Self-Inflicted Challenge

Jake said:
My question though is how would you make the actual towel. Would it have a thickness and how would the gradient affect an object with thickness? I think it would only affect the outside surface of the towel.

Jake,
If the goal is only to duplicate as closely as possible the V-Ray render, then I don't think there is a need to put a thickness on the towell since this will complicate the mesh. I had a close look at the original image and I don't think there is one there. To me, this just looks like 2 single planes attached together on 1 side slightly above the bar.
Beside this, the plane on the back, not being visible, is very likely a flat plane.
Therefore I would just subdiv/displace the front plane and later on add a second plane for the back (+move it slightly to make it visible on the lower right).

Of course, if you want a real towell so several renders can be made from various positions, then it's a different story.
 
Jake,
Looking at your latest image and more specifically to the towell, I think you need to change the subdivision type from Catmull to linear. I can see that your mesh is not regular. By going to linear I think you will get a more "linear" displacement and the map will be more evenly distributed. At least this is what I have experienced in the quick test I did. But, I'm not an expert ... just trying to help... :wink:
 
Well, back from lovely Gary, Indiana. The attached image is the sign slapped on the front door of the place I had to photograph. I think it speaks for itself.

Francois,

I'm not trying to duplicate the image exactly. Im trying to get a rendering that is comparable. I need to duplicate stuff in the image though to get an apples to apples comparison of how the light and surfaces react, but it doesn't need to be a carbon copy.

I really would like learn how to model a darn towel correctly.

ps. you are correct about the subdivision. I should toss that rag right into the hamper.
 

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I rendered a shot of the sink and faucet while I was gone. Think it looking pretty good except for the razor sharp edges inside the sink. When I modeled it I expect to see those inside edges. Got lazy.

I need to apply a little smoothing to the sink front. It still looks a little facetted. And of course the wall texure and bump map are pretty bad.
 

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Same image with a touch of Photoshop and some fake depth of field.
 

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Jeez Jake.... go easy on us will you... you are setting the bar toooo high... especially for a total novice like me... :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

those basin shots are great even as they are... but of course you could do a little better tho' if you really tried a bit more... :lol: :lol:

what were your settings for the taps and the mirror... they have both come out looking like photos... very good work indeed...

cheers
Trevor

ps... I can see what you mean now about Gary... oh well... takes all types to make this world I guess...
 
Trevor,

I'll post the file tomorrow or at I'll the least post the settings. That model is at work. The settings really aren't anything special. Reflection at about .7 and specular set to metal at 100. Use a medium grey for the color. Oversampling pass 1 at 8 or 16. Oversampling pass 2 at 0.

Jake
 
Jake said:
Use a medium grey for the color.

ah huh... that is where I must be going wrong with my chrome... I have it set far too light...

for the oversampling... I thought one was to set the 2nd run at the high level and the 1st at the low level... thought I saw it somewhere in the documentation... what is the reason behind this... as I am still not sure what it is fact doing...

cheers
Trevor
 
Hi,
you normally have to set "oversampling pass 1" to the lower value. In most cases a value between 1 and 4 should be enough. Nevertheless here is a small description to see how the oversampling algorithm works.

1. In the first pass for every pixel "oversampling pass 1" samples will be taken.

2. The next pass is a edge detection filter which depends on the "tolerance". It detects pixels who have neighboring pixels with different color. The lower the tolerance the more pixels will be classified as edges. Pixels which have beed detected as edges will be highlighted in red.

3. In the last pass those pixels which have been detected as edges (the red ones) will be refined. Therefore an extra "oversampling pass 2" samples will be calculated for that pixel. Since pixels which haven't been detected as edges won't be refined you save a lot of rendering time.


For many cases it is therefore enough if you set "oversampling pass 1" to 1 because the edge detection filter already find the edges. There are only some cases where you need a higher setting for "oversampling pass 1".

I hope that helps.

By,
Martin
 
Jake said:
I really would like learn how to model a darn towel correctly.

There are probably a hundret ways to model a towel. This is how I would make it. Each step corresponds to the attached image.

1. Start with a box. Set the size and the sections and make it editable.
2. Remove the three sides of the box you don't need.
3. Select the edges according to image 3 and move them a little bit outward.
4. Do the same with the other edges according to image 4. But this time move them inward.
5. Finally apply 1 or 2 subdivision steps with either the polygon tool or the modifier object.

As I said before this is just one way to do it.

By,
Martin
 

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I guess I'm confused then Martin, When I was working on the Farnsworth Rendering there were some artifacts that I though you said would be eliminated by not using the second pass. I though you explained it as a cache issue.

What would be the best settings? 1-4 for the first pass and as high as you can afford to wait on the second pass?
 
Gulp!

Sometimes I wonder if I am ever going to get the hang of this rendering thing..?

You experts - there would be a good market here for selling preset scenes that a goof ball like me could drop a model into, and click render..
 
lavardera said:
Gulp!

Sometimes I wonder if I am ever going to get the hang of this rendering thing..?

You experts - there would be a good market here for selling preset scenes that a goof ball like me could drop a model into, and click render..

Yea, well I wish I were goof-ball architect with your design abilities Greg. I think you'll get the hang of Cheetah3D when you get the time to really look at it closely. Right now you need to concentrate on saving the world from McMansions! :lol:
 
Yeah, I'm with you Greg, they lost me when the over-sampling started ...

These renderings are amazing Jake, good job. I'm also intrigued about the freeform stuff that you can't do that easily in Su ... ;-)
 
Allister said:
Yeah, I'm with you Greg, they lost me when the over-sampling started ...

These renderings are amazing Jake, good job. I'm also intrigued about the freeform stuff that you can't do that easily in Su ... ;-)

That intrigues me too. So far most of the free form stuff is already done. I can soften and edge or add a subdivision and distrot shapes to make them a bit more natural, but I haven't done a lot of freeform modeling in Cheetah except for site contours.

That are folks in the gallery that do quite well in that department. I'm still too SketchUp dependent. Is there a SA (sketchupper's anonymous) I could join? We could meet as a group each month and learn to draw organically!

Actually Allister. If you plan ahead as to how you group your SketchUp models. You can apply different subdivisions to say, seat cushions to soften the edges. You just need to think ahead about how you group your models or materials.

I have started to play with Martin's modeling tools and they really work well. Maybe I'll tackle a beanbag chair first!
 
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