RobF wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I'm looking for constructive criticism to improve this image.
> I'd like to improve the radiosity (currently using Radiosity_IndoorLQ), but
> not clear on which settings to tweak.
> 
> Thanks in advance,
> 
> Rob.
> ---
> http://www.fitzel.ca/dart/index.html
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
Lovely scene.  Very complete. Great detail.  The expression and 
sentience of the figure very believable.  The composition and lighting
looks solid.

So any crits assume a high level of accomplisnment and seem more about
fine tuning what the ultimate "expression" of the image.

If photorealism is the intention, it doesn't look photographic to me and 
so I find the focal blur a bit distracting.  It looks more 
painterly-real, if you will, in the style of Edward Hopper.  I think 
this is because of the figure.  It has a very believable physical 
presence but not a photoreal presence and probably it will stay that 
way.  It is as if you had to sacrifice the one to get the other.

You might be able to boost the (photo)realism by:

- gaining more foreground tactility ... perhaps you could get more out 
of the wood grain of the desk

- make her sweater completely black so to eliminate some of the 
modelling awkwardness around the shoulder

That's as far as my thoughts go at the moment.  It really has a 
Hopper-like feel.

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"RobF" <nomail@nomail> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm looking for constructive criticism to improve this image.

Well, my critiques are on the Poserish problems... the woman looks very good
(excellent hair!) except her arms and hands...  From personal experience:
get a rough approximation of the pose you want, then TURN INVERSE
KINEMATICS OFF! Fine tune all the joints using the movement dials.  Its
more time consuming, but its the only way to get away from the "Poser
look".

1. Fix her index finger on the page, the current pose is painful to look at.
 Poser doesn't do straight fingers very well, I'd use the dials to raise the
knuckles and give the finger more of a natural bend.  You may also need to
change the angle of the bend at the wrist to get this right.

2. The inside of the arm at the elbow has a very flattened "bent" look. This
is another area Poser is weak, because the skin does not flex with
positional changes like real skin does.  Poser isn't natural, so ignore
what *seems* natural in favor of what looks good.  Rotating the forearm
with the dials will move the flattened part to where it is less noticable.
In this case, moving the elbow further away from the body would probably
help also as it will put the flattened part on the inside facing the figure
and away from the camera.

RG

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Great image.. Difficult to say what needs improving, I assume as it is WIP
you may be working on some of the textures (although none of them jump out
as being bad, I just think they need a bit more detail/dirt etc..) Also it
would look better with radiosity.
Gotta get me one of those cordless lamps, are they cheap to run?

Sean

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I agree with the other critiques and would add just a few of my own. Close 
the aperture of the focal blur a bit and move it where most of the 
foreground is in focus. I also have a problem with the books having too many 
color variances. They look just a little too fake with the yellows not too 
many books have those colors(afaik) but who I'm I to say? The lighting is 
not bad but( I guess you knew this was coming) I would like to see it darker 
in the background scene. I would add ambient 0 to global settings also (I 
find it helpful in getting lighting right). I also think that the other 
lampshades look a little odd. I think you could try tweaking the ambient on 
them that might bring them around. Rad settings are always tough to get. You 
can always try recursion_limit 2 or higher and tweak the grey_level abit . I 
do like your scene though . Please change the scale of the texture of the 
wood on the desk .
I hope this is helpful.
Later,
    Brent
"RobF" <nomail@nomail> wrote in message 
news:web.4484e379e003e28629c50a910@news.povray.org...
> Hi,
>
> I'm looking for constructive criticism to improve this image.
> I'd like to improve the radiosity (currently using Radiosity_IndoorLQ), 
> but
> not clear on which settings to tweak.
>
> Thanks in advance,
>
> Rob.
> ---
> http://www.fitzel.ca/dart/index.html
>

Post a reply to this message

"RobF" <nomail@nomail> wrote in message 
news:web.4484e379e003e28629c50a910@news.povray.org...
> Hi,
>
> I'm looking for constructive criticism to improve this image.

Rob,
Pretty good!
One more thing to consider is the hair. Lovely texture. But no visible means 
of support - unless its thick with laquer. Gravity would have it hanging 
over her face unless clipped back.
DLM

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This image is screaming for an area light instead of a point light.
Use a 'circular orient' area light (probably a 10x10 points adaptive 1
should do) which is about the size of the light bulb (well, of the
imaginary light bulb since you probably didn't use a real one but
just put a light source inside the shade).

   Also the shade should have an effect on the lighting. Try removing
no_shadow from it and letting light go through it filtered.

Post a reply to this message

Thanks for the feedback. I'm using DAZ|Studio instead of Poser, so
unfortunately, I don't have inverse kinematics.

The woman is posed in DAZ|Studio, but the books and pen are CSG. Posing the
hands to fit properly was very time consuming as I'm using two programs to
line things up. I've worked out a more realistic (and less painful!) pose
that I'll post shortly.

I agree with you about the elbow. I played around with rotating the joints,
but gave up, opting instead for a long sleeved top to hide the elbow joint.

Rob.

"gonzo" <rgo### [at] lansetcom> wrote:
> "RobF" <nomail@nomail> wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm looking for constructive criticism to improve this image.
>
> Well, my critiques are on the Poserish problems... the woman looks very good
> (excellent hair!) except her arms and hands...  From personal experience:
> get a rough approximation of the pose you want, then TURN INVERSE
> KINEMATICS OFF! Fine tune all the joints using the movement dials.  Its
> more time consuming, but its the only way to get away from the "Poser
> look".
>
> 1. Fix her index finger on the page, the current pose is painful to look at.
>  Poser doesn't do straight fingers very well, I'd use the dials to raise the
> knuckles and give the finger more of a natural bend.  You may also need to
> change the angle of the bend at the wrist to get this right.
>
> 2. The inside of the arm at the elbow has a very flattened "bent" look. This
> is another area Poser is weak, because the skin does not flex with
> positional changes like real skin does.  Poser isn't natural, so ignore
> what *seems* natural in favor of what looks good.  Rotating the forearm
> with the dials will move the flattened part to where it is less noticable.
> In this case, moving the elbow further away from the body would probably
> help also as it will put the flattened part on the inside facing the figure
> and away from the camera.
>
> RG

Post a reply to this message

"s.day" <s.d### [at] uelacuk> wrote:
> Great image.. Difficult to say what needs improving, I assume as it is WIP
> you may be working on some of the textures (although none of them jump out
> as being bad, I just think they need a bit more detail/dirt etc..) Also it
> would look better with radiosity.
> Gotta get me one of those cordless lamps, are they cheap to run?
>
> Sean

Yeah, still playing with textures. The "cordless lamp" has a cord that goes
thru a hole in the table (unmodelled of course!). At least that's what it
looks like in my "inspiration image":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:NYC_Public_Library_Research_Room_Jan_2006.jpg


Rob.

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I used
global_settings {
  gravity off
}
:-)

I wanted to use that particular hair model, and tried to "gel it back" to
reveal her face. I agree with you that it looks unrealistic, so I'm working
on giving her a new hairstyle.

Thanks,

Rob.

"dlm" <me### [at] addressinvalid> wrote:
> "RobF" <nomail@nomail> wrote in message
> news:web.4484e379e003e28629c50a910@news.povray.org...
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm looking for constructive criticism to improve this image.
>
> Rob,
> Pretty good!
> One more thing to consider is the hair. Lovely texture. But no visible means
> of support - unless its thick with laquer. Gravity would have it hanging
> over her face unless clipped back.
> DLM

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I had some issues using an area light, perhaps you can help.

1) I seem to get lots of grey speckles when I used an area light. I had to
go up to adaptive 3 to get rid of them.

2) The light shade texture is opaque and uses double_illuminate. The area
light is actually below the shade. Are you suggesting using a rgbf based
texture to let the light through?

3) The area_light is defined inside the lamp CSG union. The lamp's units are
in inches and in my scene file, I scale it by 1/12 to get it in feet. I
assume the  light_source units like translation are scaled as well, what
about fade_distance?

4) The area light has the following settings
  area_light
  <2, 0, 0> <0, 0, 2> // lights spread out across this distance (x * z)
  10, 10                // total number of lights in grid (4x*4z = 16
lights)

I get the following warning. As far as I can tell, I scale the lamp evenly
in all directions

  Parse Warning: When using orient, the two axes of the area light must be
of
  equal length. Only the length of the first axis will be used.

Thanks in advance,

Rob.


Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:
> This image is screaming for an area light instead of a point light.
> Use a 'circular orient' area light (probably a 10x10 points adaptive 1
> should do) which is about the size of the light bulb (well, of the
> imaginary light bulb since you probably didn't use a real one but
> just put a light source inside the shade).
>
>    Also the shade should have an effect on the lighting. Try removing
> no_shadow from it and letting light go through it filtered.

Post a reply to this message