Ok here is what i think. the first images looks really good, and i think you should leave out the reflection, or make it really weak… exsept the top of the table… that part could use a small amount of reflection, just like you have done.
other than that, try to separate some of the bricks by a small small amount, so you get an uneven crack in between each peace… but BARELY noticable. this might make it look more like individual lego pieces being put together.
good job, not much to do. think ur close to perfect. move on and extend it make more stuff. i want to see a full office of this thing xD
The RAM-difficulties became much worse now. I think I need your help. My Blender now crashes when rendering the scene. I think there is too much memory used. But i have no idea where the problem is located. The scene has 317000 Vertices. Is this too much for this kind of scene? If anybody is able to help me it would be fantastic.
I uploaded the .blend-file here: http://www.pasteall.org/blend/32348 because the forum-upload doesn’t work for me at the moment.
I think I solved my RAM-Problem. Could it be that the subsurf-modifier needs a lot of memory when using too many subdivisions?
There are now bumpmaps on each brick that give them a slightly rough surface. Additionally I changed the lego-material again and made it reflect only things that are close to the surface. Then there are some imperfect assemblies of the bricks, less DOF and some little halloween greetings I think it’s better this way. What do you think? What could be improved on top of that?
I think you are doing a great job! I hope to contribute with something.
Have you seen the lego movie? In this picture you can see many imperfections used to make the pieces looks more real. Rugosity, finger prints, dirty…
I hope see more of you job!
Subsurfs are a pain for rendering but if you know what your machine is capable of then you can plan accordingly. Try turning it up in viewport mode and see how much memory it eats. It’s better doing it this way than firing up render and hearing the hard drive start thrashing as your os swaps out memory. I’ve had this happen more than once - blender becomes completely unresponsive when it’s synchronizing.
The one thing you probably haven’t changed is the lighting. Try maybe making the main light a warm color, then add a cold light from the opposite side of the scene. You could also experiment with some rim-lighting.
@hug0: I didn’t want to add so much dirt like in the LEGO-movie. I think they overdid it a bit. Additionally the original model which lays here beneath me consists of brand new pieces. I wanted to add some fingerprints, but hadn’t any time to do so. How would you realise them? Change the reflection by a map or overlay some other less reflecting material? I’m not sure. I will have to try a bit… If you have any suggestions.
@stonesoup: I think the memory-problems are completely fixed now. It’s a pity I don’t know why. Haha.
Blender now says it uses around 85MB, Win Taskmanager says around 400MB. So no problem at all.
@BjarkeDuDe: I’m a completely lightning noob, so I need a lot of advice with this topic. I’ll try to use your hints.
General question: Do you really think the bricks need more reflection? How could this let’s call it glossy effect be achieved? Turning up the reflection would make it look like the picture in post #19. I think there is too much “hard” reflection. Could anyone give me some keywords how to improve the reflections?
To add some fingerprints is pretty easy, I think. Just take some photo of fingerprint on google with alpha channel and duplicate on photoshop . Would be good add some dirt too. After that plug this picture on FAC on your mix shader. This is an example: /uploads/default/original/4X/2/2/1/2214283a4b0ee85a2db54d619f957b7c9d877a4b.png
Sorry for y english…
I changed the reflectiveness of the bricks, added some spec maps with scratches and dirt (and some fingerprints) to the bricks. I changed the lightning to a warmer color and added an environement texture as additional light source and to be reflected on the bricks. On top of that Bump maps of a rough surface and scratches have been added to each brick.
My only proviso is that you appear to be using similar if not identical surface finishes on the different colours. Whilst they are all made of the same plastic in theory, due to the fillers and so on, the different bricks have different finishes. (A well-spent youth with thousands of them tells me this) Lighter colours such as the yellow and white, have a more translucent finish, and the bricks with no bumps on them have a higher gloss, whilst the more ‘everyday’ bricks such as the grey, have more of a matte finish, and less translucency.
I’m not sure what to do next. Maybe I’ll try the hints given by travellingmatt. If anyone likes to give some hints or proposals I would like to learn from them.
I’ll share a little accident with you. I think it looks quite interesting It was rendered on GPU when SSS wasn’t working.
make more stuff. i want to see a full office of this thing xD
I think it’s better this way. What do you think? What could be improved on top of that?
It was rendered on GPU when SSS wasn’t working.
