1 July 2011
11 June 2011
Ready for adventure...
There is no ages for adventure..
Completely done in zbrush4, composited in photoshop.
11 April 2011
Steampunk worker
Hi this is my last work, it is a steampunk work who use a giant mecanised screwdriver.
Dobne in zbrush and 3dsmax. Composited in photoshop.
25 February 2011
selfportrait
Hi to pratice anatomy modelling and specially face modelling I use myself as references. Done in zbrush 4 and composited in photoshop. All my friend told me it look like me except maybe for the left eyes...
3 February 2011
27 January 2011
MoonBall
Hi this is the latest thing that ive done with my new pc. Just for fun took me about 2hour modelling texture and compositing.
23 December 2010
13 May 2010
Toujours en wip, le concept a changé un peu. La texture est pas mal finis et je fais des test de posture et de coupe de cheveux.. et des test de render et de composition pour me donner un apercu de ce que le résultat final peut avoir l'air.. Sur la deuxieme photo en plus gros plan on voit que c'est facile changer l'expression du visage avec zbrush. :OP
24 March 2010
Bad rabbit
A vision of what I would have like to see in a more dejanted and hardcore version of Alice in wonderland. Ive modele in Zbrush with the help of zsphere. I rendered it in zbrush and composite it in photoshop. The texture is polypainting.23 January 2010
Joker..?
HI this is my last project... Actually this is just the head of my latest project That im still currently working on it.
I was trying some correction on the head texture in photoshop and end up with that saturate look with the green resorting in the eyes zone and the more saturate lips. At first I didint like it but Ive still done a render of it just to compare between other render with differents texture.
When I checked the render Ive thought it looks a little like the joker and I decided to make a picture for my desktop background for fun. The final character will not look the same at all.
Hope you like it! Have fun!
Sam the 3d blogger
I was trying some correction on the head texture in photoshop and end up with that saturate look with the green resorting in the eyes zone and the more saturate lips. At first I didint like it but Ive still done a render of it just to compare between other render with differents texture.
When I checked the render Ive thought it looks a little like the joker and I decided to make a picture for my desktop background for fun. The final character will not look the same at all.
Hope you like it! Have fun!
Sam the 3d blogger
16 October 2009
1 June 2009
What's up Doct!
Hi! This my last project that Im working on. Just having fun with the zsphere. It seems I understand better how they work now and as well my sculpting skills in anatomy are upgrading so it is kinda fun. No bugs no unwraps! I will sculpt the body more ... trying to refine it as much as possible than texture the body in the same mood of the head.Hope you like it :O)
Sam the 3d blogger
4 May 2009
Dog, pig, alien, elf?
Hi this is my last character. Entirely done in zbrush for fun. I made the basemesh with zsphere and I sculpt it. The shader are from the matcap material and I use polypainting to paint it. The render is done in zbrush too.
1 April 2009
Happy April First!
Watch your back today or you will get stab in the back!!! He he maybe not stab but just stick with a paper fish on it. :OP
I'm kinda lucky as I can stay home all day long alone... so no one will do me this stupid but some kinda funny trick!
I'm kinda lucky as I can stay home all day long alone... so no one will do me this stupid but some kinda funny trick!
27 March 2009
Just teapotizing!
Just a little test that I'm doing this week. Ive saw a beautiful render and it was said that the person use mental ray arch design material. These material are optimized for mental ray. I use mental ray a lot in my last project, but never with the expected result. In fact It was like if I have a car with a powerful engine needing Diesel to work properly and I was feeling it with unleaded gas.. No wonder why it doesn't work as well as I wanted.
When you work with mental ray if you want the best result you must use the tool optimized for mental ray. This include the material obviously but also the lights. Mr lights with ray traced shadows are mean to be use for mental ray. Just like the architectural mats... Beside it you don't really have to edit them to make them look good.
The only bad point is that depending on the quality of the render you want and of final gather it take a fair amount of time to render... This one about 400X 300 took about 4 minutes. But in the end you get a very photo realistic render... I guess it all finish where you want to put your priority.
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
When you work with mental ray if you want the best result you must use the tool optimized for mental ray. This include the material obviously but also the lights. Mr lights with ray traced shadows are mean to be use for mental ray. Just like the architectural mats... Beside it you don't really have to edit them to make them look good.
The only bad point is that depending on the quality of the render you want and of final gather it take a fair amount of time to render... This one about 400X 300 took about 4 minutes. But in the end you get a very photo realistic render... I guess it all finish where you want to put your priority.
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
25 March 2009
Specular bloom
Hi! Today I will talk about the specular bloom. For those who don't what it is, it is an effect that occur on certain picture were the light hit a white surface or a highly lite surface. The effect look like an emission of light blurred by the object.
Neil Blevins on his tutorial about it say:
''Specular Bloom (also called Diffuse Glow, Bloom, Glow, Ghosts, Flare, Glares) is what we call it when the bright objects in your scene glow. This happens in real photography for a number of different reasons, bright areas can be so bright that the actual emulsion of the film bleeds, bright objects can cause internal reflections inside your camera lens causing lens artifacts from glow to lens flares, the photographer has placed a special "soft filter" over the lens, the photographer has placed vaseline on his lens to give their photo that "soft" look. Simulating this effect in cg is actually pretty straight forward, and helps remove some of that "cg" look from your images.''
As it is said in the last sentences, this is a effect that can be add to improve your render and giving it a more realistic look as our eyes are use to saw this effect in real life and on photos. Personally I think it improve a lot the lighting of a scene. Even if you do a simple scanline renderer it add a lot to the final result. Here are some picture that Ive done with the specular bloom so you can see by yourself what we are talking about.
This picture that Ive done that you already see in a previous post is a scanline render. In this one I use the specular bloom plug in. You can see most of the effect were the light is strong on the brick of the column. You see the blooming effect is blurring the detail as if we were blown by the light.
I prepare also a little render with the effect way to exaggerate. SO here is the infamous teapot in all his glory! I write last night on my facebook status that I was doing tutorial with teapot and a friend of mine answered that I was Teapotizing!! Very funny guy! :O)
Neil Blevins on his tutorial about it say:
''Specular Bloom (also called Diffuse Glow, Bloom, Glow, Ghosts, Flare, Glares) is what we call it when the bright objects in your scene glow. This happens in real photography for a number of different reasons, bright areas can be so bright that the actual emulsion of the film bleeds, bright objects can cause internal reflections inside your camera lens causing lens artifacts from glow to lens flares, the photographer has placed a special "soft filter" over the lens, the photographer has placed vaseline on his lens to give their photo that "soft" look. Simulating this effect in cg is actually pretty straight forward, and helps remove some of that "cg" look from your images.''
As it is said in the last sentences, this is a effect that can be add to improve your render and giving it a more realistic look as our eyes are use to saw this effect in real life and on photos. Personally I think it improve a lot the lighting of a scene. Even if you do a simple scanline renderer it add a lot to the final result. Here are some picture that Ive done with the specular bloom so you can see by yourself what we are talking about.
This picture that Ive done that you already see in a previous post is a scanline render. In this one I use the specular bloom plug in. You can see most of the effect were the light is strong on the brick of the column. You see the blooming effect is blurring the detail as if we were blown by the light.
I prepare also a little render with the effect way to exaggerate. SO here is the infamous teapot in all his glory! I write last night on my facebook status that I was doing tutorial with teapot and a friend of mine answered that I was Teapotizing!! Very funny guy! :O)
The two render are from the same scene and the same camera shot with the same lighting setup. The first is without specular bloom and the second with the effect added. You can definitely see how where the light reach an object more strongly the effect appear. Obviously the effect in not applied correctly here and I could have use it more subtlety but I wanted to show it very clearly.
I use it a lot but we must use it carefully if not it will look to much like an effect and what we want to achieve in using it will be cancel. It is about the same phenomenon as for the filter and effect in photoshop if you use it to much people will notice it and it is bad... You know when people can already tell what filter you have use... But when use correctly people will told you that you did an amazing job with the lighting!!
Now you want to know how to achieve it. In 3ds max you can use two different way to achieve it. The first is by using the specular bloom plug in. You surely can find it easily on the Internet if not try to contact me. It is a nice plug in where you can achieve also 3 more light effect as haze, stocking and glow. They all affect the bright area and the lighting but in different way. Very cool to use, sometimes I use the stocking effect to do fog. You just have to install the plugin in the right folder and then restart 3ds max, hit the 8 button, that give you the environment & effects roll out. Then you go on the effect onglet hit add and then you should be able to add the specular bloom effect. To use it you activate it and you do a render then you will see the effect add at the end. If you use the interactive button then you could now work with the settings to achieve the wanted effect without redoing every time a full render.
If you do not have or find the specular bloom you can still achieve the same result. You just have to use the already install plug in name blur. Do you remind when I said that the effect was a blurring effect? With the blur effect you can blur all your render but it is not want we want. We just want to blur area where the light is very bright when hitting object and surfaces. So you see two onglet, the first is Blur type and the second is pixel selection. Hit the second onglet, so we dont want to affect the whole image as by default but only the light so we unchecked whole image and just check the luminescence box. Now the blurring and bleeding effect will only be achieve on the very bright area regarding how the setting are.
So this is it for the specular bloom effect. I don't really know if you can use it in Maya or other software but I do know that in Maya we got a build in material effect call glow. If I recall well it does about the same if not try to affect the luminescence in the render. I think that there is a place where you can do it but it has been a while since Ive not open Maya!
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
I use it a lot but we must use it carefully if not it will look to much like an effect and what we want to achieve in using it will be cancel. It is about the same phenomenon as for the filter and effect in photoshop if you use it to much people will notice it and it is bad... You know when people can already tell what filter you have use... But when use correctly people will told you that you did an amazing job with the lighting!!
Now you want to know how to achieve it. In 3ds max you can use two different way to achieve it. The first is by using the specular bloom plug in. You surely can find it easily on the Internet if not try to contact me. It is a nice plug in where you can achieve also 3 more light effect as haze, stocking and glow. They all affect the bright area and the lighting but in different way. Very cool to use, sometimes I use the stocking effect to do fog. You just have to install the plugin in the right folder and then restart 3ds max, hit the 8 button, that give you the environment & effects roll out. Then you go on the effect onglet hit add and then you should be able to add the specular bloom effect. To use it you activate it and you do a render then you will see the effect add at the end. If you use the interactive button then you could now work with the settings to achieve the wanted effect without redoing every time a full render.
If you do not have or find the specular bloom you can still achieve the same result. You just have to use the already install plug in name blur. Do you remind when I said that the effect was a blurring effect? With the blur effect you can blur all your render but it is not want we want. We just want to blur area where the light is very bright when hitting object and surfaces. So you see two onglet, the first is Blur type and the second is pixel selection. Hit the second onglet, so we dont want to affect the whole image as by default but only the light so we unchecked whole image and just check the luminescence box. Now the blurring and bleeding effect will only be achieve on the very bright area regarding how the setting are.
So this is it for the specular bloom effect. I don't really know if you can use it in Maya or other software but I do know that in Maya we got a build in material effect call glow. If I recall well it does about the same if not try to affect the luminescence in the render. I think that there is a place where you can do it but it has been a while since Ive not open Maya!
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
24 March 2009
Slow pc?
Hi! As I was working on the Nick 3d project I was all leaving on my desktop in a folder among a lot of other folder. I had also about 30 files of hi res textures and hi res images and render in this folder. As a result my PC was going very slow at a point that I could even not let open msn or listen to itunes while rendering my character!!
Also my my computer has started to freeze due to unknown cause. It is very irritating to be forced to reboot your computer while you were talking to someone important for you or in the middle of a critical task.
The PC I currently use is not mine... it was lent to me by a close friends because he bought a new one this falls. It already got a lot of stuff in it and it cause the computer to run slowly. He didn't want me to format it because he may need it in the future. I spoke with my friend about my problems and he told me some trick as to not put directly things on the desktop because it use too much of ram. Or just deactivate the software that load automatically when you boot your PC. You know the little icon at the bottom right?? :0)
He gives me a little list of thing that we all should do to keep our PC running smoothly. I guess if you have a mac that could applied too... but I don't know to much about mac...
1. Let your PC boot up completely before opening any applications.
2. Refresh the desktop after closing any application. This will remove any unused files from the RAM.
3. Do not set very large file size images as your wallpaper. Do not keep a wallpaper at all if your PC is low on RAM (less than 64 MB).
4. Do not clutter your Desktop with a lot of shortcuts. Each shortcut on the desktop uses up to 500 bytes of RAM
5. Empty the recycle bin regularly. The files are not really deleted from your hard drive until you empty the recycle bin.
6. Delete the temporary Internet files regularly.
7. Defrag your hard drive once every two months. This will free up a lot of space on your hard drive and rearrange the files so that your applications run faster.
8. Always make two partitions in your hard drive. Install all large Software's (like PSP, Photoshop, 3DS Max etc) in the second partition. Windows uses all the available empty space in C drive as virtual memory when your Computer RAM is full. Keep the C Drive as empty as possible.
9. When installing new Software's disable the option of having a tray icon. The tray icons use up available RAM, and also slow down the booting of your PC. Also disable the option of starting the application automatically when the PC boots. You can disable these options later on also from the Tools or preferences menu in your application.
10. Protect your PC from dust. Dust causes the CPU cooling fan to jam and slow down thereby gradually heating your CPU and affecting the processing speed. Use compressed air to blow out any dust from the CPU. Never use vacuum.
So this is basically what he told me in his last email. Now the computer seem to work way better. Hope that this can be useful for you too. For my next project I will work more properly and with more order.
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
Also my my computer has started to freeze due to unknown cause. It is very irritating to be forced to reboot your computer while you were talking to someone important for you or in the middle of a critical task.
The PC I currently use is not mine... it was lent to me by a close friends because he bought a new one this falls. It already got a lot of stuff in it and it cause the computer to run slowly. He didn't want me to format it because he may need it in the future. I spoke with my friend about my problems and he told me some trick as to not put directly things on the desktop because it use too much of ram. Or just deactivate the software that load automatically when you boot your PC. You know the little icon at the bottom right?? :0)
He gives me a little list of thing that we all should do to keep our PC running smoothly. I guess if you have a mac that could applied too... but I don't know to much about mac...
1. Let your PC boot up completely before opening any applications.
2. Refresh the desktop after closing any application. This will remove any unused files from the RAM.
3. Do not set very large file size images as your wallpaper. Do not keep a wallpaper at all if your PC is low on RAM (less than 64 MB).
4. Do not clutter your Desktop with a lot of shortcuts. Each shortcut on the desktop uses up to 500 bytes of RAM
5. Empty the recycle bin regularly. The files are not really deleted from your hard drive until you empty the recycle bin.
6. Delete the temporary Internet files regularly.
7. Defrag your hard drive once every two months. This will free up a lot of space on your hard drive and rearrange the files so that your applications run faster.
8. Always make two partitions in your hard drive. Install all large Software's (like PSP, Photoshop, 3DS Max etc) in the second partition. Windows uses all the available empty space in C drive as virtual memory when your Computer RAM is full. Keep the C Drive as empty as possible.
9. When installing new Software's disable the option of having a tray icon. The tray icons use up available RAM, and also slow down the booting of your PC. Also disable the option of starting the application automatically when the PC boots. You can disable these options later on also from the Tools or preferences menu in your application.
10. Protect your PC from dust. Dust causes the CPU cooling fan to jam and slow down thereby gradually heating your CPU and affecting the processing speed. Use compressed air to blow out any dust from the CPU. Never use vacuum.
So this is basically what he told me in his last email. Now the computer seem to work way better. Hope that this can be useful for you too. For my next project I will work more properly and with more order.
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
23 March 2009
Monday March 23,, the week that I will gain a job!
Hi fellows blogger!
Another week begin, today I'm pretty joyful as I receive some good news about job opportunity yesterday. My mom phone me to tell me that my grandmother had a meeting with a woman which is son work for a big video game company here in Quebec city. She told him that I was looking for a job and he told her that they will need a lot of 3d artist soon so we should start posting or resume right now. Needless to say that this is what I should have done if I had not post my resume and portfolio already since last Tuesday :OP
This a company that back in November told me that they should call me at the beginning of 2009... So I had given them time to start their project and to call me, by this time Ive worked on my newest project. But since November I still didn't receive news from them but hope this time Ill get an answer fast.
I am somewhat confident on the new stuff I got on my portfolio. Beside it the Nick 3d project is getting a decent quote on cgtalk. But I'm kinda disappointed for the time it have took me to achieve it didn't turn as spectacular that I expect but it is my most achieve character so far so I guess it is fine like that.
Now I don't know if I will start already a new project... Ive planned to do another character but way much simpler but don't know if it would be more productive to start an environment as it has been three months since the last that Ive done... I'm waiting for extra cash to come and want to buy a new screen, mine is way to dark and cannot be lighten more. This is why my work can seems sometimes to light and with not enough contrast so it kinda bug me to start already a new scene...
But anyway stay tune this week as I will give you update about my getting a job process. I want also to write some more technical article about texture and map and also about lighting and rendering.
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
Another week begin, today I'm pretty joyful as I receive some good news about job opportunity yesterday. My mom phone me to tell me that my grandmother had a meeting with a woman which is son work for a big video game company here in Quebec city. She told him that I was looking for a job and he told her that they will need a lot of 3d artist soon so we should start posting or resume right now. Needless to say that this is what I should have done if I had not post my resume and portfolio already since last Tuesday :OP
This a company that back in November told me that they should call me at the beginning of 2009... So I had given them time to start their project and to call me, by this time Ive worked on my newest project. But since November I still didn't receive news from them but hope this time Ill get an answer fast.
I am somewhat confident on the new stuff I got on my portfolio. Beside it the Nick 3d project is getting a decent quote on cgtalk. But I'm kinda disappointed for the time it have took me to achieve it didn't turn as spectacular that I expect but it is my most achieve character so far so I guess it is fine like that.
Now I don't know if I will start already a new project... Ive planned to do another character but way much simpler but don't know if it would be more productive to start an environment as it has been three months since the last that Ive done... I'm waiting for extra cash to come and want to buy a new screen, mine is way to dark and cannot be lighten more. This is why my work can seems sometimes to light and with not enough contrast so it kinda bug me to start already a new scene...
But anyway stay tune this week as I will give you update about my getting a job process. I want also to write some more technical article about texture and map and also about lighting and rendering.
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
20 March 2009
Steamnocchio Tutorial !
Hi! Just a little post today as one of my friend send me a link to a very cool tutorial. This is the tutorial of the Steamnocchio by Fabricio Moraes. This picture is his final result. You may have seen it on cgtalk already.
He won the Individual Image Master Award in CGSociety's 'Steampunk: Myths and Legends' CGChallenge. This picture is fantastic and beside it when you read the tutorial you see that it is somehow simple to do. I guess it is where talent and skills came in the equation :OP
here is the link to this tutorial by Fabricio Moraes:
http://features.cgsociety.org/story_custom.php?story_id=4950&page=1He won the Individual Image Master Award in CGSociety's 'Steampunk: Myths and Legends' CGChallenge. This picture is fantastic and beside it when you read the tutorial you see that it is somehow simple to do. I guess it is where talent and skills came in the equation :OP
here is the link to this tutorial by Fabricio Moraes:
I wanted to take a little break from 3d as my latest project is done but seeing this it makes me wants to dive into another project really soon! Very inspiring !!
Enjoy!
Sam the 3d blogger
www.the3dblogger.blogspot.com
19 March 2009
At least it is done! SO this is the final render of the Nick 3d project. Gosh I tought I will never finish it.... But yeah now it is done :O).
It is not technically perfect. I realize as posting it that Ive made some mistakes and things that I should have done better... But anyway I did learn a lot for this project from the sss skin shader to the normal map in zbrush, rigging and skinning as well as lighting. My next project will inherits from this one for sure.
Usually I post a view with the wire frame on the textured character to show the base mesh topology. It show also where the actual modelling finish and where the normal maps begins. I wanted to do it for this one but except for the main body the mesh is not so low res so I tought whats the point beside looking cool for showing an hi res topology... This one of the mistake I have done I should have not use mesh smooth on the boots and on the arms but I wanted a hi res look and no edgy side on the silhouette.
So this is the end at least for this one. Don't want to work on it anymore. Tomorrow Ill post a version on it on cg talk and on the zbrush central forum. Hope to have some nice crits and comments :OP
ps: just click on the image to see it full size!
Sam the 3d blogger
It is not technically perfect. I realize as posting it that Ive made some mistakes and things that I should have done better... But anyway I did learn a lot for this project from the sss skin shader to the normal map in zbrush, rigging and skinning as well as lighting. My next project will inherits from this one for sure.Usually I post a view with the wire frame on the textured character to show the base mesh topology. It show also where the actual modelling finish and where the normal maps begins. I wanted to do it for this one but except for the main body the mesh is not so low res so I tought whats the point beside looking cool for showing an hi res topology... This one of the mistake I have done I should have not use mesh smooth on the boots and on the arms but I wanted a hi res look and no edgy side on the silhouette.
So this is the end at least for this one. Don't want to work on it anymore. Tomorrow Ill post a version on it on cg talk and on the zbrush central forum. Hope to have some nice crits and comments :OP
ps: just click on the image to see it full size!
Sam the 3d blogger
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