How to: Slow fading away of the background around the character

archgeo

Hello,

As an example (sorry, I don't have something visual yet) and idea. I want a character sitting/leaning on the wooden floor leaning with the back towards an wooden pillar. I want the spot around the sitting figure and the pillar with textures and displacement maps, but at 0.5-1m from it is should start fading into a white background. It should be a soft transition from photorealistic to white background and follow the 3d shape of the objects (not just a post-work vignette around the figure). I want the focus on the figure, but also not want to place it on a white plane. The shadows of the figure and the pillar should extend into the white background but eventuelly also fade.

So much to the idea I had in mind. I would be really interested in your suggestions and ideas how to do it? Or does it even work and would make sense?

Would you work with multiple masks (maybe for figure, beam and shadows) and do it in post-edit? Or does it make sense to do it partly already in Daz3d itself and how?

Thanks in advance for the ideas and suggestions!

Best regards
Chris

Luciel

So you mean the backdrop becomes white, or something like fog?

 

For fog theres the distance fog settings in Iray or a few "fog spheres" around (like this free one here)

archgeo

Yes, a white backdrop and only the pillar and ground around the character should be with detailed texture and displacement. As I was thinking to extend the fading background with some water colour pencil strokes in post-work. I guess here it gets complicated. ;-)

I found an example similar to what I had in mind ..

https://www.3dart.it/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Watercolor-render-in-Maya-with-MNPR-3dartist-1024x529.jpg

1024 × 529

RawArt

I have an enviro-cam in the store that will add a "depth haze" to fade things out...use that alogn with your depth of field and you will get some nice depth effects

https://www.daz3d.com/iray-envirocam

LeatherGryphon

I haven't done that (yet), and only making an initial suggestion here, but I'd attempt something like that with postprocessing.  Gradient filters in Photoshop.  Might take some cleverness and more than one layer to get the shape of the "hole" right but it seems like exactly the thing gradients were made for.

PixelSploiting

 Multiple gradient layers in Photoshop. But you will have to render multiple passes for masks for making it easier in PS - separate outlines for the character, then the close background, then the far away background. Also, not just using the white gradients but also desaturating the layers the farther something is from the camera.

Sevrin

LeatherGryphon said:

I haven't done that (yet), and only making an initial suggestion here, but I'd attempt something like that with postprocessing.  Gradient filters in Photoshop.  Might take some cleverness and more than one layer to get the shape of the "hole" right but it seems like exactly the thing gradients were made for.

Same here.  You have much more control over the process in an image editing program.  If you don't have Photoshop, there are cheaper and free alternatives that can do it, too. 

archgeo

In my case I would like to use GIMP, but that should work just as fine as Photoshop.

I was thinking about that idea a bit. Another question would be the Anti-Aliasing? Given I have my masks (still have to develop a strategy for that) how do I control and apply the anti-aliasing where it now has a white background? Maybe that is still a bit advanced in the process.

It will get an interesting rainy weekend! :-)

LeatherGryphon

Along with using gradient filters, probably judicious use of the oft forgot "merging" modes could be useful.

archgeo

Now I followed the advices and used the canvases as I never did before ;-)

And I am pretty happy with the result .. in case you have any feedback, that would be a great moment. GIMP is still glowing ;-)

 

Faeryl Womyn

Love the picture and glad it worked out for you, love the art on your DA account as well.

archgeo

Thanks a lot! Just getting  a taste for more :-)

 

KA1

Oh wow, that came out VERY well,colour me impressed. Beautiful image.

McGyver

The desired effect seems to have been achieved, but I'm surprised nobody mentioned Filter Forge...

Here are a couple of filters that might work well one way or another to achieve a similar effect... I'd still use them with other post work, but I figured I'd mention it for anyone interested...

Picture Fade Border Effect: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/11330.html

Watercolor Frame: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/5335.html 

Faded Photo Edge Border: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/11332.html

Faded Block Edge Border: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/11331.html

Photographic Edges: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/15677.html

Vignette Zone: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/6797.html

Rough Study Not Angry: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/14290.html

Paint HDRist: https://www.filterforge.com/filters/10787.html

There are probably others too, sometimes searching is limited by what tags the creators use... For those who own Filter Forge, remember that sometimes the page previews don't do a filter justice, and that often you can mess around with (or edit) a filter to get different or better results.

archgeo

Thanks again .. will have a look at Filterforge. I was brushes in Gimp and layer masking for the effects.