Wow Paul, that's a really nice arrangement there. Except for the grasshopper, it reminds me of a painting my grandmother had hanging on her wall (which she had done herself). The grasshopper is a really cool little touch to add to this, too. Great job!

Very very pretty, so quant, I am sure it took time, but really nicely done.

Excellent still life!!! Well done and a very attractive image. :) Irene

Beautifully done :))))

Hey!....this is excellent! :)

oh, oohhh, OOHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Fantastic!! Did I say this was incredible?!! BTW, I like this ;). Laurie

Oh, this is wonderful Paul! The lighting is quite good, the grasshopper is fun to look for and fun to find! And I especially like the fallen blossoms strewn about; very realistic touch! :D

Yeah, I'm surprised I hadn't mentioned it, but now that Varian has, when I read the title, "Still Life with Grasshopper", the first thing I set out to do was to find the grasshopper. Well, you know, the "Still Life" part of it is fairly obvious. So, the need to find the grasshopper, which is not so obvious, aand well-blended-in, adds that extra touch to the interest factor. In other words, yes, it's fun looking for it, and rewarding once it's been found. :)

Great work. Think I'm running out of adjectives around here. here's my thesaurus? How about superb and magnificent?! VERY evocative of the styles you mentioned. Thank you for sharing! Larry F

Wow, thank you all very much for all your kind words... Yeah, the grasshopper was really a comedy thing I added as an afterthought in the sense that you really can't see it right away cause everything else is so blatant... :) Anyway, this was rendered in final, 1600X1200, then shrunk down twice in Photoshop, then on a second layer copy of the image, apply sharpen and bring it in little by little with the opacity slider till I could see more definition... You can't do too much, otherwise it looks bad... I'm still not thrilled with the definition on the flowers, I wish I could render it in Vue d'Esprit so that the outline of the flower petals is really defined... Can this be done in Vue?? What's been happening is, that even in Ultra, the anti_alias just makes the edges of everything blurry.. I'd like to render so that you can see the pollen in the lilies and definition in the peony petals... If anybody knows, don't be afraid to tell me... :) Also, if you think I'm out of my mind in trying to do this in Vue, don't be afraid to tell me either... :) Or if you just think i'm out of my mind in general... :)

OK, you're just outta your mind in general. ;) Actually, I think it looks very real. The flowers DO have sharp edges, which can be seen considering the way they all contrast (very nicely, I might add) with their individual backgrounds. How sharp of an edge could you hope to put on a flower anyway, especially when the edge is a solid color? Flower petals tend to be very thin things and if the geometry of a flower model is proportionally thin, as compared to its' surroundings, I would thimk it would be giving a fairly realistic edge, no matter what. Unless the render program isn't doing it's job right, in which case....well, you know. ;) Otherwise, I have no suggestons, but maybe some masking in PS with some sharpening of the selection? Hell if I know, and I think it looks great as it is.

Hey tradivoro...not sure what you meant by able to see the pollen, edges etc...your image looks like as ifs taken atmm to 50mm standard. Don't think anyone can see them details at that, even with a Nikon lens set to right aperture and focus distance.

Thats a very very nice flower bouquet. It looks fresh and invites to smell the roses :-) Guitta

Paul, you could try switching off anti-aliasing for the portions you want to remain crisp, like the flower petals. Leave it turned on for the wall, table, fruit, vase...you get the idea. :)

It took me a while but I found the blessed grasshopper! Lovely picture.

Hey Jilly, I really didn't know it was that hidden... Glad you liked it....

Hi Bill... Actually, what I meant is not the pollen, I'm no botanist... :) I meant the inside of the lilly, it has those white things sticking out... And also, if you look at the white flowers, the petals are undefined, just a mass that suggests something, like in a painting, but not in a render... That's a very high quality flower, and it has great detail... So, I guess what I mean is, how can I get more detail on those particular items... Does a higher pixels per ray kind of thing increse sharpness, or is that only for the anti alias?? Or how about a higher dpi, does that change anything?? anyway, any ideas welcomed... :)

Hey Mike, thanks for the feedback.. I guess what I'm trying to say, I just want the white flower petals and the inside of the lillies to look more defined, like in a photograph, and I'm wondering if that's something that can be done in vue?

Ok Varian, I can try that too... Now does the rays per pixel and or the dpi change anything as far as definition??

Thanks Guitta, I'm glad that it looks fresh enough to smell... :)

"pistils" for the female flower parts, and "stamens" for the male parts. And don't even ask how I managed to remember that... ;)

Paul, This image is amazing........The feel and look of it is really inspiring. John

Heh...can't think of any other adjectives that haven't already been used. That is beautiful. :) Rich

I know what you mean by "the things sticking up" in the lilies...I used to grow lilies like these in my garden. They are oriental lillies, and boy are they lovely. And the smell! I could walk around all day with one of those plastered to my nose...LOL. Anyway, they are part of the petal, sort of fringy, feathery things that are down toward the throat of the blossom. Not stamens or pistils, but part of the petal. I don't really know how to get them to show up better other than zooming in more on the floral arrangement and turning off antialiasing on the lily materials and the materials of the other petals that you want to be less soft. Laurie

Thanks Laurie for the info, I'll definitely some of that stuff you mentioned...

See Mike, I knew you knew, I was just testing you to see if you remembered... :) Thanks...

thanks John, thanks Rich for the kind words... Glad you liked it...

Hi Paul, I see what you mean now. I am not a pro but just take what I have to say as IMHO with a pinch of salt :) Well, for that image you are doing, especially the coverage of view and viewing it in "dpi" via screen, I don't think there is much you can do. The pixels display by the monitor would 'fuzz' up the details for the white flower at that distance, even with a very good pitch high end monitor. You did a good job out of that image and its meant to view like that. For myself, when I see your image, I was not expecting the definition for any of the flowers, but an exhibit of what it is. If you need to see the pistles or stamens (thanks Mike :)), you have to go "Macro" with the view camera and focus on or near the center and that I believe you know already. We have to decide on a scene or the emphasis of an image or its compositional values and too bad we can't have it all together. In real life, even for photography, we have to go (Micro) with macro lens close up on flowers. As for higher per ray thingy with Vue, I guess it just gives better light on subject diffusion values or in general, better "ray tracing" details as far as anything to do with lighting and shadow. Takes up lots of time though and I think its only good for hardcopy prints....on screen, the clarity of it is mild (IMHO). This however have to go hand in hand with very high value pixels render. As for "antialiasing"...its has a good and 'bad' about it. Depending on what your final image is. It has this soft age thing that tends to blend to the next colour pixel and has its purpose for doing so but also create a diffuse or blur effect. Too much would make an image, overall fuzzy. Equalization, Unmasking and Sharpening comes in here, and its does almost the 'opposite' to some extend. Don't it right, you can get pleasing result, too much, you would loose most of your 3D rendering values. With regards to rendering in higher dpi, I am not sure but I guess it only takes up more Vue rendering time and no difference in display. Monitor is caple of only 72 dpi to 96 dpi and any higher makes no different. However, rendering at higher dpi vaule does give you hardcopy output which is also dependence on your printer dpi capability. I would normally render at the usual 72dpi or 96dpi. As for pixels, usually 800x600 pixels unless its something I would like to print or of commercial value, I would render them in 3300x2550 pixels or 2550x3300 pixels at 72 dpi and them have it resample in a Paint program to 150 dpi or 300 dpi. I have to emphaize here that when you resample, make very sure that the aspect ratio for the pixels must be the same and unchange, so what you are getting is, the new dpi value ( for better lpi where colour definition is more accurate)without changing the pixels (where the actual data picture value is). I read your post in another thread about better quality image for Vue and thought I answer it here. Vue finished image has what it gives and sometime is not what we expect. Its a, you see it, I like it kind of "keep it then" thingy. If you need sharp nd deep, the time of the day, lighting, environmental fog/haze setting and colour is of priority, where things get a bit on the harsh look which yield and give better clarity to sharpness. If things turns out hazy or 'powdery', an initial stage of "Equalization" is needed. After that, I would recommend "gamma/tone/contrast/brightness/intensity" adjustment. You have to have an eye for it, otherwise, it may not look right to others. Sharpening is the last thing you would ever want to do and after that is "unmask" (IMHO. Use this only as a last resort. I recommend KPT 6 "Equalizer" for any of your sharppening need as it has much better equalization control over lights, contrast, etc..when sharperning is needed. Its better than what PhotoShop, Corel Paint, Extensis, PSP and Painter can do, again IMHO. Hope you find the above useful.

Yes Bill, thanks very much, a lot of the advice is helpful... I mean, sometimes I don't know what to expect of programs like vue or bryce and wonder if some things are in the capabilities because of the programs they are... But the above explained it very well thanks... I'll try KPT6, which I have lying around somewhere I bought a while back and have used very little... I mean, I'm not completely unpleased with the above results... But with all my pictures there is always something that bugs me about the production, so I figure I'd ask those with more production experience in these matters... Also, I've seen your work and re: your remark about you not being a pro, if you're not a pro, I'm the easter bunny... :) Looks pretty pro to me... :)

LOL!....no Paul...seriously...me no pro, just an artistically gifted hobbyist. Do write to me if you intend to go Pro though...LOL!

You're right Paul...he's a pro ;). And see what I told you about KPT6? I KNEW that's why I bought it...because Bill recommended it! Hehehee... And he's right about it's sharpening capabilities. They're awesome. Now that I have it, I wouldn't use anything else :). Thanks Bill sweetie ;). Laurie

Thanks Laurie :) Plugins anyone?....Eye Candy 4000 is a must have too. Dreamsuite from Extensis is a real bonus if you are into occassional advertizing art project.

Hmmm...never heard of Dreamsuite. I picked up Eyecandy 3 when InDepth was giving it away for free. It has a demo of Eyecandy 4 in it, but from what I can tell, it looks pretty much the same stuff as Eyecandy 3. How's it different? Laurie

Attached Link: http://www.autofx.com/dreamsuite/main.html

Wow! That AutoFX Dreamsuite looks absolutely awesome, but it's really pricey, at least for me :(. I'll see if I can find it cheaper somewhere, but $300 bucks is a little over the top for me at the moment, especially for plugins. But geeze it looks great! :) Laurie

Ok Laurie and Bill... Definitely the kpt6 has strong possibilities... Mostly playing with the contrast is bringing out the petals... Also, I gotta do this scene in 800X600 for the gallery because that brings out the details in the lilies... I've also found a little color burn in a separate layer and bringing that in a little at a time gives this a depth of color that is missing right now.. The copper really looks like copper and the flowers look richer... So, I'm just applying the kpt6 to the white flowers but everythign else is using the photoshop effects... Thanks for info...

Btw, just curious. What resolution and pixel was this image rendered in? Bill

I did it at 72dpi at 1600X1200 and then shrunk it to half size in photoshop... I'll tell you, at 1600X1200, everythign looks great... It's just not a size that practical for the web... :)

Just remember that DPI is meaningless on the computer; it's a printing term only. And if you do plan to do printing, then you'd want to be printing in a high DPI, 300 or better, and that would depend on the dimensions of the image file. To get 300 DPI for your original 1600 x 1200, your largest printed size would be 5.3" x 4".

I don't plan to print this, I was only mentioning the setting in Vue... But yeah, I know I'd have to make it much bigger in order to print.. I just made it that big to shrink it... It did have a positive effect in the end result... Now Ihave to re-render some of these other pictures and see if it gives better results... But i'm pretty convinced that to get the final look I like, it's gotta get processed in Photoshop or Photopaint... Very few times somethign is going to come out of Vue that's going to look fine like that... And I have to guess that the folks that are spending 30 hours rendering are outputting images that they're going to print...

That's about the size I usually do too, 1600x1200 at 72 dpi when I'm not printing it. Now if you have this image "crop" to just the white flowers in PhotoShop, you should be able to see the details when put here for viewing at 800x600....as you know, we woun't be able to see the image as a whole as what you shown here initially. Altogether, its a new image :) ....just like my "Under The Clear Pacific" shown in three parts just to get the details for viewing here.

Well, now it's in the gallery at 800X600... After the kpt6 on the white flowers, making color tweaks and overall sharpening, I think the pic looks very nice now and I"m happy... Thanks for your help and your suggestions, they definitely made a better picture and now I have new tools to use in the future... :) Also, thanks to you too Laurie, for inspiring me to use color burn in judicious amounts... :)

Attached Link: http://www.trillium36.com

How nice to see you posting here, Cynthia! Smallspace delighted us with image after image of the wonderful Trillium flowers and thank you so much for having them in formats we can easily use with Vue! Hope you'll do the same with the food collection, hint hint! ;D

Hey Cindy, glad to see you made to the Vue d'Esprit forum... :)