Cool. Want a critique?

That is cool. I take it the muzzle flash is covering up the gun you didn't want to use...?

I'll get some pics of my own of a nice .38 made for women and get started on it in a day or two. The thing about a Saturday Night special was the fact that they were illegally obtained and weren't in the best condition. But I'll see what I can do. I have made a few pistols and even a fully detailed M-14, so it shouldn't be hard to do a SNS...

Rokket, I've finally made some asymmetrical seamless tiles of flame which I think are acceptable.

For Blaze's flame mode, I can make her cast light in Firefly, but she'd need to be opaque. With the new Superfly render engine, I'm designing a Cycles material which will be a refractive ghost (you can see through her in between the flames) and simultaneously cast light, with the light casting "gain" being adjustable.

It will take a while, but once I get the material worked up and complete a test render, I'll post.

Very cool! I am still struggling with what I have to get something I can live with.

In the meantime, I've gotten her human form and costume finished and I am very happy with how she looks. As soon as I get a WIFI connection I'll post some renders.

I am working on the Green Lightning costume right now, at the same time I am working on the buildings that make up the Forester compound. The old factory is first.

EldritchCellar posted at 10:57AM Thu, 12 November 2015 - #4238225

Cool. Want a critique?

@rokket. I agree. That muzzle flash takes up too much up of the picture and obscures the gun. Probably a realistic impression. I have to guess as no ex-wife has ever showed up to shoot me in the face. I've experienced the woman, they've emptied my bank account and six months later I was still smilin' but thankfully I never got the tattoo with their name on it. All fun aside, The gun will be in more than that scene. It will include a closeup of the smoking gun and other scenes where that cheap gun will be handy.

@EldtrichCellar Please feel free to critique anything creative I post in this and other threads. From the dialogue to the picture. Coming from you, I'm sure it would be constructive no matter how harsh.

seachnasaigh posted at 11:13AM Thu, 12 November 2015 - #4238250

Rokket, I've finally made some asymmetrical seamless tiles of flame which I think are acceptable.

For Blaze's flame mode, I can make her cast light in Firefly, but she'd need to be opaque. With the new Superfly render engine, I'm designing a Cycles material which will be a refractive ghost (you can see through her in between the flames) and simultaneously cast light, with the light casting "gain" being adjustable.

It will take a while, but once I get the material worked up and complete a test render, I'll post.

Please post a render using the geometric edges! I do comic art so I'm really interested in this feature. The idea of the light casting gain being adjustable is intriguing. I'm assuming the adjustment will be in the material room. I'd say more but it would reveal just how much I don't know!

rokket posted at 11:29AM Thu, 12 November 2015 - #4238238

That is cool. I take it the muzzle flash is covering up the gun you didn't want to use...?

I'll get some pics of my own of a nice .38 made for women and get started on it in a day or two. The thing about a Saturday Night special was the fact that they were illegally obtained and weren't in the best condition. But I'll see what I can do. I have made a few pistols and even a fully detailed M-14, so it shouldn't be hard to do a SNS...

I did say .22 thought you are right, these might be 38 caliber pistols. This was brought up by another gun expert when I posted this on the freestuff forum. I always say .22 as people have been known to be shot with a .22 and still keep coming. It's smaller and lightweight. While getting popped by a 38 would stop most heroes not wearing body armor from coming after you. "Illegally obtained and weren't in the best condition" that just screams dark alley shooting.

Did you say the Forester compound was going to be a tech company?

Yeah, nothing harsh. Just thought the muzzle flash was too much.

Argh! I shot myself in the foot; after I had dialed in the materials for Blaze in flame mode, I inadvertently overwrote the file. But, I have a render cooking of the new P11 girl Pauline using essentially the same setup. I'll post that when it finishes. Once one of workstations frees up, I can re-do SydneyG2 pretty quickly because now I know the secret formula.

In the meantime, a Superfly render of Cortana:

No IDL emitters needed, and no Poser lights needed; all of the ship's little lights have LightPath boost, so it's all self-illuminating.

Comparison of last those two renders. Won't mention my jealousy of having a workstation or Betsy (my computer) may decide to get snarky with me.

I would just like to look at them both and comment. I'll start with her hair. Why is the hair so different? Light Path! What is light Path!? Heading to google for knowledge so I won't sound like a schmuck! No Poser lights...that has to have an effect on render times!

quietrob posted at 12:44AM Fri, 13 November 2015 - #4238338

rokket posted at 11:29AM Thu, 12 November 2015 - #4238238

That is cool. I take it the muzzle flash is covering up the gun you didn't want to use...?

I'll get some pics of my own of a nice .38 made for women and get started on it in a day or two. The thing about a Saturday Night special was the fact that they were illegally obtained and weren't in the best condition. But I'll see what I can do. I have made a few pistols and even a fully detailed M-14, so it shouldn't be hard to do a SNS...

I did say .22 thought you are right, these might be 38 caliber pistols. This was brought up by another gun expert when I posted this on the freestuff forum. I always say .22 as people have been known to be shot with a .22 and still keep coming. It's smaller and lightweight. While getting popped by a 38 would stop most heroes not wearing body armor from coming after you. "Illegally obtained and weren't in the best condition" that just screams dark alley shooting.

Did you say the Forester compound was going to be a tech company?

The most popular Saturday night specials were .38 specials. They were small and packed a pretty decent wallop. Nothing as powerful as a .357 or a .44 magnum, but had decent knockdown power. Saturday night specials were notorious for not firing, blowing up in the shooter's hand, and a lot of other mishaps. They had the serial numbers filed off and were most often used as you said, in dark alley scenarios.

I will have something for you in a couple days.

And yeah, the Forester compound is a tech company. They were producing the first microchips when they went online, but of course kept up with the times, and switched gears to home security and a few other high tech ventures.

seachnasaigh posted at 12:51AM Fri, 13 November 2015 - #4238369

Argh! I shot myself in the foot; after I had dialed in the materials for Blaze in flame mode, I inadvertently overwrote the file. But, I have a render cooking of the new P11 girl Pauline using essentially the same setup. I'll post that when it finishes. Once one of workstations frees up, I can re-do SydneyG2 pretty quickly because now I know the secret formula.

In the meantime, a Superfly render of Cortana:

No IDL emitters needed, and no Poser lights needed; all of the ship's little lights have LightPath boost, so it's all self-illuminating.

A MAZ ING work, cousin! I can't wait for Poser Pro 11 to come out. I just hope I can afford it.

Guys, the discrepancies between the two Cortana renders is due to completely different node sets. The one with three spent casings (darker room, lighter doll) is a Firefly render. The one with four spent casings (lighter room, more see-through doll) is a Superfly render. Superfly can use the old familiar Firefly nodes. I'm impressed that the SmithMicro guys managed to work that out. But the refractive ghost effect in the Superfly render uses the Cycles render engine nodes; the LightPath node is a Cycles node, and I use it for both the refractive ghost effect and for boosting the light emission. The Superfly render doesn't have the patches of bright/opaque areas like the Firefly render. I could probably adjust node values to get the Superfly render to look like the Firefly render.

Here's a Superfly the new P11 dolly Pauline in Blaze's flame mode:

Notice the seams of the stone wall showing through the doll. I'll have a night render going shortly. I want Rokket to look at this render and size up whether those flame tiles are going to work.

Ooops. I made a fairly critical nodework error on Blaze. Working on the corrected node logic now, then I'll need to do a night test render (tough, so it will take a long time).

Somehow I was unsubscribed from this thread. Resubscribing and sorry If I'm asking dumb questions. Hopefully rokket will be back soon.

Your questions are good, Rob. Galadriel is mostly done with the modified Blaze render. I can see enough to evaluate the new material, and I'm in a quandry. The new material has cleaner and clearer refraction, but I like the patchy flames of the old material better. So, hmmmm... can I get the clean refraction of the new mat2 combined with the island-like patchiness of the old mat1? Don't know, but I'm going to try. I'm working with a new set of nodes, so I'm facing a learning curve.

It might be angels dancing on the head of a pin, everything I've seen you make looks great to me. That second Cortana render is really something. Don't like the lettering though, but that's just a compositional thing.

Having any issues with multiple maps in Superfly?

seachnasaigh posted at 12:28AM Sat, 14 November 2015 - #4238423

Guys, the discrepancies between the two Cortana renders is due to completely different node sets. The one with three spent casings (darker room, lighter doll) is a Firefly render. The one with four spent casings (lighter room, more see-through doll) is a Superfly render. Superfly can use the old familiar Firefly nodes. I'm impressed that the SmithMicro guys managed to work that out. But the refractive ghost effect in the Superfly render uses the Cycles render engine nodes; the LightPath node is a Cycles node, and I use it for both the refractive ghost effect and for boosting the light emission. The Superfly render doesn't have the patches of bright/opaque areas like the Firefly render. I could probably adjust node values to get the Superfly render to look like the Firefly render.

Here's a Superfly the new P11 dolly Pauline in Blaze's flame mode:

Notice the seams of the stone wall showing through the doll. I'll have a night render going shortly. I want Rokket to look at this render and size up whether those flame tiles are going to work.

This is perfect, even if you made a node error. Whatever you come up with to correct that will be perfect. I just need to get Poser 11...

I was thinking, rokket, yes it's a dangerous thing to do...how are you going to simulate melting? It's something that I have contend with as well. I'll probably resort to the pencil if I can't do it here. As I think about it, I've yet to see anything melted ever.

Still, it's not always good to ask questions if you can't come up with answers. I was thinking of wrinkles and folds. Of how if they were properly textured it could be made to look like melting concrete or metal. A little easier for me as my flame based hero mainly uses one of her other powers.

But you have a hero named blaze! Whatcha gonna do?

Post work. There are brushes and filters that can simulate melting, burning, whatever you want to do. Poser is incredible, but it can't do it all. Even Blaze's flames when she emits them will be post worked; as will Green Lightning's powers. I have already resigned myself to that. It's the reason I got GIMP. I couldn't afford Photoshop, and GIMP can do almost anything Photoshop can, so I got it. Originally, I was going to use it to post work my animations. When I got into modeling, I let the animation skill set slide, but I still have GIMP.

Another thing you can do is create bump or displacement maps in GIMP/Photoshop that can simulate melting floors, walls, wax figures... whatever you decide.

EldritchCellar posted at 7:38AM Sat, 14 November 2015 - #4238518

It might be angels dancing on the head of a pin, everything I've seen you make looks great to me. That second Cortana render is really something. Don't like the lettering though, but that's just a compositional thing.

Do you mean the font or having the speech text at all?

EldritchCellar posted at 7:39AM Sat, 14 November 2015 - #4238521

Having any issues with multiple maps in Superfly?

I have some materials which use more than a dozen maps. No problem.

rokket posted at 7:39AM Sat, 14 November 2015 - #4238541

This is perfect, even if you made a node error. Whatever you come up with to correct that will be perfect. I just need to get Poser 11...

Actually, now that I see the "corrected" version, I'd rate the earlier one ("mat1") as better. However, I want to try to get the best of both, getting the clear refraction of mat2 while retaining the prominent flame islands of mat1. Here is the "corrected" mat2:

quietrob posted at 7:39AM Sat, 14 November 2015 - #4238542

I was thinking, rokket, yes it's a dangerous thing to do...how are you going to simulate melting? It's something that I have contend with as well. I'll probably resort to the pencil if I can't do it here. As I think about it, I've yet to see anything melted ever.

Still, it's not always good to ask questions if you can't come up with answers. I was thinking of wrinkles and folds. Of how if they were properly textured it could be made to look like melting concrete or metal. A little easier for me as my flame based hero mainly uses one of her other powers.

But you have a hero named blaze! Whatcha gonna do?

Just bouncing your ideas back around here, but two possible solutions occur to me.

[] Pose doll, export doll to modeler, and "smooth" the mesh, and reduce vertical scale, and smooth again. Use soft selection to create blobby, ripple effects. Might work, might not.

[] Pose doll, export doll (weld seams!), re-import doll OBJ back into Poser, clothify doll, run dynamic cloth simulation. Again, might work, might not.

rokket posted at 7:40AM Sat, 14 November 2015 - #4238552

...Blaze's flames when she emits them...

Elaborate - does she throw fireballs, or just exude them as an external rippling flame on her surface, or spit fire like a dragon?

Particles may be a solution for this.

@ seachnasaigh, well the font does lend an impression of voice or quietness but that's not what I was referring to... I just think it looks a little awkwardly cramped in that corner. Butting up against her hair, arm and the edge of the canvas, not overlapping her edges (probably a choice due to the usage of an open field of text and color) causing tension or squeezing in the composition, which is otherwise very open. If it were me I'd move the text out to the left of the figure, change it to white or put it in a bubble or if it's not serving a purpose in a comics context and it's just a lone illustration, get rid of altogether. Anyway, I guess I've been in one too many painting critique classes or read Scott Mcloud's 'understanding comics' too much :). Thanks for that info on maps and SuperFly btw. It really looks and sounds like you're having a lot of fun with it.

@seachnasaigh:

Blaze has the ability to spit fire like a dragon if she chooses, she can also radiate heat, and emit fire from her fingers flame thrower fashion. I'll be doing a combination of all of it as the story developes. I'd use a tube prop and copy that "corrected" material for the radiated version.

I have video stills of a flame thrower that I would use for other applications.

Any ideas for some other Villains rokket? I could lend a hand on that front in various ways if your interested in the future and I'm still kicking around here. I finished rigging my new figure, also. I'll post some images when it's ready for upload in a few days (still needs a couple textures, some expression morphs, and some very minor jcms). I got grand prize in that Halloween contest so I won copies of Manga Studio EX, filter forge pro, and anime studio. Psyched, especially about MS. Now I need a new computer. Lol. That'll take awhile. A little jealous about the new Poser, it's got some really awesome features and improvements... especially on the creation aspects.

EldritchCellar posted at 7:09PM Sat, 14 November 2015 - #4238610

Any ideas for some other Villains rokket? I could lend a hand on that front in various ways if your interested in the future and I'm still kicking around here. I finished rigging my new figure, also. I'll post some images when it's ready for upload in a few days (still needs a couple textures, some expression morphs, and some very minor jcms). I got grand prize in that Halloween contest so I won copies of Manga Studio EX, filter forge pro, and anime studio. Psyched, especially about MS. Now I need a new computer. Lol. That'll take awhile. A little jealous about the new Poser, it's got some really awesome features and improvements... especially on the creation aspects.

Yeah, actually there are some other ideas. Blaze starts out as the obvious villain, but it turns out she isn't. The real villain turns out to be John Forester/Green Lightning's best friend. I am going to use James for him. But I posted the Calcaran Man Beast in Rob's superhero thread, remember? I want to rework that into something I can use, but I would need help rigging it. I don't have ZBrush, and Sculptris won't get it done.

I could give you a hand with that... in some capacity. Life might be getting in the way of alot of my Posering in a little bit, as is the case for many folks in and out of community activity. Sigh. We'll see what happens, but yeah I could help with that creature, I really don't use the most fancy tools myself. My comp is ancient so I do everything with Zbrush 2, Carrara 8.1 pro, good ol' wings, and Photoshop 8. Some people have stacks of the latest and greatest and still can't manage to make doodley so I count my blessings. As far as the monster goes, I'm pretty good with 3d painting, sculpting, and .cr2 internals. With rigging I'm getting fairly confident with legacy rigging, which is fine for now cause robots, bugs, and monsters are really what I'm interested in. I think people who set out to create realistic human figures must be gluttons for punishment. Lol. But, more power too them. That's what the software's primary focus is, after all.

I think the creature is right up your alley. His scale is important. He has to come across as 8 feet tall and close to 400 pounds. Tusks are an option but not a game stopper. Let me know if you will be able to do it. I will eventually try it myself, but rigging isn't my strong suit.

Blaze in her human form. This is a final. I have the body morphs I am happy with, the hair, and the costume. But, the mask might go away. I haven't decided yet.

What I have on the rework of the Green Lightning costume. I am happy with it so far, but it's not quite done yet.

Blaze doesn't have to hide her identity. He does. So the mask is important. But I haven't created one I am happy with. I thought about doing a battle helmet like Captain America's first costume. The cowl didn't do it for me. And a straight mask similar to Blaze isn't going to work either.

See what I mean?

I will rework it and maybe get something I like. But it has to be perfect.

I am putting some spare cash aside to get Poser Pro 11 when it becomes viable for me to do that.

I think you are right about Blaze. No one can really recognize her that well when she is in blaze form. But Green Lightning...hmm...if you were to add a cowl it would look like the flash but in green. He does need to hide that face. He might need gloves. I have a couple of other suggestions but this is your hero!

How about a full head mask that covers the neck too, don't think I've seen you do that in any of your designs.

I am still not sure how I am going to do this. I have to think about it.

Maybe something reminiscent of a welding mask and night vision monocular?

Ah, the test render of mat3 for the fiery refractive ghost effect is finished. It has the clean/clear refraction and prominent flame islands. It's what I was aiming for - though it may not be what you were aiming for. I still can recover mat1 and mat2, though.

rokket posted at 12:55PM Sun, 15 November 2015 - #4238673

See what I mean?

Take your time and come up with something good. I already like the stomach and using your man of steel mesh should look different and original. I'll try and post some choices for you to consider when I get back home.

seachnasaigh posted at 7:12PM Sun, 15 November 2015 - #4238737

Maybe something reminiscent of a welding mask and night vision monocular?

Ah, the test render of mat3 for the fiery refractive ghost effect is finished. It has the clean/clear refraction and prominent flame islands. It's what I was aiming for - though it may not be what you were aiming for. I still can recover mat1 and mat2, though.

Are you kidding? That is EXACTLY what I was aiming for. I came to the conclusion that she should have a lot of translucence is she is in fire form, so you nailed it.

quietrob posted at 7:14PM Sun, 15 November 2015 - #4238774

rokket posted at 12:55PM Sun, 15 November 2015 - #4238673

See what I mean?

Take your time and come up with something good. I already like the stomach and using your man of steel mesh should look different and original. I'll try and post some choices for you to consider when I get back home.

I modeled this one from scratch and UV mapped it. The texture on here right now is simply the noise node plugged into the alt diffuse and bump nodes. I am still trying to figure out the material I want to use for his costume. I may be leaning toward something completely non ferrous, but not leather or rubber-like.

EldritchCellar posted at 7:18PM Sun, 15 November 2015 - #4238712

How about a full head mask that covers the neck too, don't think I've seen you do that in any of your designs.

Do you mean something like a Spider-man mask?

Yeah, maybe. Might be an interesting choice. Deadpool, Rorschach... usually the characters with full masks have a different vibe to them. More... Image comics or something. It would let you concentrate more on design iconography I think, facial features or a little bit of features won't have as much of an impact on look. It would free you up to worry about that when the character isn't in disguise.

Just lost like 10 morph targets with a dumb ass naming botch. No biggie, they weren't very difficult to reconstruct. Frustrating though, note to self; don't name wip morphs untitled1, untitled2, etc. and then delete and add with identical names. Poser's like nope. Bye bye. Lol. Terrible feeling to look at what was like 20 something morphs on a palette and all of a sudden its only 8. Poser's real picky about internal naming.

How are you mapping your stuff rokket? UVMapper classic doesn't let you cut and stitch.

Are you planar mapping?

Just a heads up on UVMapper classic when dealing with tons of groups and polys. I had it dump polygons out of groups on a figure before. Wouldn't have been a big deal but we're talking about 120 groups. Felt like putting my head through a wall to regroup the thing. I don't F with that app anymore unless it's to make templates, least not on complex things.

You ever see this Poser figure by Predatron?

Redantom

I am using UV Mapper Classic. I tried Roadkill, but couldn't really get the hang of it. I am a simpleton when it comes to things like that.

I usually will map planar, but will also try the other options to see what they do. It depends on what I am trying to do with the mesh. I try to do most of my materials as procedural due to having CRS (can't remember sh*t), and always leaving out texture maps when I package up a model to distribute.

Most of my models have only a few material groups. I don't think I've ever had mapper drop polys on me.

I'll check out that figure when I get a better internet connection. Right now I am on my ship's pc. Makes the old 56k dial up look like a lightning bolt.

I am going to give the full mask some real thought. I made a suit with a cowl when I was attempting to make The Flash.

I realized you posted a Google images link, so I took a look. He kind of reinvented Deadpool, didn't he? It's a pretty cool concept for the mask. If I did it, I'd probably try to do something like Deadpool and have the eyes emote. I am going to Google other masks and see what I can come up with. Thanks for the link.

Taiwan's military uniform for close range combat features full-faced masks.

Just a couple ideas I will be tossing around with some others I will look at later on tonight.