Hi everyone, I need some help. I've been modeling one of those bionicle critters. I'm not quite done, still have the head and torso to model, but I wanted to render an "in progress" image for my portfolio. I experimented with a few lighting presets adn settled for the HDRI preset. At first it worked pretty well. But then I had the bright idea of adding the yellow "caution" sign. I like what it adds to the image but when I render it there are all those black smudges around the raised edges of the sign. The shader is simply a color, nothing else, just a shade of yellow in the color channel, that's it. So I suspect it has something to do with the lighting. Also, the sign is kind of dark. Any suggestions on how best to light this? I want to use this pic in my portfolio. I'm applying for admission at the Ubisoft Campus (in montreal) in a few days, and I need my portfolio to look it's best. The gamers amongst you will know of Ubisoft. I'm applying for the Level Design program, and the 3D modelling program. Anyway, thanks for the help. H&B

Turn off interpolation in the render properties to remove the ashes.

Additionally, try enabling the "Improved Edges" option in the render room. It ususally takes care of this kind of thing. In some instances Improved edges works better than turning off interpolation. I just see which one works best without extending the render time too much.

Post an image of the whole Bionicle critter when you get it finished!

Mark

Message edited on: 04/04/2005 06:33

Thanks for the info. Turning off interpolation seems to have worked. I'll be sure to post a pic of the completed Bionicle, though it may take awhile, I've got a slew of projects to finish off in the next couple of weeks. But it should look pretty cool once I get it done. It's shaping up well in any case. Cheers, H&B

Awesome modelling BTW...did you do it all in C4?

I know it wasnt o purpoe bu I hink the smudges dd a bit of weatherng andrealism to the sign. Just an opinion.

Yes I did the whole thing in C4..no wait come to think of it, I started it in C2 before I upgraded. So I did most of the modeling in C2, then worked the textures and lighting and the Caution sign in C4. Oh and Sparrow, I kind of agree with you about the smudges, but the compulsive-obsessive in me needed to figure out how to get rid of them. I might add a few smudges in photoshop post-render. I started up a high quality render earlier today...its taking a loooooong time..I may have boosted the quality settings a tad too much :o). Ill post a pic when its done.

I like your skinning, Do you know of any good tutorials on shaders and skinning? Im sick of trying to figure it out from the manual. I must be missing something somewhere but I can never get things to wrap correctly.

Since I haven't modeled that much in C4 yet, did you use the spline modeller mostly, booleans or the vertex? Maybe a combo? Thanks

Hi Chris, I used almost entirely the spline modeller with maybe a couple of booleans thron in. I have to admit that I havent really gotten the hang of the vertex modeler yet. I do so love that spline modeler though. :o) Oh and I cant take credit for the shaders, i used mainly shaders from litst Real World Metals collection (very much worth the purchase by the way), with some tweaks here and there. Cheers, H&B

Thanks...I gotta try this. My son loves Bionicle.

It was a lot of fun to model. Especially since I went out and bought the bionicle action figure in question. Its lot easier to model something when you have an actual physical model to work with as a reference. A lot easier than trying to do it just from pictures in any case, especially since I wanted to make it as accurate as possible. Cheers. H&B

I think you succeeded in getting it accurate. Even the colors look correct and the plastic feel is definitely there.

Here is a higher wuality render of the scene, with the caution sign smudges removed. Im not sure if the quality difference will all that visible in this compressed jpeg though. I boosted most of the rendering paramters pretty high, it took my poor little computer 15 hours to render. Im pretty satisfied with the result. Thanks again for the help folks. Cheers