Lighthouse

[Suede]

I'm kind of new with Lightwave so I thougt it would be good to hear some Pro's opinion. It's supposed to be a "cosy" pic. Not going for any realism, as you can see;)

[cg-freak]

Not that I am a pro (yet, hahaha), but maybe change the reflection on the water, looks a bit too blue-ish and different than the rest of the picture, wich has by the way a very atmospheric feel to it.

So in that regard you accomplished what you wanted, at least for me.

Grtzzzzzzzzzz...

CG-Freak:)

[Phil]

A few things come to mind, although the composition and general mood of this image works for me.

Dial down the ambient light. It makes the scene look a little washed out and the light beam looks a little odd when everything is so visible. Ambient is good for filling out shadows, but it should not provide the key lighting in your scene :) Given that you are playing with a dusk scene, a subtle red tint on your lighting would be good - nothing too heavy though. I'm not too sure where your light sources are in this image. You basically want a single light source (I generally go for an area light to give soft shadows, but there is a render time penalty) as your sun. Set your lighting up with this alone (turn ambient off / way down) and experiment with the various options. Save versions of the scene so you can recover from undesired changes. Once you are happy with this single light, you can try turning the ambient light up again, but gradually - shadows are good things to have, don't try to wash them out. In time, you may want to investigate the more advanced lighting available to you, but this should get you started.

I'm not sure what the dark grey mottling is on the lighthouse itself. Is this damage, or something in particular? If damage, it's unlikely because you don't look to have the lighthouse in the path of any real danger (ships / etc.) and paint flaking is likely to be more subtle than that.

The light beam is also likely to be more substantial at the source. The beam is generated by a parabolic reflector to give a solid beam out of the lighthouse. It's not a point source, but you will get a cone effect over distance due to light scattering in the atmosphere. You can work this by changing the light to a spot light and changing the cone base in the volumetrics panel. If you are using an object instead of a volumetric light effect, such as a cone (an old and efficient way of faking things like light beams) then you can truncate the cone, giving the beam some thickness at its start point. To actually make this look realistic, acknowledging the fact that this wasn't your aim :), you might consider adding a subtle fog. It would help 'sell' the visibility of the light beam within the image and explain the haze around the lighthouse.

Grass and plants on land don't tend to like salt water. Unless this is a fresh water lake, you might also want to kill your grass a short distance before it reaches the water. Again, it's a realism thing.

The water is interesting. I have to admit to liking the feel of it, but the colouration just looks odd in this context. If you had a different sky or tone to the lighting, it would probably sit more comfortably....

Warm pictures might also benefit from the soft filter option in the camera panel and you might want to experiment with depth of field to dilute the harsh mountain range in the background (check the manual to see how this works and play with it a little). Use the RangeFinder custom object plugin with a null to find out the distance to use for your focal length.

[Suede]

Thanks for your replies. I've changed almost everything a little bit. Mostly the water as you can see.

[gpdesigner]

Suede... I think the image is awesome dude,.... I love the angle of the shot. The composition of the water is great.... the ripple effect and highlights look good,....... the angle shows that off well...
The color of the water is ballsie, I love turquoise... Reminds me of the Keys....
besides remember what our friend Bob Ross always/use to say...
"It's your world you can make it what you want", esspecially if realism is not your goal.....
..........( I remember you saying that )............
You also did a good job framing that image.....
most people, including me,.... would have plunked that Lighthouse right in the middle of the shot.... you have it off in a quandrant ... that makes for a more interesting shot..
I also like the whole faded glow behind the lighthouse effect.. nice touch....
The Light beam effect is good.. it's good you are using Volumetrics instead of adding it in, in P.S. .......
I see the changes you made in the second image,... I also see you left out a few things. Curious to know why....?
The sky looks defffffff- inately much better... Brighter... and even though you made the scene brighter you still have that twilight feel to it, just try to keep the lighting level where you want it.
The water has more texture to it now, wavier, and more highlights..... I guess the camera angle did that..... I think if you keep the changes in the second image and go back to the camera angle in the first image you would have a nice shot.... but that is my totally non professional in-put
Suede, you said you are new to LW.... Dude you are off to a great start.
I see a lot of eliments in this image you are jumping right in on....
Volumetrics, Sasquatch, good texturing techniques.... You're going to do fine... can't waite for future posts :cool:
gp

[Suede]

Hi

I think you are right about the camera. I changed it a bit but also made it wider, I get a better feeling from it then. This is it:

[mega maniac]

the image is great, tho i think maybe the sea should be a touch darker, i attached a little example i just did in photoshop.

The sea you have seems way too blue, remember the blueness is a reflection of the sky, your sky is dark, so there is no turquoise for it to reflect.

[mega maniac]

ok, ill have to host it meself

http://www.hostmysig.com/data/megamaniac/lighthouse%20copy.gif

[cg-freak]

Well, well, I liked the first one already, but this last one shows real progress, amazing stuff, really love the whole scene and the water in particular.

Grtzzzzzzz...


CG-Freak
:)

[gpdesigner]

Originally posted by mega maniac
the image is great, tho i think maybe the sea should be a touch darker, i attached a little example i just did in photoshop.

The sea you have seems way too blue, remember the blueness is a reflection of the sky, your sky is dark, so there is no turquoise for it to reflect.

you must live in the middle of the country......... :)

[cg-freak]

Saw that the finishing touch was done by someone else.
Ahh what the h*ll, the one before that was great already;) :D

[Suede]

Hi and thanks.
I made a new color gradient with the same color as the sky with distance to camera input. It fits the image more than the turqoise (spelling?) ocean, what do you think?

[mega maniac]

ahh yes, that looks much more natural :)

if you ever do a tropical beach on a sunny day, the water should be turquoise :P

[colkai]

Weird,
I have an old image very similar to this, as I recall, I suffered a similar problem as you about the lighting.

http://www.colkai.dsl.pipex.com/highpic/lhousefinal.jpg

For me, raise the brightness some, but tint it blue and de-saturate the colour.
If you think of nighttime, the colours aren't as clear, and the light is normally a pale blue from the moon, (unless it's a harvest moon of course ;) ).

[Suede]

I raised the light slightly but I'm not sure witch I like most. But thanks alot for all replies!

[mega maniac]

i prefer the darker one

[mufty]

The darker one reminds me of dusk, the lighter one of morning. Of the two I prefer the one with gulls, it seems to have more "life". Nice work though :)

[colkai]

One comment I got, which is valid.
I had in a prior image, the 'beam' as yourself, but to get this, it would be quite foggy as the beam has to reflect off particles to be that visible.

Go with the darker one, the brightness of the tower doesn't 'sit' with the darkness around it's base.

[Suede]

That's exactly the same comment my friend gave me :D But I'll keep it and maybe add that fog some day. I've been working too long on that image, my power is up;) Thanks!