Conflicting lighting directions. The back ground suggests that the light should hit the figures more from the left side then the right back side. Content and image is great otherwise. I especially love the bump map on the man's arms.

I agree. It must be the lighting. Everything else is just marvelous!

The fault is mainly with poser, No raytacing shadows, no ability to adjust shadow density. Your best bet is to port it over to at least Bryce where you have better control over lighting and at least get a raytrace renderer. For radiosity and caustics, well you need to go with MAX or Lightwave

Well I do have max, so I'll import it and try again. There are only 2 lights though and there close to each other Bot maby the background can be ajusted a bit by??? I'll play with it a bit... -Gabe-

One problem that I am hitting though is that if I move the lights at all, then The detail on the arm suffers and that is one of the things I like the most. -Gabe-

heyas; you're gonna have to tell us how you did the tears. :) and if it were me... i'd've had the tear trail bend the other way, trying to make it looks as if it goes out over the cheek. but i dunno, it looks good this way, too.

I like it as it is, the lighting is cool. Maybe add a bit of light to the female figure? But then if she's dead the lack of light may be a good thing.

One more suggestion? Open the man's mouth slightly. Strong emotions tend to leave us gasping for air. And this is a very emotional scene. Sweet.

Bloodsong, The tear is modeled in Max 4 and imported into poser. The reflection is set really low and the matirial is almost compleetly transparant with A dark grey coler set to it. I do it with cloths all the time to get them ti fit tight against the charectors. I will admit though, I would have done the intire thing in Max, but Win 2000 Pro. and max are having issues that I have not been able to corect yet. (Microsoft told me that they wont support AMD chips and to get a new system... Can you belive that.) Anyway I am right now downloading somthing that should help that issue out. I usualy do all of the posing and sceen work in Poser and the lighting and rendering in Max. Jeff, I was thinking about lighting her a little in a bit of a low muted green light, but am not good enough with the poser light sets to be that specific. I usualy don't beleve in post render work, but I did alot of the lighting details and texture wirk in Panter 3D and Photoshop 6. That is why the shoulder is more blery than the arm. The base textures are great, I don't know who made the original but it is called SubhashSkin. I doubled the resolition and sharpened it up a bit. The bump map is made from the same texture. Messing with the lights gets rid of the details. Tygercub, I though about that, but, I lost a really good friend when I was a teenager (I was in the hospital with the family), and remember her fathers face implisitly, as he held her after she was dead. It was a very powerful image and even 12 years later I remember every detail of his face. That was what I based the expretion on. His teath were gritted so tight I though they were going to shatter. I have got a good idea though it is with the lights and I know why... The stucko wall is rounded, and come out almost like a sphere. (The center comes out more than the edges) So the lighting does seem to be confusing with it, but I have no idea how to fix that. they are both the same light sorce. Hopfaly a reitrace shadow will help. -Gabe-

Maby a little fog too...

I loke the idea of the depth of field, that is defenatly good, and I should have thought of that considering I am a photographer, Bit the liteness I don't like. It looses power. The loighting I made harsh on purpous because it is a harsh situation. The detail on the skin and the arm has suffered as well because of it. The other thing is that that type of ilumination is idealistic "doesn't occure in the real world with out seting up extra lights and is not natural. But I think you got the right idea with the dept of field and having the background slightly out of focus. when i get it into max, I'll render it with a spacific dept of field to give that effect. thanks -Gabe-

heyas; looking at it again.... i dunno, the light seems to be the right direction okay for me. but in the background, the shadows are fully saturated black, and on the figures.... well, they're not. maybe try even losing the lower/left edges of the figures in shadow. see how that strikes you. in fact, the highest contrast is on those.... bar things going across the back (whatever they are :) ), where the highest contrast should be at your point of interest.

Gabe remember your basic photography, The human eye is trained to read an image from left to right Dark to light. With that huge black void behind the character on the extreme right hand side of the image. The lighter area to the left of the figure (the slats or steps) was competeing for attention with the rest of the scene. By bring up and opening the shadows, Not lightening the entire frame. And getting rid of the huge black void. The character now is the focus of attention and not other elements in the scene. Also the skin tones are less orange and more natural. I added faint light rays streaming in over the characters shoulder so there is a indication of light coming in from that direction. If you were to photograph the scene, The highlight only from the characters shoulder would not be enough to force a underexposure to that extent for the rest of the scene. In order to get the detail on the face you would have to meter for the light in the shadows of the scene and would end up with totally overexposed highlights in the shoulders and washout of all detail in the arm. So the first image left you and others with the feeling that it was not quite right. You did not have overexposed highlights yet still had light enough to make out the downtruned face. That coupled with many totally black areas contributed to it. Are you trying to highlight your textureing and modeling skills or trying to create a good total image? You need to decide. If you are trying to do both then this may not be the image to do that with. As very dark and highly contrasty images tend to not be freindly to both objectives. The altered image is not as gloomy nor is it focusing strictly on your texturing skills. But as a image depicting a scene and a emotion it works rather well. If your intent was to have the viewer focus on the mans arm and not the pose or the scene, then I was completely offbase with the adjustment. Any way it was the easiest way for me to get my suggestions across.

Blood song has a good point with the bottom left of the image, but I think we have a gama issue between our systems, because the shadows of the figures are as dark as the background on my screen. I have my screen, sofware, and printer all calibrated to each other, and I'm not so sure how that affects images on the net. Somthing to consider i guess, but have no idea how to fix that type of gama problem. pnevai, I do see what your getting at, but it changes the entire mood of the image, and that is what is most important. You loose the projection of emotion and Power to it, by taking away the drastic diferance in lighting it softens the image, and makes it more tender or sorrowful than painful. The image needs the darkness to excentuate the mood. If not it losses it. The arm dtails and texture work was all done to making the arm look tence or strained, as if he was holding her so tight that if he did any tighter he'd pull a muscle. Look at the two again and see if you see what I'm talking about. I've seen that type of tention and emotion before and it is a horible but beautiful sight almost unnatural. I'll be posting a new version refigned in max later on tonight. I think I managed to improve on both problems you have brought up. I mimiced the two charecters lighting almost exacly (which makes me quite happy), and was able to make the wall a more natural rock surface and a bit less drastic and cubicle, which helped the shadows there, and the door is also being lightend a little. Lighting texturing and focus, is much more versital in Max than poser. i think i pushed pore poser further than it would have liked me too. As for what I'm trying to get out of this image, I'm trying to express an emotion. and that is the primamary conearn for it. I don't know if that changes the perspective or not, but using all of my knowlage and skills, to acomplish that is as you said hard as hell, but that is why I'm asking for your critiques, and what separates a hobbist from an artist. I take it from your pation that you are an artist, so I figure you understand what I'm talking about. As for left to right dark to light, that is a very good basic consept but western world spacific and those tequnices are ment for reducing tention in images. Though the basics are one of the most important thing, I'm trying to create tention, so breaking some of the rules are a very effective wat to do it, but again lets continue this when the next post goes up, I very much like your imput, and think you are going to like what I have done. It is really tuogh when you push the limits of your equipment or in this case program, and aren't there yet.

The left to right reflex is not only western. Even the Japanese and Chinese who write from top to bottom, also go from left to right. (top to bottom, left to right) In the western languages it is left to right, top to bottom. The closest thing that contradicts this is hebrew which still is read left to right, but youstart from what would appear to be the end of the book rather than the beginning. Yup, It really is a defiency in the Poser rendering and lighting system. As soon as you put a image into a good raytracing engine. A much more accurate image is possible. You are right the edited image portrays a tender or sorrowful emotion. But with the post processing there was only so much that could be done. There are many ways to portray emotion and ambiance in a image. Lighting is one. Color is another, focal point and perspective are more still. THis is actually a great thread as a tutorial, You should post a copy of the MAX rendered image here as well. It almost becomes a mini lesson in composition and lighting lesson for other inspiring artists. Because we discuss many of the subleties of image composition, lighting etc with actual examples of the different techniques. With the actual images included for the comparisons. I feel it is a pretty good resource. I look forward to seeing the latest incarnation.

I thank you for the nice coment. I will put it up here larer tonight I'm going to do a final render now it should take about an hour with the lenz effect and mesh displacments. As for left to right, that's interesting that you said that, because one of my college photo professors was japanese and argued the same thing from the opisit point years ago... needless to say, what he told me I guess sank in. If it is wrong then all good I learned somthing new. It's kinda nice to go over information that you got years ago, and see how much has acualy been forgoten or has turned automatic. when i shoot, I don't think of the tecnical aspect of photography, I just kinda know how it is going to look. It definatly wouldn't be a bad idea to brush up though. I'll post the new one soon. -Gabe-

bettre... the shadows fall where the should and the overall effect is still there... plus a lot of the details on the main figures are brought out a bit.. I still like it 8 ) Thank you Gabe.. Cheers