Where it all began - Chapter 4 - Dev Log #12
Yo,
This Log is quite a few days late, and I apologize.
I got hung up on the Daphne Treat that I still owed you from the last "Who wore it better" in which Daphne won against Katarina.
While I do have five renders of it, that I will be publishing today, I don't consider it done yet. I'm not satisfied with the result and especially after such a long wait... I expected more from myself.
This means that today's Daphne renders are considered part 1.
The idea behind treats is that I only do them when I really feel them. I felt Daphne, but I had to take care of some other things, and that was a fatal mistake.
Yet, I continued the set but wasn't in the right headspace anymore and it led to a result I don't really stand behind.
Part 2 will follow as soon as bibi Daphne hits me again.
Part 1 will be released for all supporters. Part 2, however, will be for the designated tiers.
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2. Blender's workout plan.
One possible cause for losing the initiative for Daphne's set is that I have a lot on my plate. My mind's constantly racing between different software and possible ideas.
During cardio I often think about the games and thingies I could try out. For example I observe the motion of the treadmill and wonder how hard it would be to replicate in Blender... And then let Zara (SG) run on it... How would I handle the air resistance? The friction of her shoes on the rubber...
Then, I had a day where I was reading in bed and the sun was shinning into my room... When the light hits just right, I often observe it and wonder... Why can't I replicate it like this? Do the light bounces work so differently from Iray (Daz) or Blender (Cycles)?
Is the key "indirect" lighting?
...I had to get up and do some testing.
First, I checked how Blender calculates the light bounces... In Blender you can change how often the light bounces around a scene. I created a little room with a window in it and did my tests by having light shine in and see how it illuminates the room at what values...
Then I ported the room to Daz and did the same... And Daz handled it much worse. In Daz you often have the issue, that the light from outside, doesn't illuminate the room at all. You need artificial lighting... And there lays the challenge of good renders. It's hard to get right.
The way the light bounces around the room in Daz seems to be much worse than in Blender. In Blender, I could illuminate the room with a light value of 4833 lumen.
In Daz, I needed over 65000 lumen when replicating the size of the mesh light. It looked much worse in Daz. I documented the process and will go more into detail in the Blender log.
I opened Blender again, opened Miru who was waiting for me to do some boob physics tests, and started lighting her with a singular, indirect light.
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This was in a very big room, and the light was positioned on the opposite side of the room, facing the wall.
The HDRI (World) was turned off, and the scene had no lighting besides that one mesh light (and technically her headphones).
This gives me a lot of ideas on how to light scenes in the future... But I will also do some more tests soon in Daz... While writing this, I got an idea that I have to try out.
Ennnnoooough... Before I start writing an entire Blender log... Let me get to the end of the Blender part.
Yesterday however, I came up with a new way to improve my Blender/Marvelous Designer skills.
Usually, I do what I always do and that's follow my instincts and learn as I go... Which worked out for Daz, but Blender combined with Marvelous has so many areas to cover, that I needed a better system.
So I created a workout plan for Blender. It's build exactly like a workout plan for the gym... With a few additions.
Instead of a Chest/Shoulder day, you have a Animation/Constraint day.
I came up with a few ideas to make it more fun... Geomerty Chaos & (Star)Light) are just some of the little events I created that will help me understand everything a lot better.
Or the "Hyptertrophy" 3x10 Blender workout.
For each set (1x10) you create one new render with Girl X, and then make 10 different versions out of it. I change the lighting, the camera angle and so on...
I have come up with 11 challenging events to make it more fun... And I will go into them with the first Blender log... Which will be a fucking Titan of a log.
There's also some good news about Marvelous Designer... But I will include all of this into the Blender Log.
WiAB Chapter 4
Work continues as usual.
I licensed some new music for both games, and a friend told me about a channel that produces some very nice, free, ambient music.
As mentioned, there will be fewer previews from now on. I don't want to preview every single scene in an update.
I have to write a Dev Log every week; in the past, I always needed fresh previews for every single one. But if a scene takes a month or more to finish, the previews would look very similar.
II have been showing 3-8 previews a log for years and it felt wrong if I didn't... But, I reached a point where I started worrying, "Damn, we have Monday, and I don't really have a render that would justify being previewed. Should I start a new scene already?"
So I will be cutting previews drastically. It will make them more special... And sometimes there will be a log with more previews but... It will be the exception.
Top view.
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From now on, expect around 0 - 2 previews per Dev Log. If I don't post a preview, there's a good chance I will instead show a render I did one the side. Or some Blender renders.
Time will tell.
I apologize again for the delay of the WiAB Dev log.
--Ocean
