Florian Brucker <tor### [at] torfboldcom> wrote:
> Wow, you're image looks very promising! There's little I can find to
> nitpick but here we go: As others already pointed out the trees are too
> regular. Aside from that, the snow looks a bit strange, but I can't
> really tell why. The ground in the foreground could be a bit less bumpy
> and the details in the snow a bit softer (highlights also). Right now it
> looks very hard and frozen.
>
>
> Keep up the good work!
> Florian


Yes, perhaps it could be a bit smoother.  Either freshly fallen snow which
will give nice undulating bumps, or a little windswept with some drifting
around the snowman, tree truck and fenceposts. The general texture of the
snow looks pretty good though.

-tgq

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"DLM" <mae### [at] combumbiumdedu> wrote:
> > The only criticism I can give is the trees in the background are still a
> > bit regular in their spacing (Possibly add a bit of jitter to the macro
> > thats placing the tress?)
>
> An engaging image well executed!
> I think the issue of the trees is about perceptions.
> The trees are regular in height - not just placement.
> As it stands it looks like a plantation with no boundaries - perhaps it was
> planted that way?
> To look more natural/unkempt it needs smaller trees/vegetation at the forest
> margin and variation in height/size/type.
> To look more managed it needs perhaps a fence/ utility line or similar
> bounding human intrusion.
> Thoughts?...
>
> DLM

The trees are meant to look like they have been planted there and are
surrounding a field, although I do think they look a bit too uniform even
for this. They are (sort of) based on the view from my window in which the
trees are of very even height. There are actually 3 types of tree in the
copse although the majority are the large ones the other 2 don't really
show up very well (I actually rendered them in different colours to make
sure they were there as I couldn't spot them myself).

I may try the fence idea if I get time.

Thanks,

Sean

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Florian Brucker <tor### [at] torfboldcom> wrote:
> Wow, you're image looks very promising! There's little I can find to
> nitpick but here we go: As others already pointed out the trees are too
> regular. Aside from that, the snow looks a bit strange, but I can't
> really tell why. The ground in the foreground could be a bit less bumpy
> and the details in the snow a bit softer (highlights also). Right now it
> looks very hard and frozen.
>
>
> Keep up the good work!
> Florian

Yes, I agree it does look a bit frozen especially in the bottom right corner
of the image, I will try to fix this for the final image.

Thanks,

Sean

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Looks great, keep it up! :-)

Something about the snow on the trees bothers me a little: single spheres of
snow at branch-tips and such... Additionally, you'll often find snow being
stacked more to one side of the tree than the other, very seldom does snow
just fall straight down from the sky, there's often some wind involved.
A hint for the background trees (though I don't know if you're already doing
it, but I'll say it nontheless): for the background it should suffice to use
a patterned slope-map as a texture to simulate a snow-like surface. It's
what I did in this image:
http://www.nolights.de/projects/missyou/missyou.html

I'd also add some more irregularity to the fence. In the above mentioned
image I've written a small script to create slightly bent logs, and I vary
the bending and sizes to get a more natural look...

Regards,
Tim

-- 
aka "Tim Nikias v2.0"
Homepage: <http://www.nolights.de>

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Always willing to give my opinion (whether you asked for it or not :-)

1. The composition is fantastic.

2. I assume the snowman is looking at the sunset with me, so he doesn't 
need features.  In fact I think he looks best without arms since they 
are more comic book than reality.

3. There is a strange horizontal line in the trees above the snowman's 
head...  looks like the snow is only on the bottom half of the trees.

4. The new sky is wonderful.

In fact everything is wonderful.  This is one of the most vibrant and 
compelling images posted to this group in a long time.  Thank you!


s.day wrote:
> I have added the snow to the trees and decided to put a fence in (not added
> the final texture to this or the trees yet). Also I have adjusted the
> colours of the sky a bit (not sure if it is better of worse as it depends
> on the angle at which you view it on my LCD). Still need to give the poor
> old snowman a face and some arms..
> 
> Any comments welcome
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Sean
> 
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>

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"Tim Nikias" <JUSTTHELOWERCASE:timISNOTnikias(at)gmx.netWARE> wrote:
> Looks great, keep it up! :-)
>
> Something about the snow on the trees bothers me a little: single spheres of
> snow at branch-tips and such... Additionally, you'll often find snow being
> stacked more to one side of the tree than the other, very seldom does snow
> just fall straight down from the sky, there's often some wind involved.
> A hint for the background trees (though I don't know if you're already doing
> it, but I'll say it nontheless): for the background it should suffice to use
> a patterned slope-map as a texture to simulate a snow-like surface. It's
> what I did in this image:
> http://www.nolights.de/projects/missyou/missyou.html
>
> I'd also add some more irregularity to the fence. In the above mentioned
> image I've written a small script to create slightly bent logs, and I vary
> the bending and sizes to get a more natural look...
>
> Regards,
> Tim
>
> --
> aka "Tim Nikias v2.0"
> Homepage: <http://www.nolights.de>

Thanks for the comments, I have tried several different levels of snow on
the nearest tree and to remove the odd spheres at branch ends I had to use
more snow which then meant the image lost the contrast of the dark tree
against the Sun. If I have time I will try to fix this before the IRTC
deadline (although I have a busy couple of weeks ahead so don't know how
much time I will get..) Thanks for the hint on the trees in the distance, I
will give it a go as I think the problem you have spotted is because I am
not covering all trees with snow due to memory constraints of having too
many blobs.
The fence is my latest addition and I agree it does look too regular I am
thinking of using isosurfaces for the wood to make it look weathered and
adding a bit of randomness.

Thanks

Sean

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"s.day" <s.d### [at] uelacuk> wrote:
> I have added the snow to the trees and decided to put a fence in (not added
> the final texture to this or the trees yet). Also I have adjusted the
> colours of the sky a bit (not sure if it is better of worse as it depends
> on the angle at which you view it on my LCD). Still need to give the poor
> old snowman a face and some arms..
>
> Any comments welcome
>
> Thanks,
>
> Sean


Wawww!.. Sean, very nice look outside the trees (same height?)

Regards.

Hasan

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Spock <Spo### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> Always willing to give my opinion (whether you asked for it or not :-)
>
> 1. The composition is fantastic.
>
> 2. I assume the snowman is looking at the sunset with me, so he doesn't
> need features.  In fact I think he looks best without arms since they
> are more comic book than reality.
>
> 3. There is a strange horizontal line in the trees above the snowman's
> head...  looks like the snow is only on the bottom half of the trees.
>
> 4. The new sky is wonderful.
>
> In fact everything is wonderful.  This is one of the most vibrant and
> compelling images posted to this group in a long time.  Thank you!
>
>
Thanks for the comments, I think that's why I have left the snowman's
features until now as I think it might actually make the image look worse.
I think the problem with the trees is because I have tried not covering all
tree's with snow due to memory problems which I hope to fix with Tim's
hint.

Glad the sky looks better.

Thanks

Sean

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Wow! Excellent image. Very realistic. I'm keeping a copy in my permanent 
archive.

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s.day spake:

> I have added the snow to the trees and decided to put a fence in (not
> added the final texture to this or the trees yet). Also I have adjusted
> the colours of the sky a bit (not sure if it is better of worse as it
> depends on the angle at which you view it on my LCD). Still need to give
> the poor old snowman a face and some arms..
> 
> Any comments welcome

Well done, I love the colors. 

One thing might be to make the sun disappear more "behind" the tree? Right
now it looks as if the sun is shining in front of the tree's branches,
instead of behind it.

Regards,
-- 
Stefan Viljoen
Software Support Technician / Programmer
Polar Design Solutions

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