Songbird Remix's Product Preview Thread

[JOdel]

Ken? Quick question; do we have ravens here in Los Angeles? A friend and I were over in the Echo Park/Silverlake area last Friday for dinner and saw what appeared to be an enormous crow strutting along in the parking lot. It was discernibly larger than any crow I had seen before, and crows have been part of the urban scene here for decades.

The following day I thought I saw another one on the roof on the other side of my block. Have we just acquired a giant economy-size of crow, or are they something else?

 

[Alisa]

It's easy, JOdel - you can tell if it's a raven if it quothes "Nevermore"

Sorry, couldn't resist...
Will leave the REAL answer to Ken

 

[JOdel]

These were fairly uncommunicative. (Although can hear cawing from a distance out the window. But since I can't see who's doing it, I don't know if they are typical crows or these new bigger ones.)

 

[Stezza]

I'd be worried!

 

[Ken Gilliland]

Ken? Quick question; do we have ravens here in Los Angeles? A friend and I were over in the Echo Park/Silverlake area last Friday for dinner and saw what appeared to be an enormous crow strutting along in the parking lot. It was discernibly larger than any crow I had seen before, and crows have been part of the urban scene here for decades.

The following day I thought I saw another one on the roof on the other side of my block. Have we just acquired a giant economy-size of crow, or are they something else?

We have tons of ravens and they grow them extra big in Tujunga (about 15 mi north of Echo Park/Silverlake).

There are several ways ways to tell a raven from a crow:

• Size.. they're noticeably larger (at our place in Tujunga, they're almost twice as large)
• Calls... Raven calls are lower and more hoarse sounding
• Tails... Crows are wedge-shaped and Ravens are fan-shaped
• Crown of Head... Crows are flatter/roundish while Ravens are more pointy
• Bills and Throats... the feathers look much more "shaggy" on a Raven
• Behavior... Crows generally travel in small to huge groups (4-2000)-- Ravens move about singly to small family groups (rarely more than 4)
• Location... Ravens tend to like surburbs rather than inner-city; Crows do both

More about Ravens and Crows How to Tell a Raven From a Crow

 

[Ken Gilliland]

Now, a week after my lower surgery, I'm pretty much recovered... much to my surprise-- I guess that's one of the modern wonders of the endoscope. So what all this means is that I'm back to work much early that I expected and I'm busily working on a new Nature's Wonders insect.

 

[Sunfire]

Lady bug lady bug fly away home

 

[DanaTA]

Are these the same as the things we call Lady Bugs? The ones in my area are the color of the Seven-Spotted in your image. But the spots seem more round and regular. Unless I just haven't really looked carefully.

 

[Ken Gilliland]

Yes, Ladybirds/Lady Beetles are just the European name for Ladybugs. The 7-spotted Ladybird is found thoughout the world (although it was introduced in North America)-- the ladybug that you are probably most familiar with is the Convergent Ladybug which is endemic to North America

 

[Ken Gilliland]

All 10 species that will be in the set in an Iray render... This also shows their comparative sizes; the smallest being 2mm (0.09 inches) and the largest 9mm (0.35 inches)

 

[Ken Gilliland]

Here's one of my first iray renders...

 

[DanaTA]

Is there a way you could allow the materials to rotate or shift a bit? I haven't really compared them, but I think the spots aren't exactly the same on them all. Are they? Maybe this would be too difficult.

Dana

 

[Ken Gilliland]

There, as with all species, are slight variations from individual to individual. The problem with a 3D product (such as this) is that variation in spot arraignment/size would be dependent on the texture maps. The maps are laid out intuitively and are easy to change/edit but I'm less keen on adding 3-4 variations to ten different species in this set. Now saying that, there's is a possibility I could take the most popular two (7-spot and Convergent) and add in material variations for those

 

[JOdel]

If the texture for the spotted option could be done as a shader one could adjust the offset in the tiling. Maybe that would work with the texture as well, but you might get an issue with the edges shifting.

 

[DanaTA]

If the texture for the spotted option could be done as a shader one could adjust the offset in the tiling. Maybe that would work with the texture as well, but you might get an issue with the edges shifting.

That's the idea I had in mind. Maybe not easily done, though.

 

[Ken Gilliland]

there's no tiling-- tiling would make it impossible for the correct dot patterning/placement to take place. Each species dot placement on the shell is very specific and rarely, if at all, varies. What can vary (a little) is the color of the shell and the general size/shape of each of the dots.

 

[JOdel]

Kind of expected that. If I needed variety I'd probably just adjust the diffuse intensity in the surfaces tab. But then, I work in 3DL.

 

[Ken Gilliland]

The convergent lady beetle in my Hummingbird Sage (from the NW Hummingbird Garden set) and two Australian Ladybugs (the Steelblue and the Orange-spotted) with some Bustards in the background (from SBRM Australia v3).

 

[Ken Gilliland]

Ladybugs will be out at the end of the month...

I'm slowly plowing through my next Songbird ReMix set... I have still a long ways to go (even with 100 morphs already in place)... I'm probably shooting for October or November for its release, but here a small teaser render. I may break from it to do another "Spider" volume for Halloween.

 

[Ken Gilliland]

While you probably can't see all the subtle differences in some of the breeds... here's the 12 breeds my Chicken model will support.
For those wanting Bantams too, Bantams are simply smaller versions of the breeds, so a little overall scaling will make them possible too.