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JoeyBlendhead — Cactus
Published: 2014-06-23 18:47:17 +0000 UTC; Views: 567; Favourites: 6; Downloads: 0
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CRITIQUES ARE WELCOME!
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Comments: 57
Ah, I ain't to good with the 3 point lightin' system, and I couldn't tell you the specs, as I did this some time ago 
Thanks for the feedback
-Joey
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well the usual three point system won't really work for you cause you have a window there and it might look a little weird, i dunno..
i'm not sure if the background is just an image or not, though you'd want to set the scene up like the picture is, you know with walls, windows and such... place a vertical emission plane outside, next you'd want to have one or two planes behind the plant facing it with about half the strength that the first plane has (maybe a little bit less) and with the shadows off, that should soften the shadows of the window light....
you'll also probably want to turn the background global light off, it looks like its dulling the shadows too much, though it looks like you've fixed it in your newer renders....
How long have you been blendering for?
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Um great points 
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well you're doing better than i am then.....
i'm about two years in and i don't have much to show for it, just a lot of fluid sims and failed models...
i started all this when i went through grade 11 1/2, my high school years were a little weird
for some reason i stopped exploring blender and only made fluid sims
and you certainly are improving, what are the specs of your pc?
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4 GBs of Ram, and 500 GBs hard drive..... Why do you ask? Anyway, yeah, I'm in Junior High.... I'll be in 8th grade this fall
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yeah i have about the same specs, 4gb of ram and 500gb had drive
How fast is your computer? is it an i core? Which OS are you using?
i was just curious....
i only have dual cores, like 9 or so dual cores, though the computer that i do most of my work on is my craptop that overheats a lot -.-
You've started blender pretty early, Are you planning on doing this after school?
If you are then you'll have to learn the industry standard, maya and you'll probably hate it...
i'm doing a cert2 in animation foundation online and the hotkeys and general ui in maya are just terrible...
Its almost like using windows vista.... -.-
Whats homeschooling like?
even though i'm doing my cert through the internet i went to a public school....
are you enjoying school?
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Man, is this an interview??? XD Don't know what the answers to the following questions are "How fast is your computer? is it an i core? Which OS are you using?"....
PS: I apologize if I make little sense, I'm sick....
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Yeah, sorry, i'm not as consistent as what i was a few years ago and things that say sound weird sometimes....
also people on this site are a little strange and sometimes lack social skills, plus we're almost complete strangers to each other and live on other sides of globe and we're in different age groups and we can't hear each other voice or see each other face so i think that its best to start with questions and such....
and yeah i was asking those questions because its nice to hear about hardware and stuff that other artists are using....
Blenders not just about software, you also need a pretty fast computer with a fairly new graphics card if you're using cycles...
You're probably using Windows, it comes default on almost every computer...
I was asking that because a fair amount of blender users are using the operating system it was designed for, Linux.
and yeah, if you're gonna go into animation you're gonna have to get maya, as it is the industry standard, heaps of places use maya including Pixar, they even have their own rendering engine....
but thats if you're going into animation, from the sounds of it you're looking at games and such?
not sure what they use but probably something along the lines of 3ds max -.-
and 
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Don't know what I'm sick with.... 
I plan on getting a free trial of 3ds Max soon, just to see if I like it... I also would like to try out Maya... If possible 
Anyway, Yeah..... I hope that answered some of your questions.... I tend to go a bit off-track sometimes, no, ALOT! XD LOL!
-Joey
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oh
Are you getting because of what i said or just cause you can?
and yeah, sadly enough it is, windows 8 has GPT disks and securboot, i think thats what its called -.- microsoft got in trouble for securboot, the same way they did for IE.....
also, google doesn't support windows 8 and windows phone and there was something about microsoft dropping support for windows 8 really soon without the first update or something and then there was talk of an early windows 9 cause 8 has so much wrong with it and yeah, they're just a mess at the moment......
personally i think they're gonna burn soon, less and less people are upgrading to the new versions of windoze and their phone is probably gonna go bust cause lets face it, its microsoft, they don't exactly have a good reputation for making things that work properly, they should drop all their crap and properly get into the gaming industry.....
I never really got into animation because, my computer just can't handle it....
though i recently have gotten into rigging and sculpting and such....
its hard trying to find a style that you like that works, rigging is really simple too
No, you spelt it right, yeah i'm stuck with an ati card, they're not even called ati anymore, they're cards and drivers are just terrible and buggy and my GPU doesn't support it either
the version of OpenCL that it has is too old well i wouldn't gotten too much out of it anyway, its a fairly low end card.....
and you can try all their stuff, they have student licenses and that should get you like 3 years of maya, not sure about the other ones though..
and yeah, some day i'm gonna get around to trying out z-brush and mud box, everyone seems to be using z-brush to make some really amazing things on their first go!
i sorta tried max, my sister was using it for a while and the interface sort of resembles blender only it looks and behaves like it was thrown up by a cat or something...
max is a lot like blender only, strange, not sure if its any good or not, gave me nothing but headaches, my sister seems to like it... though thats the only 3d software that shes used and she was thinking about having a look at blender sometime....
maya feels like it has more gear and control, though there are some really stupid things in it, most of it ui, its so hard to find things, but they do have a heap of preset stuff... neither of them have nodes, well not sure about max, but maya has them somewhere here but i suspect that they don't behave like the wonderful blender ones, their material settings resemble the old blender internal engine and maya just throws it all in one heap, its just a mess sometimes, well all of the time......
yeah it did thanks, yeah same here too....
how much blender stuff do you have? like projects and such...
i can't remember how much stuff i have, its like 10-15gb or something, if i actually made some decent stuff or finished some of it then there might be more there, i'm always trying new stuff so nothing is ever of decent quality or finished....
if you need help with modelling or anything lemme know, i mean i'm not the best but i do know a bit
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Doing Linux cause some buddies of mine suggested it to me a while ago and said it was much faster
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oh ok, yeah it is faster and its more customizable, linux uses like 300-400mb of ram after start up and windows uses like 1gb+, i mean srsly.....
thats just for standard distributions too, it can sometimes be smaller like raspbian which uses 50mb after boot, its made for the raspberry pie of course........
sorry that they're scattered, i wrote it at like 3am....
sounds like you have more than what i do, i'm really falling behind....
yeah, no nodes, its a menu setup like the blender internal engine...
yeah i don't like the lack of nodes either
also i think that they use Subsurface Scattering for Shrek's skin and holy hell it takes a while to render....
they have a heap of compositing and stuff in there too, compositing is awesome!
Have you seen the blender foundation movies?
Like Big Buck Bunny and Sintel, They're pretty good
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Big Buck Bunny is how I discovered blender.... It's a very long story so I'll spare you XD LOL! Anyway yeah, I plan on using Linux soon and that is all the more reason
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it can't be that long...
and internal generally has shorter rendering times but crappy lighting, i've seen some amazing things come from the internal engine....
Yeah, the blender foundation films are pretty awesome
don't worry that keeps happening to me too xD
What sorts of stuff do you make?
is it landscapes and stuff or something else?
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Okay, I used to draw/animate on Adobe Flash CS4..... You probably know/use it yourself.... And I was rather good in it...I did a lot of animations, and some comic strips... Of course I lost most of them when my old computer broke down T_T Anyway, I watch a video on the latest update of Adobe, Adobe CC that is.... and it showed the beginning of Big Buck Bunny.... Only they we're playing it in Adobe Flash! They were actually talking about the ability Adobe Flash CC now had to import/export animations and play with them in flash.... or something like that, but I thought the lady made it in Flash.... I was in shock! I later saw that video while browsing the web and recognized it.... I clicked on it to see all of what Flash could do.... Finally, when it finished, and my jaw was on the floor, I looked in the credits..... I saw that it was made using Blender.... I looked up the software, and found to my delight that it was free 
I think everything about internal is crappy! Materials, lighting, rendering, background, etc. That's why I only use Cycles now!
I make all sorts of stuff.... Houses as I recently found out...FOOD and Plants are my specialties.... weapons, low poly, just about everything..... Why? I do make landscapes.... but why you asking?
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it wasn't that long
well at least you didn't start around version 2.5, the interface was terrible, i tried to use but just gave up when i saw the interface, its just, i don't even... no....
Yes the lighting in blender internal is pretty bad, though I've seen some amazing things made with the internal engine...
though not everything is bad, there a fair amount of stuff in internal that cycles doesn't have...
such as freestyle, advanced procedural textures and i'm not sure about this one, but the ability to change the shading of an object, there's a way in cycles but its not dynamic, in the internal engine its just a simple rgb node or colour ramp....
and yeah, i tried using freestyle the other say and i couldn't get it the way i wanted it, but thats cause i've never really tried any of this before....
I used to be pretty good at scenes but now, i'm not sure... i want to get into animation and special effects and eventually develop my own style
atm i'm better at abstracty surreal stuff, i'll have to post some of it sometime soon if i ever get it done....
and i need to try low poly sometime, it looks awesome
I was asking cause there isn't too much in your galleries and I'd love to see more of it
if you don't feel comfortable posting then we could skype or you could sta.sh it or something, i dunno
i had this huge speech here before and accidentally refreshed the page -.-
i'm also quite tired....
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LOL! Hate that (refresh) but I don't Skype.... I always post my work.... either here: www.cgtrader.com/3d-designer-p… or here on deviant art..... I publish almost everything on CG Trader though (the link). I sell my stuff there
Yeah, Freestyle is nice, but it's kinda useless to me
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You've got some pretty awesome stuff there and yeah, freestyle probably isn't for you...
there is a give and take and yeah cycles is giving more atm....
i can't wait to see what other things they pack into it!
What do you like about cycles the most?
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What does atm mean? I love the way you can play with the nodes forever and get all sorts of awesome looks! And the lights you can add, and how much realism you can apply so simply.... EVERYTHING about Cycles except for LOOOOONG rendering times
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it means 'At The Moment'
ugh the nodes just fantastic
Have you had a look at the light paths and samples?
that might help you with your long render times....
also using complicated materials and displacement will send the time skyrocketing.....
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Oh, okay.... LOL!
Um, yeah I often play with light paths, and always play with samples
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How many samples do you normally render at in a fairly well lit scene?
and How long does it take?
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100...... Normally.... Though, I also do 1000 samples a lot as well! I like to do overnight renders
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just wow, you must have some pretty complex materials and geometry going on...
i'm not too big on overnight renders...
1000 samples would probably take about the same time as yours, i'm not too sure, i normally don't have to go that high...
100 samples for me can be anywhere between 20 seconds to about 30 mins depending on the scene...
my final renders are normally about 100-400 samples maybe 500 or 600 some funky stuff going on, that can take about 30 mins to 3 - 5 hours depending on the scene...
i was just wondering cause i felt that my renders were taking forever due to my retarded graphics drivers and card....
Have you ever heard of Andrew Price? The blender guru...
he uses like 1,000-5,000 samples on some of his stuff and occasionally 10,000 samples
and he was going on about it taking a few hours and sometimes needing to be rendered overnight and i'm just sitting here in my chair just like, i want your graphics card so badly
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NO, I'm not good with complex materials.... And other than the villas, I never go past 300,000 verts.... And Normally I'm under 100,000..... Which isn't low poly..... It's high poly, but not too high
And, YES, I have definitely heard of Andrew Price..... He's gotta be the King of Blender! I like his tutorials, along with several others.... Blender Cookie, Engima Toots, Dark Scarab, Sardi Pax, BlenderForNoobs, koalaboy166, TheBen sir, VscorpianC, Wireheadking, PigArt, Gleb Alexandrov, MasonBlenderRender AKA Mason Menzies, Blender Guyz, and a few others
There's a guy I know personally who did a 50,000 or 500,000 sample render...... 
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wow , that's just crazy.....
Do you know how long it took him to render it?
that many samples is just really uncalled for....
Do you know what sort of card he's using?
he must be using a GPU, i can't imagine doing something like that on a CPU unless hes got access to a render farm and even then
Do you have the picture by any chance?
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I tried to find a link but I couldn't find it..... And I think it may have been 40,000 samples.... But that's still A LOT!!! 
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its fine
and yeah, he'd have to have one to render like that....
so, the high poly villa, why is it so high poly?
could you have used some array modifiers and sub surfs for roof and stuff?
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Could've, but it would have been more difficult..... I put a decimate on the roof to make it lower poly
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This is so cute 3D! At first sight. "Cactus needs hugs" brought me there.
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The spikes look a little unrealistic but great job.
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Thanks! And yeah, I plan on an update
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Are that particles on the cactus?
It looks somehow fluffy and spiky at the same time and I love the accentuated outline of the plant
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THANKS! Yeah, it does look somewhat Fluffy
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When I tried to model a fern, because I wanted to set up a Jurassic like environment for my dinos, it looked so ugly, that I decided to use some of my photographed ferns. Somehow, I like this look of your cactus
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LOL! I tried a fern while I was still rather new to blender, and, and, and, IT WAS A DISASTER!!! D: LOL!
Hey we can chat live here: chat.deviantart.com/chat/Blend… Please join me!
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Very good as a first attempt. But to a long-time cactus lover, there is something wrong with it.
Please take a look at ethanbolvary.com/wp-content/up…
You will note that spines don't grow everywhere on the surface of a cactus, they sprout from a limited set of nodes.
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Thanks, that's a pretty good model too. And yes, you're correct about the spines. Maybe I'll update it soon. Thanks
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AWESOME!!! This looks so real!
are you using the compositor, because the lighting is so realistic!
Even the rocks are well textured!!!
I also love how you did the holes in the wall in the background!
I know this must have took atleast a hour!! right!?
Brilliant work Joey! Keep it up!!
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Thanks! Texture painted the little compositing!
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You're super super super welcome!
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