The Story Tellers Thread

[Carey]

Okay I am not quite sure where to start this out... We could very well start this out as “Once Upon a Time”...

I mean how else is a story teller supposed to start anything and that is what I am first and for most, I am just a story teller. Whether it be in cursive, in clay or on canvas I have always been a story teller.

And that is what I plan to do here, tell the story, course I hope somewhere along the line everyone that stops in will add to that story. We will attempt to make a big enough story together that those who come , add to that story and take away enough inspiration to go on and spread the word on what good story telling is through their own work...

But there is a problem...See I work rather instinctively, I tend to feel my way through things. You may come here to find out how to make a good render and that is well and good, but I want you to go away as a story teller. I don't know how I am going to do that, least not with out your help...

We are go to try and take apart my art work and with your help we are going to figure out how to make you a great story teller. We are going to tear my work apart and really try to get down to the nuts and bolts of what a good render is...

Now we are going to tear my work apart because it will help me, by being sort of forced to answer questions about my render work and more then likely forced at times to defend my work I hope to help give the all of you some answers as to how to take command of a given 3D space and make it special as only you can.

If nothing else Your going to get to see the makings of great story telling.....

Fist lets start with the work that first got me international attention and set me off in direction in 3D I had not planned on or counted on.

It is titled simply “Elephant Boy”

Now at the time I did this I knew next to nothing about the material room in poser. I just knew I wanted to somehow be a part of 3D. I didn't have a large library and the figures we had to work with didn't exactly lend them selves well to posing. They tended to do strange things if you bent them too far one way or the other. Clothes would poke out here there and every where and you just had to figure out a way to get your pose made and figure out a way to get the clothing that was poking through to poke through where it couldn't be seen.

It was poser 5 and everything I seemed to be able to produce came out cartoon like, I hated it I wanted it to a program that would help me create professional looking illustrations that didn't take me 40 hours or better to complete. Yet that what it was taking back then even on computer.. The software fought you, the models fought you, their clothes fought you and worst of all the lighting fought you....

View media item 1036

 

[Carey]

Now I didn't think Elephant Boy was all that special. In fact I almost didn't send it to Smith Micro... But Smith Micro thought it was and ask me to use this image on the cover of poser Debut. Not only that but they were willing to give me a copy of poser pro 2010 for the privilege of being able to use it.... I was Famous, first thing I did was buy a copy of the software for each of my relatives....lol

 

[Miss B]

I had a problem with that link to the image Carey, but I reported it to Alisa, and hopefully she'll know how to get it fixed.

 

[Carey]

What did I do here? I reworked the texture on the elephant and made my own texture for the Boys skin. I figured out a way to shorten the legs on the boys pants and worked and worked to get the boys pose so it have way looked like he was part of the elephant... What was my inspiration? A news story about a real life elephant boy who was stomped to death by the elephant he was in charge of. The story said something about how he was guilty of teasing the elephants and that they had left the boys body lay right where it fell for days out of shame for what the boy had done.....

 

[Carey]

I had a problem with that link to the image Carey, but I reported it to Alisa, and hopefully she'll know how to gt it fixed.

Hmm it appears to look just fine on my screen, I more then likely screwed up the coding as I didn't quite know how to bring an image in at first and tried a couple of different ways...

 

[Miss B]

I'm sure it's easily fixable, but I don't know enough about getting images in a member's album to show up here on the forum to help.

 

[Rae134]

I think it might be your folder setting. You have I think 3 options, owner only allowed to view, members only and everyone. Since I'm logged in, I can only assume you have the folder set to owner only.

 

[Miss B]

Oh, that sounds familiar Rae, I think you nailed it. He has to set the folder to "everyone" for all to see it.

 

[Carey]

Okay that took a while to figure out how to fix that but I think I have it now, course some one will have to tell me as being I am the creator of the album it will always be seen by me, Thanks so much for the advice, I didn't pay any attention to all that...

 

[Rae134]

Yep You need to be logged into HW to view as a Member. Everyone allows, well everyone on the internet (not logged in) to view it. Owner Only lets only the person who created the folder to view. So it depends if he wants only HW members to view it or everyone


Edited to add since I posted the same time as you - I can see the link now
Love it, I especially love all the plants (I like the little details that make up an image)

 

[McGyver]

Generally when I make comments, it's a combination of satire and subterfuge... It think subterfuge... I should probably look that word up or something, but anyhow... Generally I'm trying to be funny while at the same time getting a point across or asking a legitimate question... I think there is a word for that, but for now, I'll just call it being stupid.
But perhaps it's the lack of sleep, the fairly stressful and rotten past two weeks or the fact that we are all out of coffee and apparently I'm the only one properly authorized to to purchase coffee in this house and lack of caffeine in my bloodstream has rendered my thoughts muddier than normal... So please forgive me for asking this...

Is this a thread for storytelling, or you are the storyteller and this is your thread and we are supposed to critique your work?

Sorry if I missed the point... I'm guessing it's the latter one, though not necessarily with critiquing...

The title made me stop by here... Then I read the original post and discovered someone finished all the coffee and all hope of me understanding anything at all for the rest of today went out the window.
It's probably all wet too, because it just started raining a minute or two ago. When things metaphorically go out the window, do you envision them just going out the window and landing on the ground in a pile, or more like taking off like zombie virus infected monkeys from a secret government lab?
I probably shouldn't be asking a lot of questions, but I frequently throw stuff like printers, cell phones and bread makers that refuse to make bread, out windows, so I tend to visualize stuff that metaphorically goes out the window as plunging to its doom and crushing to death drunk squirrels who happen to be sleeping off a hard night of partying, under your window.
That was unnecessarily long... Sorry.

Your picture is nice... Especially if it was rendered in Poser 5. I like the idea of "Elephant Boy"... I would have titled it differently, perhaps "A boy and his elephant"... But to be honest then I'd make up a story to go with it that involved how the boy and the elephant fell in love and their parents didn't approve, so they ran away together and lived in the jungle where they started a successful lumbering company and eventually got into making new age "primitive" style furniture, which in turn brought them huge success, but caused a strain on their marriage. The elephant eventually left the boy, who was now a young man, because she felt he was no longer attracted to her because of a scar on her ear which she received in an altercation with a tiger over a parking space. The elephant ran away to Paris to pursue a career as a misunderstood elephant painter. Eventually the young man (I feel like I'd have named him "Keanu") realized that all the monkeys in the world could not buy him true happiness... I just realized my iPad turned money into "monkeys"... But I like that better, because if you think about it... No matter how many monkeys you have, they will never bring you true happiness... Sure, they'll throw poop and entertain you with their capering, but true happiness involves more than monkey poop fights...
Where was I?
So anyway Lazlow... Sorry, Keanu, decided he really loved Bhavini (the elephant... Bhavini, allegedly means "emotional" in Hindi) and no matter where she was, he'd find her... She never told him where she went, so Lazlow, I mean Keanu, had to search across the world to find her, which ironically would have been much easier if he had read the news paper like Bhavini was always telling him to do when they were first married, because she had become one of the world's most famous elephant artists and was even elected as mayor of Paris for her role in thwarting a terrorist plot to steal the Eiffel Tower.
Eventually Lazlow... Forget it, he's Lazlow now... Eventually Keanu, I mean Lazlow made it to Paris after spending all his money searching the world for Brenda... I mean Bhavini... As he lay under a bridge, freezing, he wrapped himself in newspaper and found a picture of Berlinda, I mean Bhavini in the headlines... He had no idea what it was about, because he had neglected to learn French before traveling there, but he saw her in the picture and how happy she looked (really she hardly ever smiled anymore, but at the moment of the photo, she had just farted and it was more of a smile of relief and embarrassment), so Harvey... Uh... Lazlow, decided to go back home. The next day after packing up his newspapers and rags he set off on his journey home back to the jungle. As Lazlow, I mean... No, it was Lazlow, I finally got it right... Well, actually not counting Bert... No, Kent... No, Keanu.... But anyway, as Larry crossed the street, Barbara's motorcade ran him over. Britany leapt out of her limousine and picked up the battered Lenny... She began to weep uncontrollably and overcome with grief, she threw herself off the bridge (this is happening on the same bridge Lawrence slept under).
Louis, who was not actually dead, just really dirty and unwashed and a little bit stunned from being run over by a limousine with an elephant in it, came to just in time to see Becky plunge over the side. Lamar jumped to his feet and dove after her, just in time to catch her before they hit the water together and drowned because neither of them had ever bothered to learn to swim.
Their tragic romance became world news and diverted attention from the investigation as to how an elephant could have gotten elected mayor.
Eventually the citizens of Paris had a bronze plaque placed in that very spot and to this day, lovers from all around the world come there to tragically drown themselves, just like Lashon and Bailey.

But.... Um... Yeah... I suppose your title was better, mine was just too tragic and stupid.

I guess I have taken up too much of your time... I'll go back into exile now...

Cheers.

 

[Alisa]

Very cool image, Carey! Looks like you guys got the link issue figured out

Thanks for starting this thread so people can learn about how you do things in Poser and hear some of your tales, too

 

[Miss B]

Oh I like that render Carey. Glad to see you got it fixed so we can all see it here in the thread.

 

[Carey]

View media item 1046
Okay lets take a look at this work and take it apart, Now this was done in terradome available or should I say it was available at Runtime DNA. Now out of necessity this was done as a composite. I did this because Terradome wouldn't let me get the close up I wanted of the fire men I also went out and took a picture of an actual road to add to the road seen here as an over lay in post work. Now I do a lot of post work, especially when I do a composite, I match the light and many times I will "blend" the layer to make it look more like it belongs. I also make full use of photoshops burn and dodge tools to rework high lights and shadows I generally set these tools down around the opacity of no more then 10. I do this to prevent things from going too bright or dark too quickly I also feather the edges of the brush. If you really look you can see the burn brush was used on their shoulders...

I do this for a number of reasons, but the main one is to get things to come forward or get them to recede into the back ground a little bit. I will also use these brushes to sculpt my finished work. Now I don't suggest doing that right on your original, do it by copy and pasting a new layer. I work in layers a great deal and we are about to go into a little bit on how I work with layers...No matter how I try Poser and Daz studio for that matter tend to burn through subtle texturing on the faces of your model. Many times the facial expressions will all but disappear. Now I have years of life drawing and life painting. I know where the shadows and where the color should be on a face and that is where the blood is closet to the surface of the skin

Skin has blood vessels closet be the end of the nose, the edges of the ears and the cheeks. I actually take the lasso tool and capture those, I copy and paste them right in place and add not only red but blue also. Then a use a feathered eraser to blend them in. If they appear too dark go to your layer blender and blend it in a bit by increasing its transparency.

Now I have never seen a rendered model that didn't over burn in the eyes. so I generally take my dodge tool and darken around the eyes... Many times I will take my lasso tool and actually make the eyes bigger. I do this because that is what the human eye does. The human eye automatically zooms in on the eyes and being a great deal of the body english the human eye gets in that first look comes from the eyes, so why wouldn't you do every thing you can do to draw the viewer into your work...

Now I am going to stop here for now for questions and comments and then I'll address them and then going on and tear this work apart a bit more....

 

[Carey]

Oh I like that render Carey. Glad to see you got it fixed so we can all see it here in the thread.

I am knew here and it has been a while since I did any web paging so I am more then a little rusty,,, thanks for you help in pointing out the problem to me.. The Elephant Boy is one of the oldest renders I will allow any one to see..You don't think I started out creating master pieces do you....lol I created more then my share of flops, well at the time I did them I thought they were great, but after I got better I burned them and then buried them....lol

 

[Carey]

Very cool image, Carey! Looks like you guys got the link issue figured out

Thanks for starting this thread so people can learn about how you do things in Poser and hear some of your tales, too

I have done more then my share of web page creation in the past, but boy am I rus
ty...lol

 

[Carey]

Generally when I make comments, it's a combination of satire and subterfuge... It think subterfuge... I should probably look that word up or something, but anyhow... Generally I'm trying to be funny while at the same time getting a point across or asking a legitimate question... I think there is a word for that, but for now, I'll just call it being stupid.
But perhaps it's the lack of sleep, the fairly stressful and rotten past two weeks or the fact that we are all out of coffee and apparently I'm the only one properly authorized to to purchase coffee in this house and lack of caffeine in my bloodstream has rendered my thoughts muddier than normal... So please forgive me for asking this...

Is this a thread for storytelling, or you are the storyteller and this is your thread and we are supposed to critique your work?

Sorry if I missed the point... I'm guessing it's the latter one, though not necessarily with critiquing...

The title made me stop by here... Then I read the original post and discovered someone finished all the coffee and all hope of me understanding anything at all for the rest of today went out the window.
It's probably all wet too, because it just started raining a minute or two ago. When things metaphorically go out the window, do you envision them just going out the window and landing on the ground in a pile, or more like taking off like zombie virus infected monkeys from a secret government lab?
I probably shouldn't be asking a lot of questions, but I frequently throw stuff like printers, cell phones and bread makers that refuse to make bread, out windows, so I tend to visualize stuff that metaphorically goes out the window as plunging to its doom and crushing to death drunk squirrels who happen to be sleeping off a hard night of partying, under your window.
That was unnecessarily long... Sorry.

Your picture is nice... Especially if it was rendered in Poser 5. I like the idea of "Elephant Boy"... I would have titled it differently, perhaps "A boy and his elephant"... But to be honest then I'd make up a story to go with it that involved how the boy and the elephant fell in love and their parents didn't approve, so they ran away together and lived in the jungle where they started a successful lumbering company and eventually got into making new age "primitive" style furniture, which in turn brought them huge success, but caused a strain on their marriage. The elephant eventually left the boy, who was now a young man, because she felt he was no longer attracted to her because of a scar on her ear which she received in an altercation with a tiger over a parking space. The elephant ran away to Paris to pursue a career as a misunderstood elephant painter. Eventually the young man (I feel like I'd have named him "Keanu") realized that all the monkeys in the world could not buy him true happiness... I just realized my iPad turned money into "monkeys"... But I like that better, because if you think about it... No matter how many monkeys you have, they will never bring you true happiness... Sure, they'll throw poop and entertain you with their capering, but true happiness involves more than monkey poop fights...
Where was I?
So anyway Lazlow... Sorry, Keanu, decided he really loved Bhavini (the elephant... Bhavini, allegedly means "emotional" in Hindi) and no matter where she was, he'd find her... She never told him where she went, so Lazlow, I mean Keanu, had to search across the world to find her, which ironically would have been much easier if he had read the news paper like Bhavini was always telling him to do when they were first married, because she had become one of the world's most famous elephant artists and was even elected as mayor of Paris for her role in thwarting a terrorist plot to steal the Eiffel Tower.
Eventually Lazlow... Forget it, he's Lazlow now... Eventually Keanu, I mean Lazlow made it to Paris after spending all his money searching the world for Brenda... I mean Bhavini... As he lay under a bridge, freezing, he wrapped himself in newspaper and found a picture of Berlinda, I mean Bhavini in the headlines... He had no idea what it was about, because he had neglected to learn French before traveling there, but he saw her in the picture and how happy she looked (really she hardly ever smiled anymore, but at the moment of the photo, she had just farted and it was more of a smile of relief and embarrassment), so Harvey... Uh... Lazlow, decided to go back home. The next day after packing up his newspapers and rags he set off on his journey home back to the jungle. As Lazlow, I mean... No, it was Lazlow, I finally got it right... Well, actually not counting Bert... No, Kent... No, Keanu.... But anyway, as Larry crossed the street, Barbara's motorcade ran him over. Britany leapt out of her limousine and picked up the battered Lenny... She began to weep uncontrollably and overcome with grief, she threw herself off the bridge (this is happening on the same bridge Lawrence slept under).
Louis, who was not actually dead, just really dirty and unwashed and a little bit stunned from being run over by a limousine with an elephant in it, came to just in time to see Becky plunge over the side. Lamar jumped to his feet and dove after her, just in time to catch her before they hit the water together and drowned because neither of them had ever bothered to learn to swim.
Their tragic romance became world news and diverted attention from the investigation as to how an elephant could have gotten elected mayor.
Eventually the citizens of Paris had a bronze plaque placed in that very spot and to this day, lovers from all around the world come there to tragically drown themselves, just like Lashon and Bailey.

But.... Um... Yeah... I suppose your title was better, mine was just too tragic and stupid.

I guess I have taken up too much of your time... I'll go back into exile now...

Cheers.

All excellent concerns and questions and yes I hope that eventually we will cover everything you are talking about. I am a story teller, we are starting out by tearing apart my work because and to be perfectly honest, I don't take it personally. Hopefully later on we will get into people to post their own work here, but that is up to the group as a whole. Right now I am covering the ART aspects of story telling. It would be great to do some story swapping here but for now I plan to stick to the nuts and bolts of creating a great render.

We might have to create still another place for writing and perhaps some one else will take care of that. I am a writer, but I mainly write humor I am good at it, but I am not great at such things like dialog in some areas, that is unless your looking for a punch line that is...lol

SO save your stories for right now and let's talk about rendering.... Okay???

I want to help people understand and get confidence on how to go about doing 3D work To me a good render tells a story. I don't do a create many "cheese cake" shots, I create scenes. Now there is nothing wrong with those cheese cake shots, I just don't do them. If enough people are interested in what I have to offer then my little corner here will grow, if not it will die....We shall see...

 

[Carey]

Oh I also should likely mention I suffer from nerve damage, My hands tend to be painful, even though much of the time they feel sort of numb... As a result I don't feel the keyboard keys real well and as a result I tend to make typing mistakes....

 

[Miss B]

Nice render of the Rookie Carey, and don't worry about the typos, we all make them.

 

[Rae134]