Help with the exterior ambience

[Crayox13]

Hi guys...so after 15 years of doing archviz...again I feel lost. Client wants a lively atmosphere so I had to use people which I almost never do (a few 3D and a few 2D in PS) but I also gave my scene a warm white balance to make it look even more....warm/lively.
My usual setup nowadays is vray sun/sky system...with sky map in a light dome. I also usually make the light dome with 2.0 or 3.0 multiplier for softer/lighter shadows...still my scene looks kinda dead compared to those I'm attaching here as clients reference.

Not sure where and how those renders were made but I'm guessing with some "basic" software with everything pre-set. I feel like I can't see a forest for the forest. Tried more afternoon setup too, with lower sun but still I'm not getting that lively feel they have.
I edit my renders in PS camera raw.

Can someone please help, will repay in any way possible.

Edit: one more thing...I usually use one domelight (with vray sky) for diffuse and spec, and refl turned off, and the other with only refl turned on and some hdr in it, and I just realized they cancel eachother out, like the one with reflections isn't affecting my windows...any ideas?
Thanks in advance

[glorybound]

You just need a little work on your materials, they all look a little too clean. Chamfer your corners might help. I thin, you are almost there.

[francomanko]

I also struggle with getting the last 10% of an image, because subtle changes in materials, cam angles etc can make all the diference. I agree with Bobby, you materials need work to make them look less flat, break up the glossiness, reflection etc. Also your cut outs dont sit that well in the scene, the car in the first shot, some of the background houses edges look either too blurred or have visible white edges etc. The old fella on the lower balcony on the second shot looks ill to me

[Nicinus]

I would also play around with the glass reflections, maybe put in some noise. The windows look dead.

[Crayox13]

Yeah I agree with those details but I really do fast scenes/renders and so many changes that I don't play with chamfer anymore, clients don't notice it so I found it's not worth for fast projects. But what I really mean is this: I want the atmosphere like on the last render of those 3 samples, and for the life of me I can't do it! I just realized that vray is now defaulting hosek instead of preetham. Think the preetham gave nicer and warmer scenes. So that helped a bit, but I do not understand why I can't get that warm/cold atmosphere like in the last image. I even tried lightselect now to make my sun warm and sky cold in PS but that didn't give me that atmosphere either. White balance is not helping either. I don't understand that last render, why is it so "warm" and cold at the same time. Will post an update soon.

[Crayox13]

Here's an update.
A bit of a problem...denoiser is not denoising lightselect, not sure if there's a way to do that.

Window reflections were not present because I used one domelight for diffuse/specular with vraysky, and the other domelight for reflections with hdri and higher multiply. But since they are "infinite" domes, they cancel eachother? Any other way to do this? I think I asked this before but I can't find the solution.

I'm also a bit limited with the background photo I need to use. So I will have to do an another setup to match it.

Here I used domelight mult 5.0 and sun 1.0 to get brighter shadows like on that sample, but maybe the ratio is too high.

[OPEN_RANGE]

Something does look a bit odd with the lighting. The shadows from the people are much darker and seem sharper than the shadows on the building. I think it should be he other way around. Shadows cast on grass not as sharp and defined as shadows cast on walls.

Perhaps turn off the dome lights and instance the vray sun/ sky map into the vray GI environment map and vray reflection/refraction environment map. Take the dome lights out of the setup for simplified and initial trouble shooting.

[glorybound]

You can download the scene and try their setup.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy8-...MB-cCS&index=2

[lilou]

in my opinion, your images are much too harsh and contrasting. The whites are too white, the blacks too black. The bakgrounds must be much softer, more airy (like the reference photos), your sky much less dark and saturated. Everything seems in the foreground, without depth. (But curiously the foliage in the foreground on the top right on the contrary lacks contrast ...)
Look at photographs of landscapes to learn how to balance the elements between them (in terms of contrast, values and colors (saturation)). you have to create depth (in general the foregrounds are warmer and more contrasting than the backgrounds)

[Crayox13]

Yeah, the people shadows are from cutouts, didn't fix those. I too feel my shadows are a bit harsh, but I thought I shouldn't change vray default settings, and already this is with sky light 2 times stronger than sun (should be 1/1 right?) and sun size multiplier 5. Will try more softening and that scene (thanks Glory).

[lilou]

I try very quickly with photoshop to create more depht into your picture. Hope it could help you a bit. Personally I never try to have the final output with the frame buffer. The post production part is very important because it allows me to adjust the image much more finely and quickly.

[Crayox13]

Yeah, I always do a post in PS too. I think I like "clarity" modifier too much . What did you do here? Just adjust shadows, or levels, or curves?

[lilou]

I join a photoshop capture of my 3 minutes post production...
I try to keep it very simple, only few exposure layers with some masks( i create more than one exposure because i need to tweak differently areas from pictures) I prefer the exposure level because you can adjust much better the luminosity and the contrast.)
I like to use hue/saturation layer because i find that generaly 3d output are way too saturated ( but it is my bad taste!)
I like to to use different fusion mode between layers ( in this at the top i duplicate the picture in "screen mode "with a little %

As i write in my previous post i try to create depth in these kind of picture, for me it is the most important thing ( the real question for me is the first look , the atmosphere and the mood of the picture, it is not a question of qualities and realism of textures and materials( for me these tweaks are for the fine tuning))

[lilou]

To return to the subject, rather than forcing it directly in post production, the most obvious thing would already be to prepare your background photographs so that they are already more balanced in contrast, values, brightness and saturation. That way you can work your lighting more finely directly.
When I look at the background photos of your client, they are much less "dense" than those of test images.

See as an example the work of Mir (they do a lot of integration in photos): https://www.mir.no/ or Beauty and the bit https://www.beautyandthebit.com/