hard surface modeling excercise - Page 3 - Simply Maya User Community

# 31 21-10-2011 , 11:24 PM

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yep that's what I am doing

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

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# 32 22-10-2011 , 04:23 AM

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Wow Rick....looks intensely difficult this project....nicely done though mate..right up your alley with automotive!

cheers bullet

bullet1968

"A Darkness at Sethanon", a book I aspire to model some of the charcters and scenes

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# 33 22-10-2011 , 05:28 AM

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Thanks Bullet.

There are so many renders of what looks like the same part because every time I was about to declare victory I would find another reference image and see there was another hole, or slot, or pocket to cut into it or a new whatchamajigger to stuff into it and of course in the very end I found my front view proportions to be off a tad. Not enough that I am going to worry about it but it make the ECD in me get a little twitchy!

I have been looking for the next bit to do there are a few parts on the bike that look challenging. Deciding which way to go next.

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

Last edited by ctbram; 22-10-2011 at 05:42 AM.

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# 34 22-10-2011 , 07:52 AM

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Cool mate, I wasnt sure (reply for the AO on surface shader)

Jay

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# 35 22-10-2011 , 04:37 PM

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Okay with Jay's help I have started to use render layers. I still have not figured out how to use them to create all renders in a single shot. Primarily because they share a single render globals from what I can see and they all look at the current preview render settings.

So for wire render I want the preview render setting to be 1 and in the render globals contour rendering enabled.

For all the other renders I want preview render to 3 and no contour rendering.

In the DIFF and AO render I want FG off in the globals.

In the FG I want FG on in the globals.

So I have to do a render for the wire, switch settings and then do a render for the AO and DIFF, then switch settings and do a render for the FG.

TEST RENDERS

Here is the DIFF only. The image is milky and colors are muted and do not pop

Here is the FG only the colors are more vibrant but the image is to bright

Here is the DIFF and FG combined (multiplied) better color and balance but no shadows

Here is AO shadows

Here is DIFF + FG + AO To me this looks pretty much correct (possibly a tad dark)

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

Last edited by ctbram; 22-10-2011 at 08:44 PM.

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# 36 23-10-2011 , 05:40 AM

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Ah I just learned I can override render setting for each render layer so each RL can have unique render settings.

So now the only obstacle to rendering all layers at once is the wire frame render that I want to render at smooth preview setting 1 (1-key) and the rest of the layers I want to render at smooth preview setting 3 (3-key).

Is there a way to do that?

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

Last edited by ctbram; 23-10-2011 at 05:51 AM.

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# 37 23-10-2011 , 10:28 AM

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you should multiply the AO by the diffuse.

but your diffuse shouldn't have any specular, likewise with your FG render. For the FG, the pass you want is the "indirect diffuse" this will be your indirect light which is basically FG only. Because you are just using diffuse direct and indirect and AO. you will need the direct specular pass too. you can add these together and you will get your primary.

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# 38 24-10-2011 , 07:48 AM

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You could use contour rendering in Mental Ray. But Im not sure if it works for smoothing level 1 !

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# 39 24-10-2011 , 09:43 AM

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I do use contour rendering in mental ray. It works in smooth preview level 1. If you do not choose level 1 you get the actual render tessellation and for level 3 that is 2 levels of subdivision and you get a very dense wire frame that does not show the actual modeling cage.

So the issue for the MR wire frame is I just have to manually set my preview render setting to the 1-key for all the objects I want wires on. For all the other renders I just set it to the 3-key for the default 2 levels of smoothing.

It's not a major inconvenience.

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

Last edited by ctbram; 24-10-2011 at 09:48 AM.

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# 40 24-10-2011 , 10:05 AM

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You could use Approximation Editor and assign a Subdivision Approx. for your desired geometry in a new renderlayer. You can also create overrides for the values. Go Window/ Rendering Editors / Mental Ray / Approximation Editor.

So that means you could leave everything at level 1 and drive the SubD only by the Approxeditor. And for the contourlayer you simply change the values in the editor.

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# 41 24-10-2011 , 10:40 AM

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oh I will look into the approximation editor.

Part of the frustration is I do not particularly enjoy rendering or lighting in maya (primarily because I hate mental ray). I find it tedious and boring. Also, there are several technologies that were added to maya that overlap and in some case conflict.

Like render layers vs render passes. If you try to google for info you get a mish mash of tutorials that talk about render layer presets that do not exist anymore and whacky work flows that do not really demonstrate how to use either the render layers or passes properly. So you are left scratching your head in frustration.

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

Last edited by ctbram; 24-10-2011 at 11:15 AM.

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# 42 24-10-2011 , 10:58 AM

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Yeah...I know. i never use the RenderPasses Presets since they never work and its more work to set them up as it takes to create your own custom renderlayers.

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