The Cathedral (anno Domini 1526) (update: new walkthrough) [Archive]

sebastian_k

25-Aug-06, 16:21

Hi! Hereby I declare the Cathedral .... FINISHED!
After almost 1 Year of Work (which is in fact the time i seriously use blender.... learning by doing) i lay down my digital hammer and nails and leave it as it is. Of course there are still some minor bugs and things to work on, but in 2 weeks is the project's deadline and i still have to write lots of texts for it and do some programming with directorMX. I think it's good enough. I've made it for an exhibition about cardinal Albrecht von Brandenburg in a museum in Halle / Germany.
Anyway, here it is...

http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/3209/hochaltarcu6.th.jpg (http://img232.imageshack.us/my.php?image=hochaltarcu6.jpg)

http://img390.imageshack.us/img390/2776/engelvv9.th.jpg (http://img390.imageshack.us/my.php?image=engelvv9.jpg)

http://img182.imageshack.us/img182/6683/orgelbn5.th.jpg (http://img182.imageshack.us/my.php?image=orgelbn5.jpg)

http://img390.imageshack.us/img390/5514/perlenaltarxs9.th.jpg (http://img390.imageshack.us/my.php?image=perlenaltarxs9.jpg)

Flurp

25-Aug-06, 16:37

AWESOME! very very nice!

motorsep

25-Aug-06, 16:38

Amazing! Hats off!
Was it personal project or commercial one? Cos nobody have 1 year deadline for commercial project :D
What render did you use?
And what rendering time looked like?

dgebel

25-Aug-06, 16:53

Wow. That's incredible work.

sebastian_k

25-Aug-06, 16:54

Hi and Thanks!
It was rendered with blenders internal (AO/Sub+SkyColor), render times for 1024*1280 were about 15-20 minutes.
I started the whole project as my universtiy diploma. i worked together with the art-historians of a museum, together with them i reconstructed the cathedral as it probably looked like in 1526. They liked the results of my work in december, so they engaged me to do it professionally for an exhibition about Cardinal Albrecht, which starts on september 8th (which is the deadline) and finds place in the cathedral. there'll be a computer-terminal in the cathedral with my work, on which visitors can get informations about Lucas Cranach, Dürer and Grünewald - and of course dive back into history by watching my animation of the cathedral. and the best is - i got PAYED for that!

motorsep

25-Aug-06, 16:59

Wow! That's an amazing story too! Congratulations!

sebastian_k

25-Aug-06, 17:00

hehe, thanks!

Imperitor

25-Aug-06, 17:19

Thats awesome work. 5 stars from me.
The models and textures are excellent.

It would be cool if you rendered a video of it. Kind of like a virtual tour.

Edeehem

25-Aug-06, 17:43

This is absolutely Incredible with a big I job. The modelling part of all the catedral is just beautiful. I can't point one detail that has been rushed and ignored. Great stuff. 5stars for me

Now I would have loved only one thing to see in the pictures as they are a bit dark would have been the color of the windows shinning throught the air (slight volumetric effect) and adding sparkling colors to the catedral.
The first shot does it more or less well for the light, but I dont see color splotches from them. Other then that, thumbs up and its really up to your preferences .

*****

Ian30

25-Aug-06, 18:33

Absolutely breathtaking.......

BgDM

25-Aug-06, 20:16

Fantastic detail work and perfect lighting in this one. Well done.

BgDM

sebastian_k

25-Aug-06, 20:42

wow, thank you all!
@ Edeehem: i would like to see that too (coloured ight and stuff). but... i don't know how and i'm tired of tryin out variuos light settings. if it's right to the left, it messes up to the right and so on. and i got to keep an eye on the render times (probably higher with REAL and coloured volumetric lightning), because:
@imperitor: there will be. just gimme some render time... probably in septemer. AND-->
@imperitor: and once again thanks a lot for pointing me in the right direction with UV and bumpmaps. now i can't stop bumping. my UV-Map-Folder is getting bigger and bigger...
@all: thanks for being such a great community. it's just great around the blender playgrounds!
(i think i'm getting a bit pathetic now...)
@all + TON: THANX for BLENDER!!! snieff!

Alden

25-Aug-06, 21:52

I noticed in the first image that a candle flame seems to have a shadow on it? (The one closest to the camera) Maybe it's just my monitor, but if you're not going to use particles, you should turn off shadows on the material.

sebastian_k

26-Aug-06, 04:01

no, it's not your monitor. i noticed that too. but i do have turned off shadows on it. i think it's alpha-values are somehow interfering with the halo, which i use to achive the glow-effect.

qwequ777

26-Aug-06, 04:12

Well... I can't think of anything to say - I'm struck dumb *g*
maybe one german word: erstklassig!
* * * * * !

gunnarstahl

26-Aug-06, 06:15

This is awesome. If it only wasn't a church... Allthough I am a christian I do not like churches. Especially during this time they were homings for real monsters.

But besides this, if I can forget for these facts for a second, then I am overwhelmed by your work, the colours, the atmosphere and the detailness! Amazing.

One slight crit: It is especially visible in the first picture, at the top of the dome, these spider-like structures which are for supporting the roof. They look like having sharp bends. It seems like there are faces set to solid which should have been set to smooth.

But this doesn't really matter. As I said, it is overwhelming for the sheer details, size and amount of work you must have put into it.

Yt,

Gunnar

Zazu

26-Aug-06, 08:03

Excellent work!
5 stars from me!

Rinne

26-Aug-06, 08:55

This is indeed awesome, and, needless to say..
One of the most impressing things I have seen yet to be made in Blender..
15-20minutes render time..
this is either a very fast PC you are rendering on, or a heavily optimised scene... I guess, though.. both:p

The thing I'm most impressed on is the endurance you brought with this project..

One year is indeed a very long time..

Good luck with your diploma :)

Milky

26-Aug-06, 09:17

The modeling, texture and lighting are just top-notch. Great job!

Inmare

26-Aug-06, 10:29

Fantastic!

Another reason to go back to Halle to celebrate the 1200 year anniversary.
And great that you got payed for this. Hat Andreas seinen Etat doch gut angelegt :D.

sebastian_k

26-Aug-06, 10:55

Hat Andreas seinen Etat doch gut angelegt .
Haha, ja, hat er wohl. ;)

@inmare: thanks! so may i welcome you at the opening on 08.09.?
great to know some blenderheads are near...

enricoceric

26-Aug-06, 12:21

Very nice ! Great modeling and nice details. I would have prefered with some more volumetric light in the 3 last images.

Congrats

Inmare

26-Aug-06, 13:04

@inmare: thanks! so may i welcome you at the opening on 08.09.?
great to know some blenderheads are near...
...were near. I am now some hundred kilometers off (near the ocean again, finally), so I don't think I'll manage it. But greet nice Halle from me (and Andreas, if you ran over him -- which I don't doubt, as historican and organisator of the anniversary he surely won't miss this event). Halle has an interesting cathedral too :) (SCNR, Hallenser have always to compare with Magdeburg for some reasons).

I wish you a great success with and within the exhibition!

CasperN

26-Aug-06, 13:38

Fantastic work!, 5 stars from me
Gallery pic?

Lancer

26-Aug-06, 16:27

I also noticed right off that the domes have cornered bends. I'm thinking you may need to subsmooth those out. The textures in the roof (as everywhere) are fantastic, although it's distracting to notice that the patterns repeat heavily, especially in the dome... redo just the textures for some variation and it should multiply the realism of the overall scenes.

This is awesome work.

Historical question: were the floors as dirty back then or did they keep everything polished? I'm assuming your historians have guided you with that one.

sebastian_k

26-Aug-06, 17:03

I also noticed right off that the domes have cornered bends. I'm thinking you may need to subsmooth those out.
yeah, you are right. perhaps i should do this. and perhaps i could give the roof textures a little variation... but i'm running out of time, so i don't know if i can manage this.

Historical question: were the floors as dirty back then or did they keep everything polished? I'm assuming your historians have guided you with that one. i made the floor as it is today. we do not really know what it looked like in 1526, so the art-historian said i should not try something else. of course the walls, and the statues too were rich painted, but nobody knows how, so we thought this would be the best way. a mixture of "could be", "is now" and "looks good". the wall pattern makes the pictures and animations more interesting, but if it is the historical truth? who knows...

but thanks @ all, i'm starting to feel really proud:D:D

charliemcf

26-Aug-06, 18:00

very nice...in fact beautiful!

lovin every bit...so real and detailed

ex-nihilo

26-Aug-06, 18:37

Wow, that is beautiful! Excellent work!
xn

sebastian_k

26-Aug-06, 19:38

Wow, that is beautiful! Excellent work!
xn thanks! You too!! Cheers!

panzi

26-Aug-06, 20:20

Awesome! Did you render it with blender or yafray? (I guess blender)
I guess it is not possible to sse the .blend file? :)

frodo2975

26-Aug-06, 21:29

Incredible work! I love the amount of detail. 5 stars.
panzi: read the first page

sundialsvc4

26-Aug-06, 21:33

Wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Fantastic piece of work. Sure you could nit-pick at details here and there, but that's not the point. It does what it set out to do, and it does it very effectively ... and with reasonable render-times! :cool:

You have certainly made good choices with respect to camera angles and composition. What is more, generally speaking the lighting is very appropriate. The focal-lengths of lenses that you've chosen to use seem to me to be somewhat uniform, which slightly plays the deuce in terms of feeling depth in some of the shots, but lens-choices are the purview of the photographer. What you chose to do, you did extremely well and you are entirely justified to feel very proud of it.

I would advocate caution about things like "dirty floors." If the Cardinals were inviting a photographer in, I daresay they would have mopped the floors first. When you look at a photograph, you expect the same. So, unless you (and your client!) felt a very strong need to depict dirtiness, you probably don't want to. It's fine, I think, to depict the cathedral tastefully. A photographer would seek to depict this subject in a respectful manner, as you have done.

sebastian_k

27-Aug-06, 03:16

I would advocate caution about things like "dirty floors." If the Cardinals were inviting a photographer in, I daresay they would have mopped the floors first. When you look at a photograph, you expect the same. So, unless you (and your client!) felt a very strong need to depict dirtiness, you probably don't want to. It's fine, I think, to depict the cathedral tastefully. A photographer would seek to depict this subject in a respectful manner, as you have done.

yes, it's a tricky thing with the floors.... of course you are somewhat right. yes, but: the church was originally built by the Dominicans in the 13th century. In 1519 the cardinal was in the urgent need of a cathedral, so what he did was to wipe out the dominicans, put them in any other church and take over theirs. then he let paint all the retables, pictures and stuff, put the statues in, but left the architectural interior as it was - with the jube, the gallery and other things. so the original floor was worn out by his antecessors. now we don't know exactly how the floor looked like, so we decided to take that one, that is worn out by our antecessors. and it makes it easier for the people to transfer the church of today to the past. (the terminal on which my work is shown will actually stand inside this very cathedral for the exhibition)

but hey, thank you very much for this detailed and very nice crit!

ThisOne

27-Aug-06, 08:37

A masterpiece!

Inmare

27-Aug-06, 11:51

but: the church was originally built by the Dominicans in the 13th century. In 1519 the cardinal was in the urgent need of a cathedral, so what he did was to wipe out the dominicans, put them in any other church and take over theirs.

(the terminal on which my work is shown will actually stand inside this very cathedral for the exhibition)

Peinlich. I thought it was about the Cathedral in Magdeburg, because of Albrecht von Brandenburg who was archbishop of Magdeburg. And the Hallesche cathedral was no "real" cathedral (Dom) because it was not the seat of the bishop (but Halle was the residence of archbishop Albrecht).
But your description sounds to much like the Hallesche cathedral, right?

The main exhibition is in the Moritzburg, right? Will your work be seen there too?

sebastian_k

27-Aug-06, 12:28

Peinlich. I thought it was about the Cathedral in Magdeburg, because of Albrecht von Brandenburg who was archbishop of Magdeburg. And the Hallesche cathedral was no "real" cathedral (Dom) because it was not the seat of the bishop (but Halle was the residence of archbishop Albrecht). But your description sounds to much like the Hallesche cathedral, right?
yes, right. but to name it "New Pencil" (Neues Stift)... i don't know:D

The main exhibition is in the Moritzburg, right? Will your work be seen there too?
right. i hope so. perhaps they show an animated walkthrough in the room were Cranach's paintings are. well, they should. i think the visitors would
benefit from that. but the "moritzburg foundation" and money (for beamer or TV) is a different story...

and does magdeburg have 1200th anniversary as well?
perhaps we were talking about different Andreases. infact i confused andreas with thomas(schauerte), which i hope he'll never read...

Regards!

P.S.: Wow, in the forum gallery now! i'm so proud!:)

neos

27-Aug-06, 13:25

I dont get this. It's obviosly spectacular work, but the lightning isnt so great, there are too many completly dark places that should be filled by bounced (in-direct) light.

I bet it was a lot of work to finish this, so I think your work deserve to be here anyways ;)

cheers

sebastian_k

27-Aug-06, 13:36

you could be right. i made the lightning on my laptop, which blurs out some colours and takes away quite contrast. then i checked it on my TFT, and the contrast was great, but not too dark. today, i've seen it on another monitor, this time a crt, and surprise surprise: it was absolutely too dark, i could hardly see anything. bad luck.
on the other hand this will be shown on a 19'' TFT (1024x768), and if it behaves like mine, it will be perfectly okay.
so, suspense suspense...

and i'm so sick of tweaking light...

Charlesworth999

27-Aug-06, 15:10

i got PAYED for that!

Hate to be nosey, but how much did it pay? I'd like to know what a year's worth of hard 3D work is worth :p

sebastian_k

27-Aug-06, 15:44

5000€. i don't really think they payed me that well...

Charlesworth999

27-Aug-06, 15:53

5000€ ?
That's the netto, average income of 5 months...
Or the advance a beginning author might expect for a promising book.
You're right to say they didn't pay you very well. After all, that Cathedral IS awesome :eek:
Did you do it in your spare time, part-time or full-time?

sebastian_k

27-Aug-06, 16:15

both. i had to write my diploma at the same time, and do the programming for the menues with directorMX, write the texts, learn about the history... it WAS fulltime, but not only blender. and buy the software(of course not blender...) and hardware with the money. but i'm really happy with it. can one have a better start in "real life" after university?
forgot to mention, the cathedral will be shown in TV as well.

svenniemannie

27-Aug-06, 16:18

Great! That's all I have to say.

Inmare

27-Aug-06, 17:16

yes, right. but to name it "New Pencil" (Neues Stift)... i don't know:D

"Neuer Azubi" :-P
Sorry, I wasn't complaining about the term cathedral, as it is used for some years now (around 500), it may be legally incorrect, but is ok (same for Naumburg or Meldorf...). I sadly mixed up the cities...

and does magdeburg have 1200th anniversary as well?

They celebrated exactly that last year :-). As I said, Albrecht lead me to the wrong city because of his formal title.

5000€ for a diploma thesis is good money, regarding you get your degree with it. Typically diploma (i.e. in germany the final thesis after four years of studying, lasting 3 to 6 months typically) are unpaid or much lower paid.

P.S.: Wow, in the forum gallery now! i'm so proud!:)
Congratulations! You deserve it. I really would like to see it live. For how long will it be on display?

forgot to mention, the cathedral will be shown in TV as well.
Do you know the time, date and channel? AFAIK we have DDR3...er, MDR in our cable network here in the north. I don't own a TV myself, but will find a place to watch it then.

sebastian_k

28-Aug-06, 02:36

Do you know the time, date and channel? AFAIK we have DDR3...er, MDR in our cable network here in the north. I don't own a TV myself, but will find a place to watch it then.

i think it will be in septmeber on "lexi TV" (MDR), the famous competitor of the Discovery Channel. i'll post date and time.

5000€ for a diploma thesis is good money, regarding you get your degree with it. Typically diploma (i.e. in germany the final thesis after four years of studying, lasting 3 to 6 months typically) are unpaid or much lower paid.

yes, i know, and i'm far from complaining. although doing it only for the degree would have been half of work.;)
i just ment, if they'd have hired me in a normal way without beeing me graduand it would have been a bit more expensive ... at least i think so.

does anybody know what the "normal" price for a project like this is? i hope someday i can do stuff like this for a living (but perhaps i'm a bit of a dreamer...).
so what are the normal charges?

weedmonkey13

29-Aug-06, 21:23

(*sniff sniff) its buetiful

any chance we could see the .blend or wireframe:D :D

sebastian_k

30-Aug-06, 04:24

i think in the next blenderart there will be some wireframes and perhaps a few more pics. just wait a week or so...

paicolman

30-Aug-06, 09:52

Eine glatte 1, oder: five stars!

Inmare

09-Sep-06, 16:49

Hej,
how was the opening of the exhibition? I didn't made it there, to much work to do; but your part will be seen there for a longer time, I assume?
Anything new about the TV broadcast?

sebastian_k

10-Sep-06, 04:27

the opening of the exhibition (08.09.206) was great. I managed to finish everything 5 hours before opening, and to my surprise everything works fine (unless the directorMX-projector starts showing bugs, or the users find mistakes. there was no time for testing). Cardinal Lehmann watched the animated walkthrough for several minutes, that was shown on a tv-set in the moritzburg. man, that was a feeling...
Nevertheless it was a bit disappointing that my work, which is one of the three main exhibits in the cathedral, wasn't mentioned at all. It seems that the director did not consider it as sth. to take seriously. i was a bit sulky that evening...

the animated walkthrough will be shown on MDR, 22.09.2006, Lexi-TV, 14.30

Inmare

13-Sep-06, 12:55

Hej,
yes, people always take software and arts projects for granted. You know you are mentioned on www.halle.de with the installation?
Great you made in in time :-). JIT, like it has to be...
The TV show is all about Halle; I am glad you pointed me to that one. I will try to get it recorded on HDD.
I really should go there again soon. Maybe I will find some time in October...

McMarbi

16-Sep-06, 13:56

Charlesworth999

16-Sep-06, 15:20

Oh Mann, sind die Bilder gut. Ich wurstele auch schon ne Weile mit Blender rum, doch davon bin ich Meilen entfernt. Mein Englisch ist zu schlecht (und die Bücher zu dick...) und ich habe viel zu wenig Zeit. Aber für nen Trip mit der S-Bahn nach Halle wird es hoffentlich reichen. Wie lange läuft die Sache noch?

Viele Grüße und eine tiefe Verbeugung!:D

McMarbi /Martin (Leipzig)

This is an English forum, so please provide a translation of your German text. If it's a private message, send a private message. If it's on a public thread, write it in English.

Caius

18-Sep-06, 13:22

Incredible! I saw some of your early posts on this - inspired me to play around with stainded glass a bit on my own. Fantastic job!

Xand

19-Sep-06, 14:02

If you want a look of a colorad cathedral, search for cathedral of Amiens.
the West facade is coloured by video projection.
this Url is in french but the image are stunning.
http://www.ecoles.cfwb.be/argattidegamond/cARTable/Amiens.htm

delic

19-Sep-06, 16:11

Yeeeeeaaaaaaaah !
Amazing !

I'm also trying to model a cathedral ... The one near where I'm living !
Did you only made the interior of the build ?
Is there a way to see the wireframe of your model ?
I tried to model from the masses plan, and it works well, bur for the details of the sculptures it's another deal ...
Did you use instances and splines for the columns and the skeleton strcuture ?
I wish to make a tute for this because some issues were very hard to achieve like the crossed quadripartite voutes !

delic

20-Sep-06, 09:37

I saw a wire of your model on the themes thread, nice ...

sebastian_k

20-Sep-06, 10:50

first of all, thanks for all the great replys! right now, i am "resting on my laurels":D
but as some of you asked for some wires, here you are:

http://img161.imageshack.us/img161/2905/frontviewhb4.th.jpg (http://img161.imageshack.us/my.php?image=frontviewhb4.jpg)

http://img182.imageshack.us/img182/4987/topviewna1.th.jpg (http://img182.imageshack.us/my.php?image=topviewna1.jpg)

http://img124.imageshack.us/img124/6803/sideviewxi8.th.jpg (http://img124.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sideviewxi8.jpg)

if i manage to compress the animated walkthrough, i might be posting it on youtube. i'll let you know.

delic

20-Sep-06, 13:50

Did you get the masses plan to model it ?
It's wonderful !

sebastian_k

20-Sep-06, 14:14

well, to be honest, i don't know what a masses plan is.
you could download the blenderart-magazine, i wrote a bit about my project there (nothing detailed though).

delic

20-Sep-06, 14:17

Thanks man !

delic

20-Sep-06, 14:20

It's the plan with the structure, the columns and the "contreforts" only ...
The walls are like paper in a cathedral plan !
I'm trying to also model the outside of the cathedral of Lausanne ...
Lot of work but very interesting ...

Inmare

22-Sep-06, 14:07

the animated walkthrough will be shown on MDR, 22.09.2006, Lexi-TV, 14.30

I missed it, but it will be repeated on tuesday morning.

But one can find the video at the show's site (http://www.lexi-tv.de/lexikon/thema.asp?InhaltID=4171) (Video link below "Der Kardinal"). The walktrough looks GREAT!

Windows Media DSL (http://www.lexi-tv.de/video/video.asp?VideoID=1561&FormatID=3&ModemID=2)
Windows Media Modem (http://www.lexi-tv.de/video/video.asp?VideoID=1561&FormatID=3&ModemID=1)
Real Player DSL (http://www.lexi-tv.de/video/video.asp?VideoID=1561&FormatID=2&ModemID=2)
Real Player Modem (http://www.lexi-tv.de/video/video.asp?VideoID=1561&FormatID=2&ModemID=1)

Time index: 1:16 - 1:38

sebastian_k

22-Sep-06, 14:44

hey, thanks a lot, and great you posted the links!
already been to the exhibition? don't miss it!

Lando

29-Sep-06, 16:01

Wow, thats great work. Not really anything to crit on, just really cool. I watched the video on the site. Its too bad they only showed the model for that brief clip, but its better than it not being there at all. I assume you used AO for the lighting? I like the feel, very medieval and fairly dark, with a nice contrast.

Keep up the good work,

-Lando

mjl1966

05-Jan-07, 13:46

What could there possibly be to look at after this? WOW. This has to be some kind of benchmark for photorealistic architecture.
I cannot find the words.

free_ality

05-Jan-07, 14:43

This is the gallery, but that was a pretty bad bump..........

sebastian_k

24-Feb-07, 13:02

Hi! Here is a little update to the cathedral. it's an animated walkthrough that i made for the exhibition about lucas cranach in aschaffenburg/germany.
look here:
http://www.cranach-im-exil.de/cont03_03.html

best regards!

Anom

26-Feb-07, 14:22

Compleatly amazing!
i was wondering if anyone knows how to do stained glass?
if so please reply.

BlackBoe

26-Feb-07, 16:26

Get an image for your window and use an 'emit map' for the bright parts to glow. Either that or just make the panes translucent and shine a light on them from the other side.

ysvry

16-Mar-07, 21:12

great job, how much did they pay you for this job?

sebastian_k

17-Mar-07, 07:36

the animation was used by two different museums, one in Halle, one in Aschaffenburg (Germany). All in all i got 6500€ for the whole project (which included some programming in directorMX as well). i am very happy with that, because it was my diploma. :-)

Gobley

12-Oct-07, 03:23

I think it's fantastic that you were able to not only improve your skill with Blender, you were also able to help to restore knowledge about an important historical and religious building. This kind of project is one of the best you can undertake. Thanks.

Five stars.