Your prefered method of adding People

[PGD]

What is your preferred method of adding people into your images?

I want to add 'better' people into my images, but time constraints are often an issue so a quick solution would be handy.

To date I've been using RPC people, and usually create a white silhouette version of them in PS. This is quick to do, the scale of the people is worked out for you, theirs a variety of people to choose from and it's cheap. But it doesn't look good does it, and with this method I have no shadows cast on the floor either

If time allows I'll add a shadow to the rpc's in PS. Or if more time is available I'll swap the rpc's for cutout people in photoshop, but this is a rarity tbh.

So what steps should I take to improve this?

[glorybound]

3D scanned people are the way to go, in my opinion.

https://secure.axyz-design.com/metropoly-3d-people

[PGD]

Just been looking at those myself, they do look good. Do you then distribute them manually?

[glorybound]

I use them sparingly, so I manually place them in my scene.

Just been looking at those myself, they do look good. Do you then distribute them manually?

[tricky]

3d modelling and rendering is the 'easy' bit. Getting the people looking convincing is the hard bit. That's why a lot of the 'best' CGIs you see don't have any people.

[Neilg]

If you're using photographed people the main thing is to go into each one and paint layers of light/shadow over them. you'd be surprised how well you can relight and integrate people with a stack of curves and some soft brushing.

[Pixelcon]

IMO (we're all entitled, of course ) re-lit people never look good. Never as good as people who have exactly the right lighting straight off the bat. Of course it's going to be difficult to get enough people to fit the exact scenario, but the results speak for themselves... That's why 'studio lit' entourage never ever looks good (unless you're doing a render of a photography studio...)

[Neilg]

there is no such thing as exactly the right lighting - that's why you need to relight them. i'm not talking about taking someone shot in sunlight and putting them into an interior - even if they were shot in a studio with an exact recreation of the cg lights, they wont look good.

Photographers spend hours adjusting these things on people they've shot - and they're not even integrating them into anything. slapping cut out people into an image and just matching the brightness/color tone isn't enough.

[Pixelcon]

I disagree entirely. Sorry :/

there is no such thing as exactly the right lighting - that's why you need to relight them. i'm not talking about taking someone shot in sunlight and putting them into an interior - even if they were shot in a studio with an exact recreation of the cg lights, they wont look good.

Photographers spend hours adjusting these things on people they've shot - and they're not even integrating them into anything. slapping cut out people into an image and just matching the brightness/color tone isn't enough.

[Neilg]

I'm saying put more effort and care into sitting the people into an image. looking at the light and shadows more, breaking them up instead of doing one big adjustment and hoping it works. you disagree with that?

[PGD]

I'd love to be able to leave people out of the images, I really would. But the architects seems to be obsessed with people in their images, and lots of them too. I've tried to use people sparingly and get them looking good, but they always want more.

Photoshopping photographed people in there is fine (and adjusting them to suit as suggested), but it's time consuming isn't it.

[Pixelcon]

No no I apologize I should have "quoted" more selectively! I disagree with the comment "there is no such thing as exactly the right lighting". Maybe "exact" is an exaggeration on my part but 95% correct is more desirable than re-lighting someone. I always fall into the trap of relighting to realize half-way down the track that "this is never going to look right". And to expand and clarify on my previous spiel, I disagree that a studio lighting setup doesn't work; I think it works perfectly when done right but I do think that buying pre-lit packaged people that have been photographed in a studio is a bad bad bad idea.

I'm saying put more effort and care into sitting the people into an image. looking at the light and shadows more, breaking them up instead of doing one big adjustment and hoping it works. you disagree with that?

[Pixelcon]

Yes they always want more. Perhaps they're deluded into thinking their projects will become the center of the universe and people will flock from all corners of the globe to see it!

Something you can do to save some time is to save out just the people from each image once it's finished into a separate PSD file. If you've been careful in making sure their lighting is correct and consistent then when another image comes along with the same lighting you can drag and drop the people from that PSD into your new image. Even if you can create eye-level crowds of people then you can easily drag and drop them into an image to instantly satisfy and deluded architect!

Otherwise I would say the fastest and easiest way to add a lot of people is to use the populate tools in max 2014 (maybe 2013 too?). You can just draw lanes and idle-areas and generate heaps of 3d animated people really quickly. Sure they're not as good as good PS people but they're probably fine for in-house work...

I'd love to be able to leave people out of the images, I really would. But the architects seems to be obsessed with people in their images, and lots of them too. I've tried to use people sparingly and get them looking good, but they always want more.

Photoshopping photographed people in there is fine (and adjusting them to suit as suggested), but it's time consuming isn't it.