Op 05/10/2020 om 19:54 schreef Bald Eagle:
> I found the perfect bird for your scene.
> 

LOL! Absolutely! Thanks for the reminder: birds will be one of the last 
decisions when all else will be done on this scene.

-- 
Thomas

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in news:5f72f3d2$1@news.povray.org Thomas de Groot wrote:

> Living 
> in a country that is a bit too crowded for my taste

Hier in't Oosten is't ook wel rustiger,

Ingo

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Op 13/10/2020 om 12:04 schreef ingo:
> in news:5f72f3d2$1@news.povray.org Thomas de Groot wrote:
> 
>> Living
>> in a country that is a bit too crowded for my taste
> 
> Hier in't Oosten is't ook wel rustiger,
> 
> Ingo
> 

[switch En/Nl...klang!]

Inderdaad. Dat was ook een van mijn kandidaten na een Randstad leven...

Tussen haakjes: bedankt voor Meshmaker! Ik kom daar zo dadelijk op terug 
hieronder.

[switch Nl/En...klang!]

-- 
Thomas

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Please find here the (last) version of the scene. Search for the 
differences ;-)

One notable change I want to elaborate on a bit. I dumped Gilles Tran's 
MakeGrass and replaced it by Lawnmaker from Uwe Gleiss (2004). 
Unfortunately, his website from where it was downloaded does not exist 
anymore. Interestingly, the grass blades were made of parametric objects 
and I remembered the infinite time it took to render a proper scene, so 
I never used it. William Pokorny's discovery about the optimal settings 
for parametric objects, made me curious of course and, Lo! Lawnmaker 
suddenly became a serious candidate. Not stopping there, and interested 
as I am in using mesh2{} files, I decided to experiment with Meshmaker 
(thanks Ingo!). With the help of an example file by Friedrich 
Lohmueller, I made the conversion within a couple of minutes. Taking 
into account the size of the grasspatches and their grass blade density 
(which can increase parsing time quite rapidly) a typical lawn renders 
very fast, hardly slower than the rest of the scene.

-- 
Thomas

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Attachments:
Download 'pending storm_10_final2.jpg' (346 KB)

Preview of image 'pending storm_10_final2.jpg'

Le 2020-10-14 à 03:02, Thomas de Groot a écrit :
> Please find here the (last) version of the scene. Search for the 
> differences ;-)
> 
> One notable change I want to elaborate on a bit. I dumped Gilles Tran's 
> MakeGrass and replaced it by Lawnmaker from Uwe Gleiss (2004). 
> Unfortunately, his website from where it was downloaded does not exist 
> anymore. Interestingly, the grass blades were made of parametric objects 
> and I remembered the infinite time it took to render a proper scene, so 
> I never used it. William Pokorny's discovery about the optimal settings 
> for parametric objects, made me curious of course and, Lo! Lawnmaker 
> suddenly became a serious candidate. Not stopping there, and interested 
> as I am in using mesh2{} files, I decided to experiment with Meshmaker 
> (thanks Ingo!). With the help of an example file by Friedrich 
> Lohmueller, I made the conversion within a couple of minutes. Taking 
> into account the size of the grasspatches and their grass blade density 
> (which can increase parsing time quite rapidly) a typical lawn renders 
> very fast, hardly slower than the rest of the scene.
> 

That grass is MUCH better than the original.

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Op 14/10/2020 om 20:46 schreef Alain Martel:
> 
> That grass is MUCH better than the original.

Absolutely. In the past I was rather pleased with MakeGrass but lately I 
had trouble to get what I wanted. Lawnmaker is also easier to control 
and to implement further if need arises (which I shall certainly explore).

-- 
Thomas

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Thomas de Groot <tho### [at] degrootorg> wrote:
> Please find here the (last) version of the scene. Search for the
> differences ;-)
>

Even more beautiful than your original render.

I see that the trees have been fattened-up a bit; and one of the rusty metal
fence-bars has been broken and bent (a nice touch.) It also looks like the
castle or church has been thrown into more shadow (or maybe with less fill
light), which nicely matches the late afternoon Sun. The stones under the fence
seem to have changed too.

I do like the detailed grass, but my personal preference is for the previous
'mossy' appearance; it just seems to go better with the overall 'look' of the
scene-- maybe because, with its 'lack of detail', it offsets the more-detailed
valley and trees. And it more clearly shows the shadow of the out-of-frame tree
that is cast across the lawn.

I like *both* versions of the fence stones; I think I prefer the previous
stones' textures, but the new stones' shapes. A difficult decision!

It's easy to be an amateur art critic, ha :-P

You have used so *many* interesting code tools for this scene, tools that I have
not even started experimenting with yet. Thanks for the detailed descriptions of
your techniques.

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Thomas de Groot <tho### [at] degrootorg> wrote:
> Please find here the (last) version of the scene. Search for the
> differences ;-)
>
> One notable change I want to elaborate on a bit. I dumped Gilles Tran's
> MakeGrass and replaced it by Lawnmaker from Uwe Gleiss (2004).
> Unfortunately, his website from where it was downloaded does not exist
> anymore. Interestingly, the grass blades were made of parametric objects
> and I remembered the infinite time it took to render a proper scene, so
> I never used it. William Pokorny's discovery about the optimal settings
> for parametric objects, made me curious of course and, Lo! Lawnmaker
> suddenly became a serious candidate. Not stopping there, and interested
> as I am in using mesh2{} files, I decided to experiment with Meshmaker
> (thanks Ingo!). With the help of an example file by Friedrich
> Lohmueller, I made the conversion within a couple of minutes. Taking
> into account the size of the grasspatches and their grass blade density
> (which can increase parsing time quite rapidly) a typical lawn renders
> very fast, hardly slower than the rest of the scene.
>
> --
> Thomas

Hi sorry, is it too late to give suggestions? The potential of this image is big
!  My first and only remark if too late is that there would me a more immersive
feeling if silhouette of the castle had more bumpy details for slabs. That would
be a lot of work (maybe less for an HG POV displacement). So I hold my tong for
the other possible areas to work on and really appologize if it's too late, I
enjoy the meteorological effect of clouds falling down to rain a lot, and the
slopes of distant hills , and the grain on the rusty metal bar and the position
of wooden ramp to compose image into depth.

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You've definitely made some noticeable improvements on the left side.

On the right ...   it all seems to have faded into a lack of definition.
The clouds and the land ooze together into a brown cloud - I would have expected
some greater contrast, and a darker, almost black color.   Something to add
WEIGHT and authoritatively announce the arrival of a STORM, and make you _feel_
it.

You have sunlight shining on the trees, but no highlights.
An effect of the light group?

The little buildings also seem to have disappeared into the beige cloud.
Are they no longer lit as well?

It's still kicking butt, and I like both versions of the grass.

That all of it is parametric, with a conversion to mesh2{} is pretty exciting as
well.   Maybe a tiny example scene showing how all of that is implemented, along
with the needed files in a zip would prod other folks into taking a crack at
some renders of their own   ;)

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Op 15/10/2020 om 22:38 schreef Bald Eagle:
> You've definitely made some noticeable improvements on the left side.
> 
> On the right ...   it all seems to have faded into a lack of definition.
> The clouds and the land ooze together into a brown cloud - I would have expected
> some greater contrast, and a darker, almost black color.   Something to add
> WEIGHT and authoritatively announce the arrival of a STORM, and make you _feel_
> it.

Well, It may not be rain... maybe a dust storm. I understand what you 
mean but I believe I am leaving things as they are now. Maybe something 
for an update in ten years time :-)

> 
> You have sunlight shining on the trees, but no highlights.
> An effect of the light group?

No. This is something I am going to look into in my next scene which 
will be on ground level, without the castle. It probably results from 
the billboard settings and or gamma maybe.

> 
> The little buildings also seem to have disappeared into the beige cloud.
> Are they no longer lit as well?

No, they are there at the same place. What has been changed are the 
textures.

> 
> It's still kicking butt, and I like both versions of the grass.

I prefer this one .

> 
> That all of it is parametric, with a conversion to mesh2{} is pretty exciting as
> well.   Maybe a tiny example scene showing how all of that is implemented, along
> with the needed files in a zip would prod other folks into taking a crack at
> some renders of their own   ;)
> 

Excellent idea. I need to note it as todo before I forget or before RL 
kicks me over.

-- 
Thomas

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