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Environment WIP - Cathedral

polycounter lvl 18
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Tulkamir polycounter lvl 18
Updated Below!

compshot.jpg

I'm working on this for my demo reel, and would love any comments or critiques you guys have.

Also, I was hoping for some opinions. On my reel I'm thinking about building a facade for the front of the church and having an out-doors jungle scene the camera flies through, into the doors of the church, then up the isle. Would this be a good way to present it?

I'm thinking that I might change the altar at the front to the trunk of a large tree breaking through the ground and through the roof of the alcove at the end. I think this could add more interest.

Good idea's, or no?

Anyways, thanks for the help.

Replies

  • malcolm
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    malcolm polycount sponsor
    That is looking neat, it looks a little dark here though but that could be my monitor at home. I have a few requests, the images look really compressed can I see jpeg quality of 10, also the unlit shots look like they are still lit with the viewport light can you go to lighting> use no lights and grab those shots again. It is under the viewport tabs.
  • rooster
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    rooster mod
    looks cool man, feels to me a bit narrow for a cathedral of that size, unless its just the perspective? I've never been in one that long and thin
  • Rick Stirling
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    Rick Stirling polycounter lvl 18
    It's very dark. Very very dark.

    It's also very much like Durham Cathedral.

    http://www.pitt.edu/~pascual/Durham%20Cathedral%20interior.jpg


    It seems that the vegetation has taken root, and is therefore abandoned. With that in mind, the pews are to new and clean looking. If the plants have moved in, what about wildlife?

    Who built it? Why? They loved it enough to give it a stained glass window and decorated pews, but no other decoration? No lighting?

    Consider this as an extreme of how it might have once looked:

    main_img.jpg
  • Mark Dygert
    It needs a lot more bounced light. What you have now is closer to torch light or a spot light than proper lighting. Think about the lighting on a cloudy day and try to add really defused lighting like that to your scene. A "sky light" can help achieve this pretty easily but be careful it can really up your render times.

    There is an age discrepancy between the pews and the building. The age and size of the plant life tell us it has been wet in here for quite some time, yet the wooden pews are shinny and bright? If those are cushions on the pews they would have mildewed and nearly rotted off. Even if the wood was lacquered it would start to split, twist, swell and discolor if there is enough water coming in to support plant life. I think you can solve this pretty quickly by just turning down the saturation on the pew texture.

    Good start so far, just gotta nail down the texture and age of those pews, and then the lighting. Bounce some subtle lighting around and bring the ambient light level up quite a bit.
  • Tulkamir
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    Tulkamir polycounter lvl 18
    Oh wow, you guys are right, it was WAY too dark. I checked it on the school computers, apparently my home monitor is bright.

    render2.jpg
    render3.jpg
    nolit1.JPG
    nolit2.JPG

    Anyways, thanks for all the critiques I've started working on some and am working heavily on others.

    Thanks for pointing out hte thing with the viewport lighting Malcom. I threw up some screen grabs without lighting as you said. The new renders are also no compressed nearly as much. One question though, for some reason when I render I lose a lot of the texture detail. It's most apparent on the pews at the front. In the viewport you can see the texture fairly clearly and well, but renders seem to blur it up a fair amount. Is there a way to fix this?

    It is fairly narrow rooster, but more so because of the perspective. Thanks for pointing it out, I had the focal length on the camera set too low. I still might, I'll have to play with it some.

    And thanks for point out about Durham Rick. I hadn't known about that, it's actually based on Wells Cathedral (Very similar). Though i took a lot of artistic liscence. And thank you very much for pointing out about the decorations Rick. I've been trying to figure out how to populate it more without overdoing the plants, as it seemed to bare. I'd say you definitely hit the nail on the head there. I'm going to try to find some more interesting decor to put in now.

    As for the pews, I've done some quick retexturing, but I think I'll have to age them more based on your guys' comments.

    And I think I will have to play some more with the bounce lighting as you've said Vig. I upped the Ambient light a lot, and you were right that it helped, but I might play around with it all some more.

    Thanks again guys, any more comments you have would be wonderful!
  • tremulant
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    tremulant polycounter lvl 17
    dang dude, this looks great
  • {scumworks}
    Really unsure what to crit, it looks awsome.
  • katzeimsack
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    katzeimsack polycounter lvl 18
    nice!
    reminds me of zelda tt smile.gif
  • Joao Sapiro
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    Joao Sapiro sublime tool
    i love that first f the 4 shot really nice !
  • katzeimsack
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    katzeimsack polycounter lvl 18
    [ QUOTE ]
    ..when I render I lose a lot of the texture detail. It's most apparent on the pews at the front. In the viewport you can see the texture fairly clearly and well, but renders seem to blur it up a fair amount. Is there a way to fix this?

    [/ QUOTE ]
    You should render the picture two times. once without texture filtering and once with. Then blend them together in photoshop. smile.gif
  • noritsune
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    noritsune polycounter lvl 17
    hey tulkamir - cool stuff! seems like not so long ago I was making my own cathedral for the blizzard thing smile.gif If I were you I would definitely decrease the scale of the pews. Right now they are large enough that the height of the main vault would only be about 20 or 30 feet - VERY ho-hum for a cathedral. bring those pews wayyyy down and maybe put 4 in a row. likewise consider decreasing the scale of the plant life, and the thickness of the rope.

    I like the lighting you are working with, especially in the second render - it's very warm. However, something needs to be done about the symmetry of the scene overall. cathedrals are really symmetrical places; but normally the interplay between the symmetrical forms and the assymetry of the lighting conditions makes them so beautiful. what I'm trying to say is - experiment with making your lighting more assymetrical. possibly adding rays (not overdone), or harsher cast shadows, or something. can't hurt to try pushing it a little further!
  • Uly
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    Uly polycounter lvl 17
    [ QUOTE ]
    [ QUOTE ]
    ..when I render I lose a lot of the texture detail. It's most apparent on the pews at the front. In the viewport you can see the texture fairly clearly and well, but renders seem to blur it up a fair amount. Is there a way to fix this?

    [/ QUOTE ]
    You should render the picture two times. once without texture filtering and once with. Then blend them together in photoshop. smile.gif

    [/ QUOTE ]

    To add upon what Katz said, It'd definately be worth looking into some solution for Maya's rendering woes. (I assume your using maya. :P) The blurring is definately being caused by Maya's Quadratic texture filtering, which can be disabled in the realtime port, or disabled per texture for rendering.

    In your viewport.
    Shading -> Hardware Texturing Box-> Turn the slot that say's quadratic to unfiltered, and then apply.

    To disable render filtering.
    Open the node with the texture in either Hypershade or Multilister, and open the 'File02' or whichever number the texture has been applied to, and above it's directory there should be another drop down slot that has "Quadratic" in it. Change it to 'Unfiltered' or whatever the equivilant is if you want it off.

    That being said, unfiltered texture passes have some nasty disadvantages. Though you won't have any texture blurring, you'll receive that effect you've probobly seen in old games where if the camera passes by a very fine texture, (say, a chain link fence) you'll see strange waves appear at distances where the resolution can't handle rendering every pixel at that difference.

    As for your light issues, it sounds like you have them solved, which is good, but it's best to choose "one golden monitor" which has good settings. : P Now that you're nearing the end of your lovely experience wherever you are, you'll probobly have noticed that all the monitors are radically different. Find a normal one, and build everything for that monitor. (And make sure you get that monitor for the Portfolio show.)

    It's looking great Tulk, I'm liking the lighting quite a bit. Good luck man.
  • malcolm
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    malcolm polycount sponsor
    Tulkamir, looks much better without the compression, I like both light rigs. There are two main factors when rendering that will cause the dreaded blurry texture in Maya. First I need to know if you are using Mentalray? If so open the place2d texture node in the hypershade and change the filtering from the default to mip map. I think the default is quartic or quadratic? That will help a bit. The other issue is antialiasing, turn on production quality and use a triangle filter, then turn samples to 1 and 1. This will basically give you no antialiasing and from their you can slowly turn it back on until you are happy with the blur vs crispness, it will be a battle between edge jaggies and texture blur. I've found for stills I always post process sharpen the image in photoshop. This works for animated reels as well if batch process all the frames before you comp them.
  • Black_Dog
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    Black_Dog polycounter lvl 17
    This looks pretty cool. It does seem that there is a lot of green between the trim and the top tier compared to the rest of the scene, though. Maybe some more moss and vegetation on the floor and ceiling?
  • Squirmy
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    Squirmy polycounter lvl 17
    the plants look out of place in this dark cathedral. How bout some holes in the roof for light or some open doors.

    Also how do they get water?
  • Nogan
    Well Tulkamir, I figure if I'm going to post anywhere on polycount first, it'd be in a thread you started. So far I like your work. I still see you working on the insides of it from time to time before class.

    Are you going to have a centerpiece on the alter, or something specific for the audience to look at, or are you going to let them see the whole inside all at once? I've been told that it's generally better to have your audience focus on something smaller (or maybe a defined path when you start planning out how your camera is going to move through this). What's going to be the focus?
  • Tulkamir
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    Tulkamir polycounter lvl 18
    Wow, thanks for all of the comments and critiques guys. I've been holding off replying until I tried to make some of the changes. I've changed it up a fair amount. Tell me what you think and keep the critiques coming. There's some already given I still plan to work with, but the more the better.

    Noritsune - Thanks for replying man, your cathedral was definitely inspirational to me for this, so it's great to have some input from ya. I've made the lighting asymmetrical as you suggested, and really feel it helped. I've touched on some of the other things you suggested, but plan to look into them more.

    Uly - I already talked to you about most of what you've said. But thanks again man. I've definitely got to work with the rendering some to get it crisp.

    Malcolm - Thanks for the comments man. I'm going to have to work with the rendering some, but I think you've got a great idea with the post render sharpening. I'm rendering with Maya Software at the moment. Given that I was wondering if Mental Ray is a better solution than Maya Software.

    Black_Dog - Great idea, I think that once I get the roof broken up some more I'll work with putting some moss up there in the appropriate places.

    Squirmy - Great ideas. As you can see I've knocked the door out like you suggested and will be knocking out parts of the roof to allow for water.

    Nogan - I already talked to you about this some. As you can see I've used the idea of a fallen tree that broke the roof around the end alcove. I've begun to put vegetation in there, but need some more work done to it. (Going to put in broken bricks etc... it still needs a lot of work)

    shot1-14.jpg
    shot2-14.jpg
    shot3-14.jpg
    shot4-14.jpg
    shot5-14.jpg
  • Tumerboy
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    Tumerboy polycounter lvl 17
    Looking much better already man.
  • kiril0t
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    kiril0t polycounter lvl 12
    wow the interior is great except that palm tree is kinda weak, dont know maby just personal but, viny and more overgrown would be better, like a twist in the palm? im sure youre getting to the more overgrown bits. The actual atmospere is great!! i just think the organics need to pushed more. That last shot is kinda weak.
  • rooster
  • Penzer
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    Penzer polycounter lvl 17
    shot2-14.jpg


    Nice compositional element there, with the leaves pointing down the cathedral. I like it.
  • Mark Dygert
    Wow, thats great! I love the changes to the lighting.

    Nice work =)
  • Tulkamir
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    Tulkamir polycounter lvl 18
    Thanks for the comments guys. kiril0t, yea, the whole end piece sucked (it's a bit better now, I like the new tree more, but I still have a lot to do there.

    Sam, Vig, and Rooster, thanks for the comments guys. smile.gif

    Keep the crits coming, I need more!

    front1.jpg
    front3.jpg
    mid2.jpg
  • Thegodzero
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    Thegodzero polycounter lvl 18
    uniform pixel density it seems is not something you have heard of...

    The scene at current is muddy looking because lack of uniform pixel density. That being making sure that everything is and well defined as any other part. It kills the shot when a pixle next to another one is 10 times the size of the other one.

    Another good term is uniform saturation level. Where nothing is more saturated than any other part unless its intentionally supposed to be bringing your attention to it. The idea is always to use color to move your eye around and to let you know what is important.
    Your pants could use alot of love in that area.
  • adam
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    adam polycounter lvl 19
    Erm, pixel density is only relative to how the environment will be seen. Although for a portfolio piece I do believe it's good to show it as uniformly as possible. Just something to keep in mind for the future (Tulk).

    I like the last shot posted there, the lighting on the roof is nice. Now some contrasting light across the pews would be nifty.. perhaps a long sliver of light draped over them? Or have the coloured light from stain glass leak through and on to the pews? Hard to say.
  • Por@szek
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    Por@szek polycounter lvl 18
    Cool work, i love the light and mood in side, reminds me a Tomb Raider. Maybe ton down a contrast could help a little?
    keep it up.
  • Tumerboy
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    Tumerboy polycounter lvl 17
    Getting better & better man.

    I'd rethink the plantlife a bit. You have a couple of big plants in the middle of the floor (carpet?)

    A) plants are like dirt (cuz they like dirt) and will start in the corners & creep their way out.

    B) Plants do not tend to grow solo. i.e. plants that big would not be there without a lot of littler plants/grasses around them.

    I'll see if I can pull up some referrence, but think about how those plants would grow a bit more and I think it'll lead your eye through the scene better.
  • Mongrelman
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    Mongrelman polycounter lvl 18
    [ QUOTE ]
    Your pants could use alot of love in that area.


    [/ QUOTE ]

    laugh.gif

    I think a nice addition to the vegetation would be creepers growing up some of the pillars and roof arches. At the moment the plants higher up just seem to be there, without evidence of how they'd get to those cracks to grow in.
  • kiril0t
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    kiril0t polycounter lvl 12
    great improvment!!! i think tis headed in the right direction. keep goin!I like the forst shot. some very good critiques in here, appart from stuff allready said, i dont think plants can grow on clean carpet smile.gif(unless thats stone, in wich case im not sold). and i would saturate/brighten the plants more to have better seperation from the muddy carpet/tiles?. the carpet/tiles? seems to intact maby by breaking it up and wearing down competetely in some ares it will give you a better way of combining it with the plants. as well as maby just adding some lichens and moss to the ground texture, to underline that mucku wetness.

    hope that helps any.
  • Tulkamir
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    Tulkamir polycounter lvl 18
    Yea, my pixel density got offed on the columns, probably because they were the first thing I did. I'll probably have to revisit that texture as soon as I can. And my pants are always open for some lovin. laugh.gif

    And a sliver of light along the pews is a great idea Adam, thanks. smile.gif I'm going to have to try to work it in if I can. smile.gif

    [email="Por@szek"]Por@szek[/email] - thanks man. smile.gif Yea, there are some areas where the light might be a bit bright. I'll look into it.

    Tumerboy - Yea, I've been working with the plants, but still have a ways to go. It doesn't show well in those renders because for some reason the sky didn't show, but I've broken the roof out where the plants are growing with the idea that it gives a place for both direct sunlight and water. The plants then can grow from where the tile meets the pillars. Would that make sense? If if so, any idea on how I can sell it better?

    Lupus - thanks man, creepers are a great idea. I'll definitely add them to my to-do list.

    kiril0t - Yea, I've had a friend of mine point out that my tiles look like carpet. I really need to work with them some more I think. :S Great suggestions as well, I'm definitely going to break up the ground in some areas as you suggested.

    Thanks again guys, keep the C&C coming! I'm going to work on what's been suggested and post again asap to get some more critiques. smile.gif
  • malcolm
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    malcolm polycount sponsor
    In my opinion maya software and mentalray are both shit but mentalray is definately better. You will most likely have to post sharpen the images you get out of maya software as they are blurry town. I don't recommend switing mid project though as mentalray has different colour and intensity values so if you have tuned your lighting with maya software it will not look the same in mentalray.
  • Tumerboy
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    Tumerboy polycounter lvl 17
    That's fine to break a hole in the roof, but they'd still need dirt to grow. Ya, move the bigger ones over by the columns, and break up the tile. Make some of them gone completely exposing the dirt below, offset some, flip some over etc. That will have the dual purpose of making room for the plants, and selling the tile more as tile rather than carpet.
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