Podium exterior

[TomDC]

Not the best exterior ever -I am no Bertrand Benoit- but I enjoyed doing this.

[andybot]

Nice feel to it. I like the soft lighting you have going on. I've been impressed with your Podium renders. I tried the plugin a couple years ago and it was rather lousy then. Looks like it's come quite a ways. But you're right - you're not Bertrand - none of us are...

[Richard]

WOW dude, that's great! The grass is brilliant, did you chop that in or in scene and the volume lighting right is that photochopped post pro? Nice mate! Just the trees and panels look to give it away!

[TomDC]

Yeah, I photoshopped this pretty intensely. The trees aren't great, agreed. I really ought to do those in PS. Anyone know a good tut on compositing?

[chedda]

Looks good Tom is the building & site fictional ? Only because i think these idyllic forest/garden scenes are a little misleading sometimes.

[Richard]

Yeah, I photoshopped this pretty intensely. The trees aren't great, agreed. I really ought to do those in PS. Anyone know a good tut on compositing?

Mate I think DavidH has done some on in the resources section, he's a bit of a master! When it comes to compositing I know I SUCK BIG - hence why I've modelled up some plants to make up for it!

[michaliszissiou]

Brilliant
I feel your pain with these trees.
I tried to model some decent trees in blender but they're rather heavy for SU. Possible though, on your own risk LOL.
Trees have to be real 3d objects, separated leaves included. Let's face it.
Excellent work Tom.

My suggestion? Bring it all to blender, set the scene and render (cycles). Tig's obj exporter is EXCELLENT!!!
The new tree generator of blender is quite impressive.
Grass? Piece of cake - real 3d particles grass I mean.

[andybot]

Tree[d] is also a great tool. If you make a good map of groups of leaves, you can get a decent poly count for SU by keeping the leaf count low.

[TomDC]

Thanks, guys.

Looks good Tom is the building & site fictional ?

The site is fictional. The building I don't know -I based it on an Evermotion model.

Bring it all to blender, set the scene and render (cycles).

I'd rather try this with Thea, I think -as soon as I find the time, that is. Not that I have anything against Blender, I'm just not comfortable with it yet.

And I'll certainly try this scene with Modo 601, as soon as the demo's out.

[Richard]

Would love to see some blender trees )in another thread obviously) Michalis! I use ONYX which is a bit hard to get head around but it builds GREAT TREES!

[pugz1983]

Hi Everybody,

Like the render Tom. Some of the best work I've seen with Podium. I also struggled with the trees/grass and plants problem and SU, and after a long period of trail and error and a lot of bugsplats and a SU that freezes I......... decided that SU is just not suitable for this type of things. The way to go is a workflow with another main compositing 3D software pack like Blender, Cinema4D or 3DSMax. I do my modeling in SU as far as I can. Then I export my model and import into blender for example. Grass, trees and plants are easy to import into model now. You can use plugins to spread grass or use hair particle system to create grass. Blender and other programs can handle Xfrog, Onyx strees for example and when using instancing the size of models won't be a problem. The only thing that takes time is finding the right mix of apps in your workflow that best suite you and the type of work you do.

PS: I forgot to mention Vue. Vue is very capable for creating nature elements like trees, grass shrubs and plants.

Greetz Twan

[michaliszissiou]

The big problem with SU is that it can not import huge meshes. Huge? Not really, we're talking about >64k tri meshes. And trees need ~100-300K.
To split into groups isn't a very promising method either. More complicated than helpful.
Blender integrated tree generator is fine. There's also the excellent ngplants open source app.
http://yorik.uncreated.net/greenhouse.html
http://ngplant.sourceforge.net/#downloadanc

@Richard
Of course, but on what topic? It has nothing to do with SU .

BTW for 2d cutout lovers. Have you tried this?
http://arnaud.ile.nc/cantree/generator.php

[TomDC]

I......... decided that SU is just not suitable for this type of things. The way to go is a workflow with another main compositing 3D software pack like Blender, Cinema4D or 3DSMax.

You're right, obviously. Still, one cannot keep buying and learning new software.

[Daniel]

Beautiful image, Tom.

FYI, the building is real. It is called the Delta Shelter, and was designed by Tom Kundig of Olson Kundig Architects, and has been published numerous times. http://www.olsonkundigarchitects.com/Pr ... ta-Shelter

[TomDC]

Thanks for the link. I quite like that building -I'd not mind living there.

This picture is way prettier than my render:

http://www.olsonkundigarchitects.com/gallery_cache/38/430_380/Delta-Shelter-TB-056.jpg

[Richard]

Yeah I'm like Tom - having to learn new apps is a pain for one and then adding new steps to workflow is another! Personally I'd like to take out steps from workflow!

@Michalis - WOW mate, those Blender plants are THE BOMB! OMG! Start a thread in the corner bar, that's what it's for!

@Tom - BTW mate, just noticed the reflections on the upper story right facing windows seems weird when you should be seeing reflected sky from such a low placed camera.

I don't know if Podium supports Proxies, they help a bundle. These plants I created in SU although not high poly so I can spread them around, are still poly loaded enough to slow SU down if you turn their layer on before export. Proxies help by way of keeping one instance on a hidden layer and populating with a scaled proxy which then contributes very little load on SU!

These days with FIRE for real time material, camera and light tweaking I've just about done away with Photoshop post pro excepting for background replacement, CYMK conversion, and image resizing. And as the pluin developer is currently rewriting the plugin to support xrefing of high poly MXS files for SU proxies on export I'll also be done with Maxwell Studio. Meaning ALL work will be direct from SU with limited PS post pro!

ACCESS-BALANCE.jpg

[TomDC]

Personally I'd like to take out steps from workflow!

Yeah.

@Tom - BTW mate, just noticed the reflections on the upper story right facing windows seems weird when you should be seeing reflected sky from such a low placed camera.

There's some really big trees in that garden, Richard!

I don't know if Podium supports Proxies

Nope. The app's pretty bare bones.

[srx]

Great job. U can use Kerkythea xfrog trees library in Thea.

[pugz1983]

After find a way to use high poly plants and trees there's another challenge awaiting. How to figure out what plants and trees go together. When just throwing in a bunch of trees and plants won't make it look good. I'm always struggling with the way plants and trees grow and are arranged in an axterior scene. But I guess that it's just a case of studiyng the nature around you.

Greetz Twan

[TomDC]

Or ... you could say "to hell with plants". Indigo version:

[Edson]

TomDC aka stinkie elsewhere?

[michaliszissiou]

A wonderful design Tom!
I never saw an indigo render that I didn't like. I admit this.
About the podium render. I still admire how you handled the reflections on windows. Well done.

[TomDC]

A wonderful design Tom!

It isn't mine. I wish it was, though!

I never saw an indigo render that I didn't like. I admit this.

Indigo is very good. It's slow, as you'd expect, but it's lighting is superb.

TomDC aka stinkie elsewhere?

Yep. Hi, Edson!

[marked001]

the indigo version is amazing! noooowww...let's see you replicate that in podium you can do it.

[TomDC]

lol. As much as I like Podium, it isn't capable of doing this. Maybe someone who's an absolute genius at using Kray (the engine Podium uses) could pull it off, to some degree, but that someone surely isn't me. I would like to see whether I can do this with Vray, though.

[TomDC]

First Vray version. Everything needs more work, but it's a decent start, I think.

[TomDC]

Second version.

[Richard]

Yeah Tom I'm all up for the last few in preference!!!!!!

Not only do your works there look brilliant (well done mate) but this style is "Show All"! Nothing is padded with the excesses and trickery - just the built for displaying it's attributes.

ALL RENDERS OF ARCHITECTURE SHOULD BE LIKE THIS! (yep yelling!).

[TomDC]

Thanks, Richard. Er, don't you always yell?