aladdin Posted July 7, 2015 Share Posted July 7, 2015 I am a homebuilder and I need to raytrace about 30 different plans for our new website and marketing materials. I am looking to pin down the best settings that I can use on every plan. Here is the best result I have been able to achieve so far. I brightened up a touch in Photoshop and also used the blur brush a little too heavily trying to blend the backgorund. Please critique and help me improve the quality of this raytrace. While passable, its nowhere near the quality of some of the raytraces out there. Thanks in advance for your help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dshall Posted July 7, 2015 Share Posted July 7, 2015 I am a homebuilder and I need to raytrace about 30 different plans for our new website and marketing materials. I am looking to pin down the best settings that I can use on every plan. Here is the best result I have been able to achieve so far. I brightened up a touch in Photoshop and also used the blur brush a little too heavily trying to blend the backgorund. Please critique and help me improve the quality of this raytrace. While passable, its nowhere near the quality of some of the raytraces out there. Thanks in advance for your help. Such a great question. I too will be interested in what others say. Looks pretty good but it lacks the pop....... suggestions..... 1- take the shot lower, maybe 36" above ground and looking up a bit 2- not such a straight on shot but maybe off to the side so you can pick up depth of house by seeing the side also 3- maybe not include the entire house, maybe miss a little bit of one of the sides 4- more plantings in front yard to give more depth and more plantings along side of yard 5- a shadow on facade of house via a tree behind the camera a pretty good raytrace, but of course we can always improve...... it would be interesting if you stripped the plan down, posted it, and let everyone take a shot at it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dennis_Gavin Posted July 7, 2015 Share Posted July 7, 2015 Did you use a bump map for the brick? If not you may want to try that or if you did increase the settings. The plants are too fake looking. Try altering the size a little along the rows and maybe break them up some. Maybe a mulch bed also. I see you have a tree shadow, that's good. Might be nice to see part of the tree if there will be one in reality. Maybe play with the grass. Good grass textures are hard to find. maybe increase the size of the texture or use another where you don't see the lines repeat so frequently. All in all it looks pretty good just needs more texture. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HumbleChief Posted July 7, 2015 Share Posted July 7, 2015 What are your current settings? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DougMaddox Posted July 7, 2015 Share Posted July 7, 2015 Looks good. If plants are 3d, turn a couple and increase/decrease size. Also, add some furniture inside as well as some window treatments. Size of lights by garage a bit large. Maybe add a fence in the distance to mask break between backdrop and terrain. Perhaps, a stone walk and another material for the drive. Other ideas??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
country Posted July 7, 2015 Share Posted July 7, 2015 Something I had drilled into me in a construction marketing class...... Exteriors should be similar to good interiors, nice decor but nothing too distracting. You are marketing to a wide range of tastes and very bright colours are limiting. The house/building should shine not the plants. I am very interested to hear the help you receive on the ray trace settings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HamlinBC Posted July 7, 2015 Share Posted July 7, 2015 I agree with what the others have said, but also remove the focal blur. That gives it the "mini house" look... All the colors feel a little STARK...not sure if it's the sun or what that's doing it. One thing that helped me with exterior renderings is looking online. You can find some pretty nice looking stuff out there, and just try to mimic it as much as possible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chiefer Posted July 8, 2015 Share Posted July 8, 2015 Alladin, Alladin, Alladin. Let's do another round. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidJPotter Posted July 8, 2015 Share Posted July 8, 2015 All the above suggestions are generally good but I would add that the common denominator of really good looking ray traces is really taking the time to SEE what tweaking certain settings does to the image. It takes time and patience but that buys you judgement and greater control of the look and feel of the image. Be your own critic and do not hope for results but methodically work towards achieving them. The images will represent you and your work, so they should be the absolute best you can do. DJP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcrump Posted July 9, 2015 Share Posted July 9, 2015 Such a great question. I too will be interested in what others say. ...... it would be interesting if you stripped the plan down, posted it, and let everyone take a shot at it. Excellent suggestion Scott. Make it a challenge. Let people vote for a winner. The winner gets .......... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chiefer Posted July 10, 2015 Share Posted July 10, 2015 ... 99 luftballons Good suggestions by Scott but instead of maybe 36" above ground make it at least 45. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kbird1 Posted July 10, 2015 Share Posted July 10, 2015 Or if you are using the images for Marketing/Sales for the next 5 years, you might want to consider just hiring a 3D Pro like Jintu to do at least some of them , or one of the other 3D artists ( and it is an Art) on the Offering Services Forum.. And NO I don't know Jintu .... just seen his work.... http://www.jintudesigns.com/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WendyatArtform Posted July 10, 2015 Share Posted July 10, 2015 1 - I'm attaching a library file with some materials I got from Pat Abood back when she was active. These roofing and grass textures won't tile as much. 2 - more casual varied plants, and NOT hot pink! In the base library, try Plants - Perennials & Biannials (sic) - Foliage - Hosta. There are a couple of tall ones, some wide ones, etc. Put in a nice varied little group, then copy and paste around. And as others have noted, vary the heights a wee bit on any repeating shrubs and trees. Just grab in 3D or elevation and drag top up or down a bit. 3 - design thing - but still - I'd put a better surround around the front door! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WendyatArtform Posted July 10, 2015 Share Posted July 10, 2015 I agree with others on camera placement - you're making your house look flat. I generally avoid head on and instead favor one side or the other (usually view has garage on far side) and I stick to camera at anywhere from 60" to tops 100" above grade. Agree with others on skip blur - just distracting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WendyatArtform Posted July 10, 2015 Share Posted July 10, 2015 And if you want to see if works for you - here are my lighting settings (attached image). I use these WITHOUT TONE MAPPING. I also skip photon mapping on exteriors. For interiors I use both. By cranking up my sun and avoiding Tone Mapping I get nice deep shadows, which let's the viewer appreciate the 3 dimensionality of the image. And here's the library file I forgot to attach two posts ago! Oops. Design Diva.calibz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dshall Posted July 10, 2015 Share Posted July 10, 2015 .......and I stick to camera at anywhere from 60" to tops 100" above grade....... Interesting, I said 36", Jintu "The Master" says 45" and Wendy the Matron ( a compliment hopefully) says 60"-100"................ I have seen many of Wendy's Pics and they are about the best save Jintu's stuff...... if you learn from Wendy's stuff or Jintu's stuff, you can't go wrong. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WendyatArtform Posted July 13, 2015 Share Posted July 13, 2015 I know a lot of professional architecture photographers put the camera pretty low - makes the house or room look bigger. So I think that's mostly about the effect you want. I tend to want to see a little more roof than I get with it that low. I think the point really is that most of the best images have the building less elevation-like and more three dimensional. What I avoid is zooming and rotating. It makes unrealistic images, even "drunk" images. I plant the camera, and adjust via the Edit Camera dbx. Some of my decisions center around the house - what's the best feature, can you see the front door (or sometimes just part of it), are we focusing on the good stuff (hence my preference for views from off center, opposite side from the garage. I always want yard foreground, not driveway. If I have to have driveway, I'll put a real leafy tree that gives it that sun-dappled shadow so it's not unrelenting pavement. I'll even do that for sun-dappled shadows on part of the house if it helps focus attention where I want it. In short - try a whole bunch of difference camera placements and just really ask yourself the question "what features do I want to be prominent?" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WendyatArtform Posted July 13, 2015 Share Posted July 13, 2015 Oh and thanks Scott! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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