cgarena apr-may09 magazine

8/17/2019 Cgarena Apr-may09 Magazine

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Get Attention in the Computer Graphics Community

VOLUME 4, ISSUE 2, APR - MAY 09

PHOTOSHOPJourney Across the Desert

3DS MAX Making of Hakara

GALLERY Latest 3d inspiring art

CGArena

ZBRUSHMaking of Meet You INTERVIEW

Heiko Wenczel

&

John Wyland


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Magazine Edited: Ashish Rastogi, India

Magazine Cover Image: Angel Diaz, Spain

Magazine Design: Yousef Ikhreis, Jordan

www.cgarena.com Page

IssueContents

Volume 4, Issue 2 Apr - May 200

Get Attention in the Computer Graphics Communit

4VOL

5

6

6

6

5

Interview Heiko Wenczel

Making of Journey Across the Desert

Making of Meet You

Making of Hakara

John Wyland

Showcase of latest 3D art

Photoshop

ZBrush

3ds Max

Interview

Gallery


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Industry News

CGArena

Issue 2 Apr - May 20

Autodesk Introduces

3ds Max 2010

Autodesk, Inc. has introduced Autodesk 3ds Max2010 software - the latest version of its 3D mod-eling, animation and rendering product – offeringnearly 350 additional features. The 2010 releaseprovides innovative creative tools: a render-qualityviewport display and at least 100 new Graphitemodeling tools. It also offers powerful new capa-bilities that help artists manage complex sceneswith greater ease and an unprecedented level ofsupport for software interoperability and pipelineintegration.

Videos of the new features in 3ds Max 2010 areavailable on the Autodesk YouTube Channel. Tolearn more about the software, also visit Autodesk’s3ds Max blogs.

Wacom unveils Intuos4

Wacom unveils the long anticipated Intuos4, a revo

tionary new professional pen tablet that delivers nefeatures and unparalleled performance to photogphers, designers and artists seeking optimal contand improved productivity. Inspired by members Wacom’s professional community, the next-genetion Intuos is anchored by the Intuos4’s amazing npen performance, capable of capturing the slightenuance of pen pressure against the tablet surfacas well as offering 2,048 levels of pressure sensitity. Other innovative product enhancements includerened and intelligent industrial design that provid

real advancements in looks, comfort and control. Spcic workow and productivity tools to savor inclu

the customizable shortcut and modier keys with a

companying OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diodedisplays, which allow users to see, via the displaywhat the keys are currently set to.

B o o k


T r a i n i n g

Action! Acting Lessons for CG Animators - In order to bring a char-acter to life, it is benecial for animators to have a solid understanding of

acting principles, and this book examines the important skills behind theartistry of creating animated characters. With a particular emphasis ona character’s motions and movement, this unique resource covers thebasic elements of acting for CG animation and then progresses to moreadvanced topics such as internal intent and motivation.ISBN - 978-0-470-22743-5

Shake Compositing Workow - 2nd Edition - Shake CompositingWorkow 2nd Edition is an introduction to node-based compositing for vi-sual effects artists working in the lm and television industry. In this video,

visual effects artists, Andrew Hazelden and Russell Hazelden, explorethe Shake user interface and the workow used to composite images.

Essential topics include: loading footage into a Shake script with the File-In node, adjusting node parameters, layering images with the Over node,using RAM and disk based Flipbooks to preview composites and render-ing nished composites using the FileOut node.

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My background is in architecture. At the University of Stuttgart, I began studying the creation of conceptuand presentation work in the CAD world. As an intern at Siemens, I used these tools to visualize robots aassembly lines for the automotive industry. Realizing the potential, I then worked as a freelancer for arctectural and industrial visualizations in 1996. After nishing my studies, I joined Mercedes as an archite

and artist. From this experience I gained skills in software, such as Catia, for automotive constructionapplied my cross-knowledge in different tools and workows to projects within simulation and virtual reaprograms. I then joined a team focused on creating a next-generation conguration and visualization sy

tem for automotive clients. There, I researched and created a workow for converting CAD data to visualiz

tion data for nal use in real-time compositing systems on the Web.

I joined Mackevision to apply my knowledge and experience on a global scale. I set up our ofce in Detr

and we work to translate ideas of repurposing assets from automotive to any other industry. At MackevisioI am responsible for the Detroit ofce together with John (Don’t forget to read the Interview with John Wyland on Pa

55 - Mackevision’s Executive Vice President and Head of Production), who represents the live action production woAdditionally, I continue to evaluate the data preparation workows and processes globally, to keep Macke

sion efcient and at the quality level for which we are known.

Heiko Wenczel


Q. Hello, could you please tell us about yourself a

bit? How did you get into the world of CG and what’s

your nature of job in Mackevision?

Working on shotsfor a big movieproduction has

always been a dreaof mine

Interview with

CGArena


Mackevision’s EVP and Manager Digital Division 3D


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Heiko Wenczel


When working with industrial design products that have a multitude of variations in material and geometit is important to have an exact representation of the products. These are typically created in CAD tools lCatia or ProE. These tools handle data quite differently than animation software like Maya or 3ds Max. Tdata is described with NURBS surfaces created in regard to production detail, not visualization use. A simptranslation into the visualization software with the original structure and setup would greatly reduce aperformance, if it would be usable at all. Therefore, an extensive workover is needed to create a datasthat allows the tracking of changes, and promotes astonishing visuals. To create image content for ma

volume picture systems, like conguration tools that request hundreds of thousands of pictures to represethe complete product line (a car for example), you will need additional thought on structuring your data.

While tessellating the NURBS data to triangulated polygon data, performance and visual feedback is a veimportant part of the pipeline, particularly when the data is to be used in animation, as well as in still imagecreation.

We pay special interest to the interior parts of a product. For example, in a car, the soft parts of seats anot created at a high enough detail in the design tools. Likewise, neither are the details of the stitchesseams. These need to be modeled and added to the dataset to provide realistic and appealing interior reresentations.

Q. Please tell our readers what is data conversion, data processing and data modeling. How this

different from normal 3D work?

Interview with

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Heiko Wenczel


Q. Tell us a bit about your pipeline and how data is shared between various departments?

Mackevision has designed our pipeline according to the steps needed to get from original manufactur

data to a nished marketing or informational piece of art. It starts with receiving the data; in the data prdepartment, people either receive the original data from automotive internal data houses or harvest the dathemselves right at the origin, which requires knowledge in the manufacturer’s specic CAD tools.

Our modeling department adds highly detailed soft parts, and all missing parts, that are not available in tmanufacturer’s data. If there is no original data, it will be created here either by modeling with different kinof modeling technologies or by scanning the original product and then remodeling it based on that informtion. The next step is shading and lighting. Based on our growing material libraries, our skilled visual artidene the digital representation of the product’s material. Our animators work in parallel on the motion

the scenes and products.

The nal step is the 2D department bringing the project to its nal beauty. As we have a very integrat

workow between 2D and 3D, most of the quality won’t be visible until these artists extract and utilize

the information created. Supporting the entire production team is an R&D group focused on keeping tcompany on the edge of performance, an IT department tracking the immense quantities of hardware asoftware running in the background and, most importantly, a quality team of technical directors keepingconstant eye on quality and workows. For example, as we confront repetitive work steps, we have creat

automated rigging systems for cars, to speed up our data prep workow. To keep track of projects and da

we have created a database system for 3ds Max which allows us to keep track of the details in very complprojects. The producers on top of every project oversee communication and project ow.

Interview with

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Heiko Wenczel


Q. Please tell us about the total number of workstations; render farms, animators, modelers, soware used in Mackevision?

Mackevision employs more than 40 artists working on different projects. The processes of modeling, daprep, shading and lighting all require a lot of resources. To keep the projects running and delivered on timour artists can leverage more than 100 render nodes for 3D and over 40 nodes for 2D. The main processbased on 3ds Max, Vray and Nuke; but Maya, Showcase and Creative Bridge, as well as a couple of oth

tools, are commonly used by our artists as well. If there is an efcient software tool available that helps o

production, we will try to integrate it into our workows wherever applicable.

Q. Which software are you using for your CG work and what’s the main reason of using those?

I use 3ds Max and Maya. 3ds Max was the rst tool I learned, and it is therefore the easiest for me to us

Many professionals in the automotive industry use Maya as a standard delivery format, and most of tpipelines rely on it for exchange with some of the other automotive products. Therefore, knowledge of Mais important for us as well.

Vray is my preferred renderer. Its speed, quality, innovative updates and roadmap make it an easy choicPhotoshop is a standard in retouching, but my most recent interest is in Nuke.

Interview with

CGArena



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Heiko Wenczel


Interview with

CGArena


Q. Do you use any special tool for the data management, please give the overview of working?

We have created our own data management tool to create high-volume conguration picture assets. Hu

helps us keep track of rendering jobs, allows us to congure datasets needed for projects and simply hel

us recreate projects without setting up everything a second time. As we could not nd a tool for our spec

needs, we had to nd our own solution for our 3ds Max pipeline.

Q. Please tell us there is any special difference in Detroit Ofce and other ofces of Mackevisi

and how you keep the coordination between ofces when working on same project?

Detroit has its specialty in data preparation and creative pre-visualization work. On one hand, we havecomplete team of specialists experienced in the generation of data sets for virtual garages and modelinOn the other hand, we are a creative house, as we focus our work on providing services to agencies creative projects in marketing.The coordination between theofces is handled by produc-ers keeping track of projectsand information, as well as mytravel between the locations.

Q. How different and difcult

the realistic 3d visualization

work from the other projects

in Mackevision?

The realistic representation ofmaterials and light setups hasalways been the focus of ourcompany. The core of our pipe-

line and the chief interest of ourartists is to achieve maximumquality. The most important partof realistic 3D projects is to getaccurate, real-life reference, and then our art directors and shaders are responsible for creating a perferepresentation in the virtual world. Without the perfect eyes and design sense for a great picture, thewould be no way for us to produce the high-quality work we’re known for. The know-how of the deeper funtions of software to achieve these results is another important part of the equation. Additionally, we realizover time at Mackevision that it is always important to take into account what others in the business halearned already. Therefore, we take photographers and other artistic branches into account when workion our projects.


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Heiko Wenczel


Q. We heard that you built a comprehensive visual conguration system for the Mercedes eet, cyou tell us about this conguration system and how this works?

We created the F_BOX family of tools, based on our efcient processes of creating and structuring da

The idea was to offer an easy way of creating content for still and animated marketing materials, with specregard to conguring complex products.

Once we have prepared and set up data for mass rendering, we can use a tool called F_BOX Media ServThis basically represents a logic-based, real-time compositing system, using Web technology. It offerspoint-of-sales or Web-based solution to represent the complete conguration of product variants in still p

tures.

F_BOX Picture Shooter is our real-time still image generator. It has the most intuitive camera setup, baground image selection and product accessorizing features such as adding license plates to a visualizvehicle. Our customers get really excited about this tool, because the data is prepared to perfection. Tfrees up the user from having to be a software expert, and lets them focus on creating the best angles their product.

A more interactive and emotional way to represent a congurable product is to place these still perspectimages in an animated environment. We call that system “Living Backgrounds.” This offers a mixture of sand motion for Web specials, features or conguration systems. The interesting part here is that there

motion in the background, giving you the impression that your product really is in a living environment.

One step further is our F_BOX Movie Shooter, which will allow agencies, based on shot and data librarieto create their own running footage commercials. This application allows users to create a complete movFor example, with vehicles, once a user has selected a car, an environment, shots within that environmea driver, and accessories, users can begin the rendering process. Within a short timeframe, in regardmaterial specications like resolution, frame rate, and format, users will receive their marketing piece.

Interview with

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Heiko Wenczel


Interview with

CGArena


Last but not least, for vehicles, Motion Congurator offers the possibility for users to watch a commercial the Web where users actually congure a car, helicopter, or jet while it is moving. This means you will

able to see a commercial with your own dened vehicle.

Q. Can you share, on which projects you are currently working, which is the most challenging pr

ect and why?

We are working on translating these tools for markets outside of automotive. Right now, we’re focusing

aviation and apparel. Still, automotive is our backbone and we are currently working on running footage f

different brands based on background material we have produced. Additionally, we are about to bring to l

the rst motion congurator with advanced features along with an automotive client.

One of our most interesting projects, about which I can only hint to, will involve virtual characters and a co

guration system. By the 3rd quarter of 2009, we will have more to share on the subject.

Q. Do you have an aim or dream as an artist? What are your hobbies and please describe your fr

time, if you have any?

Well, as with anyone in the business, working on shots for a big movie production has always been a drea

of mine. But, aside from that, keeping up the amazing work of Mackevision even in these hard times is mfocus. Realizing the potential in workows, and changing little steps which lead to new ideas and bet

solutions is an interesting task; explaining and placing them on the market is then a nice challenge.

As for most in this industry, free time doesn’t come often. When I do have time, I like to travel and see a

experience new and different things. Aside from that, I try to keep myself physically t to withstand every d

challenges like the lack of sleep.

Q. Anything you like to add? It is your chance now to state your opinion about anything.

The digital industry has evolved greatly in recent years, and it is one of the few industries where every dbrings new ideas and new challenges. That is exactly what fascinates me about the digital content creati

world. There are no limits and the possibilities are endless.

Thanks a lot Heiko for taking out sometime for us from your busy schedule.

www.mackevision.co

http://www.mackevision.com/en/index.htmlhttp://www.mackevision.com/en/index.html


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Tutorial

CGArena

Making of Journey

Across the Desert


Software:

Photoshop

by Daniel Romanovsky, Canada

2D

About the Image - This image was a personal project, I wanted to paint an exotic open desert landscaand imbue with a sense of mystery. The painting was created using Adobe Photoshop CS3, took appromately 8 hours of work over the course of two days.

As you are about to see, I used a direct mass painting approach working without a preliminary drawingchoose several of Jean-Lean Gerome’s paintings with a similar theme to use as a reference for my copallet and composition. I highly recommend studying the works of classical painters to enhance your undstanding of artistic techniques.



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Tutorial

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Journey Across the Desert



Considering that the image is primarily a horizontal composition, I choose a pretty wide aspect ratio. I startby establishing the horizon line, placing it just above center. Using the gradation tool I added in the sky aground tones choosing somewhat desaturated colors with the intention of adding saturation as the imaprogresses. I also kept the edge at the horizon line soft to have the exibility to tweak it later on.

The next step was to block in the sky, I used mostly gray blues with a little bit of earth tones to help blendwith a ground.


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Tutorial

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Painting the ground plane was a very similar process, keeping it pretty simple. I was looking to paint moof a rocky desert landscape which allowed me the opportunity to reect some of the sky tone on the roc

planes.

It’s generally a good idea to paint in layers; background rst, then middle ground and nally the foregrouelements. That way you can tweak your composition later without worrying about overlapping and visucontinuity.




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Tutorial

CGArena





At this stage, I put more work into the sky addingsome storm clouds to create both drama and in-terest. To make the process more efcient, I used

some of my own custom cloud brushes, whichare fun and easy to create. I also added a fore-ground rock element to help bring the viewer intothe picture.

With the landscape established it was time to block in the key elements of the composition. Before staing work on the bones, I studied some pictureswhale skeletons to give me a basic idea of the tyof iconography I need. While I wasn’t trying depany specic creature, I still wanted the skelet

to look plausible. I used a solid opaque color aa smaller brush to lay in the silhouette, makithe bones wrap the terrain in an S curve. It tooknumber of attempts before I was satised with t

overall shape. Even though bones are a very ganic form, it’s still crucial to adhere to the ruleslinear perspective, in order to create the illusionform in space. The camel rider was painted in tsame fashion, starting with the silhouette shaand then adding the lights and darks.


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Tutorial

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Once I was satised with the overall composition, it was time to work out the bones. Since I was pleas

with how my initial lay-in turned out, the overall silhouette did not change very much from start to nish. T

main challenge here was getting the foreshortening to read correctly.

At this point everything was starting to come together. I nalized the clouds and the camel rider, tweaki

him until the scale between him and the skeleton was just right. I added an atmosphere layer using a scloud brush loaded with my background color. This helped reinforce my depth cues pushing the backgrouinformation into the distance.




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The last major step was to nish painting and detailing the landscape, I made sure to turn off all the unne

essary layers while painting. I used a lot of particle brushes to get the right effect. Achieving a realistic loo

is a matter of studying at a lot of reference material, getting the colors, values and edges right during tlay-in stage and then zooming into specic areas and adding information locally.


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Tutorial

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For the most part I used two of the standard brushes that come withPhotoshop, one is a solid gauche-like brush with a softer age, I use it lay in all my tones, and the other ischalk-like brush which is great for adding texture.

Here I wanted to show how you can use a series of large sweeping curves in your composition to lead yoviewer’s eye to the main area of interest. Notice how the skeleton, the landscape, the clouds and even tbirds are all pointing to the rider.

Another compositional device to draw attention to the focal point of the image is the use of color accentsplaced a daub of red color next to its complimentary which is green, it is a subtle effect, but an effective ononetheless.


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The nishing touches included adding some bone tex-ture to the foreground part of the skeleton, some vul-tures in the sky that I imagine are accompanying ourguy on his journey and the moon in the background togive the scene more of a fantastic feel.

I hope that you enjoyed reading this article and thatthe insights that I provided will help you in your futureartistic endeavors. To see more of my artwork visit mywebsite www.formlanguage.net.

Thank you for taking interest in my creative process.

Website: www.formlanguage.nEmail: [email protected]

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Tutorial

CGArena



Software:

Maya, ZBrush, Photoshop

by Zhang Sheng, China

3D

Hello everyone, I am Zhang Sheng from China. ‘Meet you’ is my latest work and glad that lots of frienlike this. I Would also like to thank the CGArena.com for their assistance, so that I can share the productiprocess.

CONCEPTION

Before I made the various 3d artworks including the ro-bot, variation and so on. At the time in university, I studiedpainting at the Art Institute. Thoughts and techniques ofpainting has been affecting me. This time I want to portraya cute Oriental girl, a unique beauty of the Orient. She isfashionable, condent and lively. In my imagination she

meets me.

I collected some photos as a reference, but I did not wantto produce in accordance with anyone. I want to create agirl in my imagination.

MODELING & SCULPTING

I used Maya to create this Girl. Create a bamodel. At this time I paid attention to the pportion of the model and topology.

I export the basic model in .obj le and th

sculpting the model in Zbrush. Frankly speaing, ZBrush is a very high efcient modeli

tool, I can rely on it for the shape I want model. This will also be beneted to me fro

my painting experience.

Making of Meet You


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Tutorial

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Later I will give her clothes to put on, so now I do not want to add too many physical details in sculpting. Mbe I will add later on.

I modeled the hand by taking the reference of my own hand. Ha.Ha, this is a fun process, feel that they bcome the part of the character. Thank God for giving me a pair of slender hands.

For modeling the good sculpture, Istart editing the model UVs. Editingthe UV mapping now to avoid defor-

mation later. Export the model in .obj,then open it using Unfold3d. Then se-lected edges are cut open, unfolding,everything is easy. Unfold3d is an ex-cellent software.

Making of Meet You


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Now UV layout was confusing and my own needs in ac-cordance with the re-distribution at Maya. Maya ‘s ‘MoveUV shell tool’ and ‘Rotate UV’ tool is useful.

TEXTURING

‘I used the photographs as material and use the ZBrushprojection master to mapping the texture.

Mapping the characters from front, side, bottom, top andback. I also used the Photoshop then get the completetexture.

I used to display maps in ZBrush, then nd out the problem and cor -rect it. In my opinion this is a very effective way. I also use my ZBrushmaterial to show skin, so I can estimate the nal results. In order to get

the enough details, I created a map of 6000x6000.

Making of Meet You


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POSE

If there is no ZBrush, posture adjustment in model wouldbe a troublesome thing because to create a set of skin andbone weights. In ZBrush3.1, using the Transpose tool toregulate the posture is very easy.

I used the ‘move brush’ and open ‘Activate symmetry’, tomake the smiley face. In my opinion the creation of perfectfacial expressions are most important part. I tried to give acharming smile like ‘Mona Lisa’ had. I hope that she cantouch everyone.

SKIN SHADER

I used Maya mental ray ‘misss_fast_skin’ To createthe skin shader of the character. The shader is easy,I don’t use mix20layer and other shaders. Since Iam now satised with the skin.

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This is the color mapping, bump mapping and specular mapping.

Test Rendering

I use the maya textures to create the eye texture of the gDistinction between the use of ramp and the white of the eiris. Use the set of noise-node combination to produce the texture. The use of a group of marble nodes to produce tbloodshot in the eye.

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HAIR AND EYEBROWS

Hair production is a challenging job. First of all, I draw the draft hairin Photoshop to determine the Hair Style and composition.

I think ‘Shave and a haircut’ is the best tool for the production of thehair. Create a polymesh as the scalp to generate hair and use thenurbs curve as guideline to control the hair.

Analysis of my hair, and up from toriginal model to replicate as ma

block poly scalp. CV curve tool usto create more nurbs curve to guithe hair

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Eyebrows also created in the same way. Use the shave brush tool to Combing hair. The shape of the halso needs Combing. Adjust the shape but also necessary to adjust hair color, quantity, thickness and othcharacteristics in order to complete the creation of hair.

Here is the nal render. I hope this tutorial has been

helpful for you. Thanks for giving the time to read mytutorial and thanks to CGArena.com for this great op-portunity!

Web: blog.sina.com.cn/zszsartEmail: [email protected]

Making of Meet You

http://blog.sina.com.cn/zszarthttp://blog.sina.com.cn/zszartmailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]://blog.sina.com.cn/zszart


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http://cr1.e-onsoftware.com/


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http://www.fmx.de/


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara


Software:

3ds max, ZBrush, Vray

by Angel Díaz, Spain

3D

Greetings, First thanks to CGArena for the opportunity to publish this making in your e-zine. And thanks Cesar Sampedro, Amadeu Aldavert and Alicia Pereira for their help.

Motivated by the ideas and designs from Luis Royo and Boris Vallejo I decided to create a sexy girl with litclothing and weapons. At rst I only had to look for references of beautiful girls and choose one interesti

and suggestive pose. Once the idea was clear I only need to take a naked model and to pose it. For thisused 3ds max and ZBrush. Later talking to my friend Yolanda we decided to create a character for a novI opened the girl model which I did before with few polys to apply a skin, easily to adapt create a simpskeleton, skin it and open it with ZBrush to give more details.

In ZBrush I got a better shape and better overall proportions, as well as the details of wrinkles, fat, bonesand I leave the model perfectly for the camera which I will use for render.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



Then in Photoshop I made my rst concept based on the model and made the pose that I liked. Few lin

and a little volume gave me a clear idea of what should I add in accessories and which composition wdo.

She has to be sexy so I thought it was best to add the little clothing and in the line of Luis Rollo and Bordecided to add weapons, swords, monsters and some strange substance. When I nished the idea I sen

to my friend Cesar Sampedro and he draw several designs from which I choose one of them.


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I start modeling tclothes, added the cocept in 3ds max asbackground and mo

eled the bikini, the massome belts, the eyes athe sword.

Each piece was modelin 3ds max and after touched in ZBrush to gmore detail from the nmal map I extractedchannel “dirty” with thelp of crazy bump.

The dirty channel withlightmap and the occsion is added to the dfuse. Later I congur

a vray material until tspecular reection

achieved that I am looing for.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



In the case of gas mask, I modeled itfrom a redesign that I did in Photoshop.I made a diffuse texture, normal andspecular map. For this object I chooseto make 4 sub-materials for differenttypes of reections (high reection,

little reection, more blurred reection

and nothing).

You can also create a glossiness map

as in other objects but sometimes I ndit more useful to do it by this way.

In almost all the objects I used BodyPaint3D to x the seams, to pr

ect textures etc.. A good example is the skin.

For the skin, rst I decide to split the mesh of the girl in different pa

using the clothes. I assigned 4 materials and maps to each partmade a lightmap of everything together and a wire of each object.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



Then I open the BodyPaint3D and textured each part usingphotos of skin and xing the seams between the different

textures.

Then I added one specular based on the desaturated andcontrasted diffuse and a new layer using the “high pass”effect from Photoshop to clean the texture and see only theimportant pores.

I converted the same texture in normalmap and mixed it with the normal mapbase with an action of Photoshop called“Poopinmymouth” to give details of poresto the normal map of the skin. Then I setthe shader with some scatter.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



I deleted the old head because I was not too convinced and decide to create a new one which is more seous but not less in beauty. I made the base model in 3ds max and then changed the volumes in ZBrush.

Later, back to max I made the new mapping andthen back to ZBrush again. I opened the ztool ofmy model head, I did a “capture mesh” from thehigh poly mesh with “zmapper”, I imported thenew head in 3ds max in low poly and projected itto get the new normal map. Now you could openBodypaint and texture the head.


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As I said before taking advantage of the specular and with other tricks I got the normal map with the detaof pores. I made the eyelashes with Hair and Fur. First I created some guidelines (splines) and then I cogured it to have a nice eyelashes rendered as geometry.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



For the hair I did the same steps, I created some guidelines for each lock of hair and then using the hair afur modier and the utility “Finish Styling” I got the style looking for.

For the scarf I tried to create a effect of bers and clo

I modeled the base in max, edited in ZBrush to ginice volumes for the wrinkles and created a diffuse teture and a normal map.

With a copy of the model and using the “push” modi

in 3ds max I made a new layer with alpha and normmap to make cloth effect and with the hair and fur moer made the little bers.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



I did a new design of the gun for the screenplay of the novel. Imade a shape of aquatic animal, and to give a technologicalbetter look I choose the effect of “car paint”. So I textured theweapon in Bodypaint, added maps of occlusion and diffuse withVray and made shaders to create the effect of car paint.

I got the self-illumination effect of the lights with the “VRayMtl-Wrapper” material.


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Here the parameters of the shader “car paint”.


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Tutorial

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Making of Hakara



With all the stuff nished I just want tomake the hair. The renderings I’ve beenusing all the time used the HDRI for color& reections and a couple of omni lights to

give volume. The hair is rendered as ge-ometry. Now in a new scene I choose theGbuffer option to render the hair in a layerusing the more interesting features of theHair and Fur modier.

In this new scene using “default scanlinerenderer” of max (No vray) I made 2 lightsfocused directly to the hair to get a moreinteresting shine. Once I congured the

hair color and brightness, in the “RenderElements” panel I assigned “Hair and Fur”and made a render to have a layer of hair in 32-bit with alpha channel. I also got little bers of hair in th

scarf. This was mixed with the original render to get a better look of the hair and give it some shine.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



Once the girl is completed Ionly need to make the back-ground and the enemy. Forthe background I modeled abig round door of a space-craft with pipes, cables andnothing else. Focused withthe same camera of course,I added some omni lightsof vray, I mapped all the

stuff and created a textureof 4096x4096 for the fullstage.

I extracted a layer of ambi-ent occlusion from the scen-ery to give more volumeand Zdepth channel for theblur and fog. I used the Lens Blur effectin Photoshop selecting the Zdepth chan-nel in the alpha channel, with this I blurred

the background with depth. (If you don’tknow how to do this then you can easilynd a tutorial in the google search).

I added the girl to the scene, used aZdepth channel and occlusion as I usedfor the background and I blurred the edg-es a bit using “ lens blur” of photoshop.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



For the enemy I modeled a very simple robot and extracted a render withlight, reections, quite dark occlusion channel and a Zdepth channel to

do the same steps for the blur, but this time this need to be very blurredbecause it should be an object very near and unfocused.

I added a bright eye and made a nal render with

some dust, noise and little touch of color and con-trast.


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Tutorial

CGArena


Making of Hakara



And here is the nal render with a bit of smart sharpen. I hope this making was useful for you and explainsome tips and techniques used in the creation of the image. Cheers! If you have any query then don’t hetate to ask.

Web: www.tios.co

Email: [email protected]

http://www.tiflos.com/http://www.tiflos.com/http://www.tiflos.com/mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.tiflos.com/


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http://www.cgoverdrive.com/


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I have always loved cars. As a kid, I prided myself in my ability to distinguish one car from another whencould only see the smallest of detail. Then, there was the love of photography. Even in high school I wassisting a photographer and attending lm school to learn light, lenses and composition. After time, I grad

ated to lm and I have spent the last 30 years making commercials. It was through lmmaking that I got

know Mackevision. Agencies were asking for effects to be added to their traditional live action lms. I w

so impressed with the artistic level that I immediately saw that Mackevision was the only place that fully uderstood the integration of the two worlds. When Mackevision opened its Detroit ofce I saw an opportunto bring these two worlds together. Partnering with Heiko has brought both of our technical expertise aartistic desires together to move forward in areas that not too long ago were only dreams.

Together, the Detroit ofce, along with Stuttgart, has brought to market compelling new directions to C

and to our clients. We have pioneered Digital Running Footage Libraries where the customer can choofrom a menu the road, a driver, a car, a trim, a color, a wheel, a license plate and various other accessorieThat is automatically assembled and delivered to the client within a short timeframe. That led to creatingWeb-based image creator for clients to utilize as a tool to create everything from Web to print applicationfrom the comfort of their own ofce, which is rendered and returned in record time. All of that, and the incre

ible images and movies we create for our customers. Mackevision really is bringing together passion atechnology.

John Wyland


Q. Hello John, will you please tell us about yourself

and which services are offered in Mackevision?

Clients see CGI asthe future and no

only as a cost-savinmeasure

Interview with

CGArena


Mackevision’s EVP and Head of Production


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John Wyland


In our car projects we haven’t been using mocap thus far, as we have created our own rigs and worko

to create animations to full beauty. Working with characters, though, we will have to use mocap solutiofor ongoing and future projects. The recent developments and solutions in that regard offer strong suppoin nishing projects more efciently and of high-quality. Depending on the needs, animation will always

a balance between the accuracy of physics simulators, the honesty of mocap, and the artistry of traditiontechniques. You use each where it gives you the best result.

Q. Are there any tools or services which are offered exclusively at Mackevision, and what are yo

future plans?

One of our most interesting services at this time is the creation of running footage based on real locatishots and complete, virtual cars in several congurations. We’ve combined our lm expertise with our re

world CGI capabilities. And, with our focus on creative visualization and mass content creation, we devetools that we not only use, but our customers do, too. Our rapid visualization tool, F_BOX Picture Shootand our semi-animated product-visualization solution, Living Backgrounds, are the rst of many signica

steps into a new era.

Q. Are you also using mocap in any VFX project and what do you think: in the future, will moc

replace traditional animation?

Interview with

CGArena



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John Wyland


Q. Can you tell our readers about the process involved from the time the client enters the stud

with the concept through to nal execution?

A client’s rst impression will stay with them for their entire career. It is important for them to know we a

here to provide a solution to their dreams. We have clients that come to us with everything from a blank slato a polished storyboard. Some just come with an idea on a napkin. It is our job to listen and contributetheir quest.

Supercially, CGI has many similarities to other traditional production ows, but it stops there. Even thou

dreams are a hallmark of CGI it is still a medium not meant for reactionary decisions. With CGI, it is esse

tial to have a workow with intermediate steps for approval that have to be strictly adhered to. Any deviati

costs money and time. It is the implementation and understanding of a proactive workow that ultimate

keeps everyone happy.

It is our goal to provide a comfortable reassuring and nurturing experience to every client from the rst me

ing to the nal delivery.

Interview with

CGArena



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John Wyland

Q. During recruitment, what does a company like Mackevision look for?

We are always looking for a new perspective and people who want to bring that quality to their profession

experience.

Q. Are you also feeling the heat of recession and you are still hiring the creative people?

No business is recession-proof, but CGI has been an impressive tool for our clients. They see it as the

ture; not only as a cost-saving measure, but as a new artistic outlet to be explored. It took quite a long tim

for the world to accept photography as a form of illustration, and we are now experiencing the same w

CGI. With all the new options for marketing and advertising, CGI is proving itself as a tool to reach out

all levels. To answer the question, yes, parts of some industry segments have slowed, but we are alwa

proactively on the lookout for fresh and creative ideas for the future.

Q. What is one piece of advice

you would give to any artist

looking to work with Mackevi-

sion?

Please let us know of your inter-

est in Mackevision. Do not wait

for us to reach out. We are al-

ways looking for people willing

to take initiative, and what bet-

ter way to start? Who knows,

we may not even know we need

you.

Q. Anything you like to add?It is your chance now to state

your opinion about anything.

There is nothing like working on the razor’s edge of technology and its relationship to creativity.

Thanks a lot, John for taking out some time from your busy schedule for us.

www.mackevision.co

Interview with

CGArena


http://www.mackevision.com/en/index.htmlhttp://www.mackevision.com/en/index.html


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gallery


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Jian Xu, [email protected] Max 9, Photoshop


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Vikram.V, [email protected], 3ds Max, Photoshop


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Sinan Ilkaz, [email protected] 3ds max, Vray

Massimo Righi, [email protected]

Marco Pazmino, Ecuador [email protected]

Lightwave, ZBrush, Photoshop


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Adi Irawanto, Indonesia

[email protected], Mental Ray, ZBrush


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Ongie Ongushi, [email protected]

3ds Max


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Mike Lundahl, [email protected]

XSI, ZBrush, Mental Ray

Zsolt Berghammer, [email protected], 3ds Max, Mudbox


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Volkan Kacar, Turkey [email protected] max, Vray, Photoshop

Ruben D. Karamanites, [email protected] max, ZBrush Photoshop


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Istvan Vastag, Hungary [email protected] max, Vray


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How to send in your images.We showcase the cream of reader images in magazine and on website gallery

Here’s how to get yours noticed

Upload Images through WebsiteFollow this link http://www.cgarena.com/submit.php

This is by far the quickest and easiest way to send your images to us.
http://www.cgarena.com/submit.phphttp://www.cgarena.com/submit.phphttp://www.cgarena.com/submit.phphttp://www.cgarena.com/submit.php

cgarena apr-may09 magazine

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