just rendered from a different angle and with a few more windows added to it.
When I brought everything into Photoshop, I was able to apply some more lighting effects to the gun (which was a free model from Daz) and to the other models to spice it up a bit.
Another retouched background from the Hubble completed the image. I felt like this was the first one where it all came together. However, I can still see many ways to improve on this. I'm not a 3D guru (yet), so there's still many things for me to learn.
I'm currently working on a webcomic of The Commander Series, so I'm trying my new techniques out even now.
I'll say this about the 2 programs I use for 3D:
Daz Studio is a bit of a beast. You can't really complain since it's free, but I feel like the overhead on the GUI for this program is not really handled right. It's very slow to open and save, slow to pose and a bit difficult to change views and get the perspective you want.
Some of the previews are not very accurate, or I just haven't learned to adjust my expectations of what the render will look like. I've been very surprised sometimes seeing the final image after I've seen the preview.
I expect slow renders, but I would like a bit more speed out of this program as you are working. I really don't look forward to opening it up to set up my scenes.
Conversely, Blender is extremely fast and responsive. Everything moves quick, and there's absolutely no sluggishness. Yes you have to put up with a very NON-standard UI, but to me it's worth it since I can work so fast. Changes happen like lighting, and I have a few different ways to get quick, fairly accurate previews.
All this happens, plus Blender does a lot more than Daz. It's very powerful. I could make a commercial-grade movie out of this if I had the skills. I'm constantly working on learning more Blender so I can create my own figures from scratch, rig them up for posing and set up my entire scenes in Blender.
For now, though, at my skill level I have to use Daz to get models and props, and I'll just have to make sure to apply my own spin on things to make them as unique as possible since everyone has access to the same models.
Right now that's the state of things, so look for future updates in 3D and The Commander Series when it debuts.
|
My Projects 
Comments