Please vote for Resume Render

[treddie]

You know what? I forgot one other major point that explains why I try to model as much as possible. One of my big goals is to do rapid prototyping and build my own garage model kits from those 3D models. So I always build actual parts that can be assembled. I know that will roll some eyes out there because the first thing that might be going through your mind is, "GAWD! That means tones of detail that otherwise would not need to be modeled for 3D Viz sake alone". But that's the reality of it...I kind of need my models to be STL ready for 3D printing, and I don't want to have to spend the additional hours necessary to simplify those models just for visualization. Yah, it takes hours more to render them, but I have a million other things I'm doing in the meantime.

[gueoct]

I fully understand and respect your perfectionism!
A friend called me "Mr. 400%" because in photoshop i constantly zoom in (to 400%) and out when retouching.

But still: i do not get your super-doopa-hi-poly modeling.

Of course, as an illustrator, you are spoiled by the endlessly scalable vectors,

but isn´t it the overall impression of an image that is more important rather than the finest detail?

The Port Gemini pictures look so perfect, the surface is so smooth, of course one tends to examine
the details. if the surfaces were not so sleek, had imperfections, nobody would see if the edge was
not perfectly round...

i am glad, you still got that enthusiasm, that craziness, the urge to try the impossible!!!!

[treddie]

You bring up good points.

but isn´t it the overall impression of an image that is more important rather than the finest detail?

I think it's all relative. For business, I do what I need to do to keep to my deadlines. Once and awhile, I can convince my clients to take it a bit further. A lot of times I'll even add some extra detail at no cost just because I can't help myself.

But it could definitely be considered a hobby, what I love to do with modeling. As for going crazy on it, I realized one other thing along the way. When a feature is too small to be recognized due to too low of a resolution, the pixels are still there, even though they may look like muck. They in effect become their own noise in a way. But in terms of realism, they still need to be there because they still contribute to the realism, much like indiscernible features lost in the grain of a traditional, film-based photograph. So even though you can't tell what a feature is, if you took it away, it would look unnatural and too smooth. So strictly speaking, the tiny details do matter and the devil IS in the details.

To play the devil's advocate, to NOT do this could be seen as an art too...to use optimized methods to fool the eye into accepting the image as still photographic without having to over-model.

But I just have a hankering for the former. With more horsepower, I will just take things farther. The Port Geminis would have a reflectivity map to add variations in the yellow paint, as one example. The Jupiter-2 interior will have subtle reflectivity variations in the floor, with an occasional floor scuff. And a lot of decals and object clutter like the aformentioned fire extinguishers. I still have to put the big astrogator in the middle of the floor.

But still: i do not get your super-doopa-hi-poly modeling.

Because I'm a nut-case!

[treddie]

Oh, forgot this too. This is all going way out of the original topic, but be that as it may...In an example of having to use a kludge...In the helmet image, if you look closely, you will see hairline scratches in the bubble. Unfortunately, no matter where I put my "studio" lights, I could never get the scratches to appear except where you see them...Around bright highlights or just generally bright surfaces, which is part of what you might expect to happen. As a result, they end up looking like fuzz around the headpad, and not scratches in the bubble itself. In the future, as I port this render over to Octane, I think I will model at least some of the scratches not as bump, but as "painted" white hairlines in a material mix "layer". That way, they will show up exactly where I put them, regardless of what the lighting situation is. This may not be such a kludge after all, if you consider that a scratch in a surface does not have polished surfaces...It is somewhat rough meaning that is partly a reflectance issue as much as a bump issue. Maybe I should just duplicate all of the existing scratches into a reflectance channel so that they have both a bump highlight and a reflectance character.