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Post Your Renders - Happy New Year yall

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  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    fool said:

    Dart is that a telescope or a rocket launcher?

    That reminds me... I was going to buy a rocket launcher... thanks for reminding me!

  • starboardstarboard Posts: 452

    Dart,

    That is some serious equipment .  I have an old refracting telescope ..2 1/2" from my early days, it was a low budget item..all I could afford back then.. If you have not fooled with astronomical telescopes you do not realize how  tough it is to track...Well maybe not so much these days ...I had to do it manually back then, many decades ago. If you were tracking and hunting galaxies - that is delicate work ...You probably got the Edmund Scientific Catalogs also...They had the neatest  gadgets... It always amazed me that you are actually dealing with planatary mechanics.. Although we all know that the Earth goes around the sun, etc. Its not until you are actually turning the dials. or setting up the equipment yourself that you realize it is for real and this sucker, the Earth is really moving (rotating) at a clip. It is sort of a reality moment. 

    Anyway, that is an impressive piece of equipment and quite a project rebuilding it... Thanks for sharing..

     

     

     

  • chickenmanchickenman Posts: 1,202

    I think it is a launcher with a scope on it.

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    edited April 2016
    msteaka said:

    Dart,

    That is some serious equipment .  I have an old refracting telescope ..2 1/2" from my early days, it was a low budget item..all I could afford back then.. If you have not fooled with astronomical telescopes you do not realize how  tough it is to track...Well maybe not so much these days ...I had to do it manually back then, many decades ago. If you were tracking and hunting galaxies - that is delicate work ...You probably got the Edmund Scientific Catalogs also...They had the neatest  gadgets... It always amazed me that you are actually dealing with planatary mechanics.. Although we all know that the Earth goes around the sun, etc. Its not until you are actually turning the dials. or setting up the equipment yourself that you realize it is for real and this sucker, the Earth is really moving (rotating) at a clip. It is sort of a reality moment. 

    Anyway, that is an impressive piece of equipment and quite a project rebuilding it... Thanks for sharing..

     

    ...as a matter of fact, I later obtained one of those Edmund Scientific "Astroscan" Reflector telescopes

     Mine is from back before they came with that aiming device. I should get one of those for mine ;) Yeah... my family is born to science ;)

    My telescope was very popular in the sixties and seventies, back before I knew much of anything at all LOL, The Criterion DynaScope 6" Relfector, made in the US

    The German Equatorial mount that those came with used a cork bushing, which now requires some modding skills to keep working correctly. Instead, I was able to find a brand new mount (just the Equatroial Head and fastening rings, I had to make the pier myself) for a Russian TAL 150, which instead was made with real ball bearings instead of bushings. Sky & Telescope magazine had an article on how to rewire the thing for U.S. 120V electricity, and the seller had a version with that already performed upon it - so I oredered that one. 

       The telescope tube makes the mount look smal in pictures, but the shipping weight of the mount alone is around ninety pounds, and it comes in a hand-crafted birch plywood crate with wooden forms and fingers holding everything tightly in place. I use that crate for transporting the mount - it's so huge and heavy! LOL  For scale reference, the telescope pictured here is over five feet long! These TAL 150 telescopes are still available new, I believe. Criterion Dynascopes are a big hobby in backyard astronomy and can be found here and there for sale used, and there are web pages detailing how to refurbish them, which is what I used to refurbish mine. One suggestion was to sand down the inside of the optical tube (the big cannon) and layer it with strong glue, then fleck it with sand, finally painting it with ultra-flat black. The ultra-flat black sand reduces light scatter, increasing contrast of dim (distant) objects. My tube needed structural repairs as well, and I sent my mirrors off to get resurfaced so I had time to do all of this... it was fun! The original Criterion came with a horrible focuser (eyepiece holder) so I've upgraded to a JMI reverse Crayford, which is the opposite of horrible. I have two Pentax wide-view eyepieces that compliment the scope perfectly! Looking at the moon is so detailed that it'll make you dizzy looking at it. Saturn and Jupiter look nicer through this thing than they do through our club's 14" observatory scope! :) Well... it could be that I'm biassed! But I think that the ultra-flat black sand has a lot to do with it!

     

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  • ncampncamp Posts: 345

    A buddy of mine had one of the Edmund Scientific "Astroscan" Reflector telescopes.  We watched the '84 solar eclipse with it in college. 

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561

    It's not a "Goto", mind you, where you tell it what to point at and it goes. I have to aim the telescope to find the elusive object. But once I do, the mount takes over and keeps the rotation of the Earth out of the equation! :)   Of course, there's a cost of having to properly align the mount to North for this to work, which is really easy where I live! ;)

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    ncamp said:

    A buddy of mine had one of the Edmund Scientific "Astroscan" Reflector telescopes.  We watched the '84 solar eclipse with it in college. 

    They're cute little telescopes, and very well made. I keep mine just for nostalgia since it takes smaller diameter eyepieces than what I have. Maybe one day I'll find a set of Edmund Scientific eyepieces for it. I have one that came with it, but it's scratched beyond repair. My brother has a set of those eyepieces I mentioned, but won't part with them just yet! :(

    Doesn't matter, though. When Hunting Deep Sky Objects, we always tend to use the largest instrument we have. Mine is a dwarf compared to many, but most of those larger aperture scopes don't track like mine does - and I like to gaze. To me it's not enough to just find it and move on... unless it's a boring object. But in our Celestial Tapestry, it's hard to find boring subjects! :)

  • StezzaStezza Posts: 8,051

    all I have is a pair of binoculars and the missus threw them out during cleanup sad

  • starboardstarboard Posts: 452

    That is really nice equipment Dart. Great enthusiasm.   I used my refractor to watch the the eclipse ..I think it was  1974.. or it could have been 76 ?.... (You can see why I have so much trouble learning Carrara - memory.)  I have been doing some  reading about the James Cook expedition and its study of the transit of Venus.. back in 1769. Cook used a modified Gregorian reflector telescope. It is amazing how little the design has changed over three centuries.  I never got too deep in astronomy, instead  when in High School I became involved in Celestrial Navigation.  I bought a surplus SAC bubble sextant  from Airbourne Sales and became adept at fixing my position. Of course along came GPS  which took all the fun out of it and made it all obsolete. 

    Getting back to astronomy.. and galaxies... A few years ago I saw this book in a book store and it absolutely stunned me. It is called Cosmos a Field Guide by Giles Sparrow. It is a large book 17" by 14" so when it opens up some of the images are 17 by 28... Much of the book is of plates of galaxies and galaxy clusters...in full color.  I was so impressed by the images and the astounding beauty of our universe..I ended up buying extra copies for my brother and my wife for school..who was teaching 3rd grade at the time. Even now when I open the pages I am amazed and awed by the images.....and helps to  put our little world into perspective.

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  • evilproducerevilproducer Posts: 9,050
    I find it helps to put the universe into perspective by looking at it through the eyes of Zaphod Beeblebrox. ;-)
  • magaremotomagaremoto Posts: 1,227

    genny and tenny, carrara render no postwork

     

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  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561

    Wow! They look pretty amazing, Magaremoto! Quite realistic. On the other side of things, here's me messing with "un" realistic! LOL

    I have just made a purchase of some amazingly inexpensive products that should prove to be most fun in my projects!

    Power Pixie by Garee and 3D Universe with Outpost 94 in a rather hot location! I got a few more goodies to play with as well... hope to get some renders of them up here soon! ;)

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    edited April 2016

    Also in my 'almost nothing' purchasing spree I picked up the Battle Bot HD 01 and the HD 02 add-on for it. So fun! 

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  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561

    Hmmm... he's supposed to be walking. Oh well. I'll try and fix it later. It's a pretty cool model, though! :)

  • ChoholeChohole Posts: 33,604

    Animated gif's don't work on this forum software unfrortunately

  • DUDUDUDU Posts: 1,945
    Chohole said:

    Animated gif's don't work on this forum software unfrortunately

    Your animated avatar is not a .gif ?

  • ChoholeChohole Posts: 33,604

    Yes, but it was imported from the older version of the forum, which was merged with this one.  Only those who had animated avatars on the old forum still have animated ones.

     

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    edited April 2016
    Chohole said:

    Animated gif's don't work on this forum software unfrortunately

    Must be a new difficulty. Misty, fool, and I (and others) have been posting them for a while :(

      

    Post edited by Dartanbeck on
  • ChoholeChohole Posts: 33,604

    Ok,  I should have said that they don't work when attached to posts, have to be filed somewhere else and added as in line images using the tools above.

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    edited April 2016
    Chohole said:

    Ok,  I should have said that they don't work when attached to posts, have to be filed somewhere else and added as in line images using the tools above.

    Sorry Sweetie... I can be a bit... thick... especially when I'm tired. It sinks in beautifully now! Thank you! :)

    Let's try this:

    Yaaay!!! Look! It's working!!!

    EDIT: Okay, I just have to say - I've been a Predatron fan as long as I've been a Daz 3D customer. But this 14MU link is one heck of a thing! I love it - it's absolutely huge and full of detail, yet it renders in an instant, and it renders very well! Like all Predatron products it's very easy to work with in Carrara - setting the shaders to be just right... fantastic! 

    There are MANY artists here at Daz 3D that are equally impressive, but I just had to add Kudos to this incredible artist for continually impressing me and saving me gobs of time!

    Post edited by Dartanbeck on
  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675

    gave up on this render after 20 hours smiley

    gave up on this one after about 30 hours smiley

    renders went fast when i focused on just the koi pond and iris flowers




  • MistaraMistara Posts: 38,675
    Dartanbeck said:
    Chohole said:

    Animated gif's don't work on this forum software unfrortunately

    Must be a new difficulty. Misty, fool, and I (and others) have been posting them for a while :(

      

     

    i post gifs to stash to post here as gifs
    it's a shame cant stash here lol, have a dream for animated emoji for daz forum

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561

    Also out of my "$ next-to-nothing" spending spree I've picked up this marvelous Pier View item.

    Not sure if it's because of being a PC+ member or if these things are just over a dollar for everyone... but I love it!

    I have a decent collection going now thanks to these items offered for so close to costing nothing at all. Their worth is much more. These are all really nice things and there's hundreds more of them that I don't have yet! I love it... it just never ends! My Beautiful, Wonderful Wife says "Okay Dartan, you can spend $x " which is usually the same that she'll be spending on games. It's usually not very much, so these PC items are so fun.

  • magaremotomagaremoto Posts: 1,227
    edited April 2016

    thank you DB,

    made some slight tweaks, desaturation in post

    w.i.p. on eyes

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  • DondecDondec Posts: 243
    edited April 2016

    Going for something a bit more light hearted this time, I call it "Summer Fantasy". 

    I wanted to add at least one more figure, but I ran into the 2G limit, I think because of memory bloat by the sub.  Its Sketchup conversion to OBJ came with over 700 Shading Domains, all of which were useless in Carrara.  I think if I remove them all it would have saved a lot of space.  But there's no "group remove" facility for Shading Domains, none I could find anyway, and after 20 minutes of single removes I only got rid of like 50.  Too tedious.

    All figures are Genesis, including Eve, a G2F converted to Genesis using the Batch Converter and GenX2.  The converted figure worked perfectly in Carrara but the process itself was slow and time consuming.  No problems with Genesis and clothing.

    The bow wave was mostly hand drawn in PS.  I used some of Ron's brushes for the spash effects.

       - Don

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  • StezzaStezza Posts: 8,051

    Great image Dondec... break out the water skis ;-)

  • DondecDondec Posts: 243

    Thank you... there's a Captain Nemo fantasy in there somewhere  :)

       - Don

  • DondecDondec Posts: 243

    BTW: I did find a way to eliminate all those Shading Domains.  You have to edit the Carrara  .car file you created from the OBJ import in a text editor, deleting lines that look like:

            Shdo "blabla.jpg1"Shdo"etc... grp {

            }

    I guessed these might be the Shading Domain definitions, and I guess I was right.  THey were all gone on reload, and I was able to create my own new ones no problem.   This tip might come in handy when you import OBJ files.  FYI

       - Don

  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    edited April 2016
    magaremoto said:

    thank you DB,

    made some slight tweaks, desaturation in post

    w.i.p. on eyes

    Nice. I've had some amazing fun by loading the "Glass Clear" shader from the browser onto the surface, tears, etc., of the eye, each of those zones being tweaked a little differently to create different results, then make sure to have something for them to reflect back behind the camera and off to one side or the other. Then I raise that reflective whatever up to assist in happy emotions, and down for sorrowful times, and all over the place in between to help direct the mood... it's been working pretty well, I think.

    << click for larger view >>

      

    EDIT: Forgot to add that I also borrow some concepts from Indigone's endless eyes shader kit for V4. She uses some cool procedural shader setting for all zones... her V4 skin shaders and lights kit too. It's called "for V4", but since they're all procedural, they work on anything. Sweet!

    Post edited by Dartanbeck on
  • DartanbeckDartanbeck Posts: 21,561
    Dondec said:

    BTW: I did find a way to eliminate all those Shading Domains.  You have to edit the Carrara  .car file you created from the OBJ import in a text editor, deleting lines that look like:

            Shdo "blabla.jpg1"Shdo"etc... grp {

            }

    I guessed these might be the Shading Domain definitions, and I guess I was right.  THey were all gone on reload, and I was able to create my own new ones no problem.   This tip might come in handy when you import OBJ files.  FYI

       - Don

    That is an awesome frickin' image! Really... what a blast!

    Say... coming in late on the domain thing... I think all you have to do is select the polygons you want to create a domain for and create a new domain in the Global tab, give the new domain a name and save it. It'll automatically pull the selected vertices out of the other domain they might be in. If you have an empty domain in the list, you can delete it from within the Global tab in the Model room. For example, we could select a single, tiny polygon on a figures face and give it a new shading domain called "mole" or "Pimple" or Dimple, or whatever, and we'll have a new domain to assign a shader to - it won't change the UV mapping either, so we can still use the same map, but edit it for the area that we've just created as a new domain ;)   Fun stuff!

This discussion has been closed.