All about Trees & Plants

[3DMK]

RE: All about Trees & Plants

Hi All,

I am currently starting a business to sell High quality trees/shrubs/plants [in the GrowFX file format] for use in Archviz or other 3d projects.
As an Viz- Artist for the last 7-8 years, I have learned a lot about issues & problems associated with creating & using 3D trees/plants. Although I have my own ideas of what I think is really important, I would love to know what others think!!
So let it all out.....tell me what gives you the shits with using/buying 3D trees & plants in your projects??? Is it a lack of specific species...bad quality models...not able to tweak???. Anything at all, just let me know what problems you currently deal with. That way I can fix your problems by providing 3D trees & plants that make you happy again

All the best & I appreciate your valuable time.....thanks!

Cheers
Jamie [3DMK]

[Pixelcon]

I was wondering just last week when you were going to start selling models! About time.

I could suggest perhaps a green-wall pack. After seeing your great gree-wall renders I think that could be a good product. Plus maybe some distribution maps to go with it or something.

Also I think maybe doing some standard council specified trees for major cities around the world. And not just a single model, either a GrowFX definition or at least 5 models.

That's all I can think of now but pre converted to proxy trees nicely organized and at 0,0,0 etc etc are always appreciated.

[Pixelcon]

Shit actually I would be more interested in purchasing some good video tutorials over trees!

[Smalerbi]

Hi Jamie,

All of the above are important. It's impossible to focus on any specific species of vegetation. The bulk of my projects, the trees and shrubs are specified by the landscape architect. I look online to see what the plant or tree would look like, then thumb through my existing library to see if I have that specific item or what might look pretty close. Turbosquid seems to have some decent models but there are always room for more. The only thing I would suggest is stay away from opacity based leaves. When I see a model that is opacity based........I DO NOT GET IT!!. I think everyone on this forum understands opacity based leaves are the Vray rendering kiss of death. There are some very nice models that are all geometry. Sure, you have more poly's but it renders so much faster. The other thing I would suggest is to offer your services to model specific items at a competitive rate when needed by the artist. You can do this by having an understanding with the artist that the item you are creating will be offered for sale to the general public. This way, you can offer the model at a reasonable rate and make up the difference on the back side. If the artist wishes to keep the model only to themselves, then you will need to charge more. I would be interested in hiring you for such a task. I run into several occasions where I need a specific tree that is unique in nature. If you are interested, drop me an email Smalerbi4760@gmail.com.

thanks,

Scott

[glorybound]

I would love to see a library specific for VRay, of course, but specifically for heavy scenes. I had a library before that had young, medium, and adult versions of the same tree. I would love to see the same thing, but for level of details. One for close up, one for mid way distance, and one for far away. That would be the bomb!

[voltron7]

Hello,

I will add...
Some general shit causers

-missing maps
-none sense material names
-nonsense object names
-leaf color variation either entirely overdone, or way too uniform.
-use of translucency and/sss or standard materials, 2sided is fine.
-floating leaf geometry = really hate this.

Other thoughts...
-minimum of 5 variations per species
-low poly geometry with separate trunks&leaves, that can be turbosmoothed for close ups
-or high poly and lo poly version
-catalog that indicates heights in all the usual units, not just metric or imperial.
-for each species, a nice neat canopy version for landscape installations and a wild or rural version.
-including pre-created v-ray proxies would be nice.
-scene - exact scene file should be included that was used to generate product previews. This provides assurance the same result can be achieved without post/comp work.

That's it for now, I guess
Nice previews by the way!
Good luck with your new venture...

[beestee]

Having different bottom of canopy options could be beneficial. I like having my library divided between trees that work well for screening/planting beds and pedestrian/roadway areas. I have not had much use for wild or forest tree types myself, but I am sure that is another category that would be distinguished from the other two and likely something that some would find useful.

[Horizon]

I struggle to find nicely pruned trees in the small to medium size. Maybe with the built up soil around as if they were maintained professionally or recently planted. And for trees in general possibly making two versions of the canopies....one dense and one light or maybe make the leaves in two separate objects so you can turn off half of the leaves for a lighter canopy. That way you can use the light versions in front of buildings without blocking too much.

Logical material names and objects.
I don't like the translucency/sss on leaves.
V-ray proxies appreciated.

[tricky]

Apart from a few purchased trees we *try* to create our own using Onyx when we have a specific requirement (i.e. canopy height and branch density etc). Onyx certainly isn't without its problems though. One of the major annoyances with it (apart from my own skill level!) is where boughs intersect the trunk, or branches intersect the boughs. There is no way to grade them into eachother properly, either through mapping or geometry.

Trees are good, but ground cover plants are also handy, such as low shrubs that will work well ForestPro.

Pre-created vrayproxies would be nice with logical materials (vrayproxies don't have materials applied and saved with them, right?)

A way of 'thinning' the leaves would be good. Clients are forever asking us to 'make trees more transparent'! One way could be to reduce the number of leaves. Another way might be to have 3 different sizes of bitmap/alpha leaves.

No bloody palm trees!

[jacksc02]

Lots of Aussie trees please

[voltron7]

Pre-created vrayproxies would be nice with logical materials (vrayproxies don't have materials applied and saved with them, right?)

A way of 'thinning' the leaves would be good. Clients are forever asking us to 'make trees more transparent'! One way could be to reduce the number of leaves. Another way might be to have 3 different sizes of bitmap/alpha leaves.

No bloody palm trees!

When I save a v-ray proxy, it goes along with it's materials. I suppose if you exported it without materials than it would stay that way.
+1 for "thinning"
+1 no palms (nothing personal against palms...only because I bought some for one job and will probably never need them again.)

[Neilg]

No bloody palm trees!

More tropical trees!

but actual tropical trees, we already have 8 variations of the same palm and none of a ton of really common trees.

stuff like this if you're up to it -

[3DMK]

Thanks to everyone for taking the time to respond.
Too many deadlines have prevented me getting back to you all sooner
I will give some more info over the next few days that will hopefully answer your most of your questions....and may well spark a few more!

All the best
Jamie

[duke2]

I don't necessarily agree with the comment that opacity mapped leaves are evil - at some point, 12 million poly trees become impractical, especially on a network.

[voltron7]

I don't necessarily agree with the comment that opacity mapped leaves are evil - at some point, 12 million poly trees become impractical, especially on a network.

will agree here, too...as long as opacity's filtering is unchecked, they seem just fine.