Help: Chicken coop

I’m creating a chicken coop for a commercial based on these references of the restaurant:

MAX 7.5 file + maps

I can’t seem to get the neon looking right.. I have a projector light emitting light onto the tin roof to try and fake it.. :?:

I need to put a nest in the back corner.. Vray fur?

The chicken wire in the front kills my render, I can’t render larger than 320x240 or it errors out..

My main problem right now is for some reason nothing is rendering at all.. Just black.. What have I clicked to kill it from rendering? Time to get the dongle?

-Matthew

actually that particle spline script thing would be really good for a nest. as for the neon, just use vray light material on the text is my guess

You render black, because your camera is behind the VRayLight. Move that light, so that the camera is in front of it.

Best regards,
nikki Candelero

You render black, because your camera is behind the VRayLight. Move that light, so that the camera is in front of it.

Ack! Boy, am I still learning VRay.. :?

as for the neon, just use vray light material on the text is my guess

I tried that and didn’t get the effect I wanted.. I’ll keep playing with it, though.. I figured it would just be easier to do in combustion..

Thanks!

-Matthew

Is this kinda what you want??

It may be too dark but wasnt focusing on that part.

Im not really sure what your after… but if the above aint it… tell me what you would change to get the “look” that you after.

Also if you need lots of nests/hay/straw in the coop then the particle spline script would be great for that.. im gonna give that a try later.

That is actually VERY close, but if you look at the reference, only the neon glass tube is fully saturated, the rest is illuminated by that.. I was getting what you are getting, which is a fully saturated/illuminated neon sign background.. The glow I would add in combustion.. Is there a way to keep the illumination on the tin roof but not on the sign background?

Also if you need lots of nests/hay/straw in the coop then the particle spline script would be great for that.. im gonna give that a try later.

where is this amazing script?

I was working today on optimizing that chicken wire.. It was supposed to stay a spline, I didn’t realize it would convert to an editible mesh when I collapsed/grouped them all.. No wonder it’s too big!

Thanks! :slight_smile:

-Matthew

ahh i see.. LOL sorry i messed up.. hhe wasnt thinging.. i though “why did he leave these damn splines here.. they just get in the way.. HIDE” LOL ok
let me re-do it in a couple of hours when i get home. and should be able to come up with what you want :wink:

Thread with some info about it.
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=114324&page=184&pp=15&highlight=ParticleFlow

THe actual site for the script and tut.. its in german so use babel.altavista.com to convert it. or google language tools or something.
Actually im almost positive that someone here posted an english conversion for it. Try a search for it.
http://core2core.de/spielwiese/PFSplines/PFSplines1.htm

Couple of tricky things to remember when using the script… before running the script.. just draw a spline and set up the options that you want like renderable and ..whatever.. then delete it.. and when you run the script the splines will have the properties/options of the spline that you just setup and deleted.
Also always make sure that you have selected the PFsource before running the script.. wont work otherwise :wink:

Ok, here is what i ended up with after a little tinkering … seems ok… what do you think.
(glow was quickly done within max… so could DEFINITLY be better.. hehe)

YES, definitely much better.. Ok, how’d you do that? :?: Is it more glow than illumination? Looks great on the tin roof..

Question: I hate to ask, but why does the light have to be behind the camera for it to render?

Also: that particle spline thingy looks amazing! I’ve never seen anything like it.. very cool.. I got google to translate the page for me, hopefully I can figure it out..

Thanks!

-Matthew

Well its more of a cheat than a real situation. But it works.
Here is the max file which explains its best :slight_smile:
For some reason the sphere vray light still affected the text even if i told it to exclude everything but the tin roof… so my work around was to turn of received GI for the text and then use a vraylightmtl to achieve the same color as the original… or close enough to anyway.
www.apex.net.au/~daforce/vray/chicken_coop01_vray-DaForce01.rar

The reason why your vraylight had to be beind the camera is because it was not set to invisible.. and therefore is like having a big plane infront of the camera…which you cant see thru.. so either tick “Invisible” in the vraylight properties… or just move it behind the camera like I did.

Yeah the script is awesome… very cool indeed…also if you need any help with it, dont hesitate to ask :smile:

Check out this thread. THere is a link to an updated version of the script and also some post of examples of what the script can do.
http://www.chaosgroup.com/forum/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=13758&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=pflow+script&start=25

Great work DaForce!

Thanks :smile:

I’m finally getting around to rendering this animation out, and I have some more questions to show how little I know about VRay..

First, it’s taking too freaking long! I obviously have a setting wrong or something.. The opening 80 frames have been rendering for 50 hours now and it still has 20 hours to go.. Here is the latest frame:

Lots of reflections from picture glass and tin, however the only thing moving is the camera.. Is this a ‘walkthrough’ type situation where I can save the irradiance map and speed things up (which I’ve never done)? How would you do that for a scene with reflections? I currently have the irradiance map set to the preset ‘high-animations’ and mode on ‘single frame’..

Second- things are blotchy.. The sign at the beginning is blotchy around the neon and it changes every frame.. Also the wood in the back of the coop (between the basketball and soccerball) is flickering.. Is this a GI thing, AA, or Irradiance Map hemisphere (or a combination)?

Third - on the pic you can see the balls are being illuminated from underneath.. Why is this?

I’ll have to render again, so I’d like things to be right yet hopefully get a much speedier render.. The client isn’t happy it’s taking so long.. :cry:

-Matthew

looking good so far! id replace the CEDFENCE.jpg though lol

Thanks! It’s supposed to have a sports-bar feel.. I agree on CEDFENCE.JPG, but now the client has seen it and is married to it.

I may have to render this sequence 4 times with different textures in the picture frames (can’t show partiality!).. Any way to speed up the rendering yet smooth out the blotches? I can’t sit through another 90 hour render, certainly I’m not doing something right.. :?:

-Matthew

hey :smile:

If its around the neon you may need to up the hsph subdivs.. try 100.. see if that helps.
Also HIGH-Animation is probably overkill for your render.
Can you post all your settings so I can have a look. And also what resolution are you rendering at?

As for the balls being lite from beneath… move them up slightly so they are not touching the wood.. and make sure that blur GI isnt on.. i think it may be as part of the HIGH-Animation preset… yep it is.. so post your settings and we will try some custom settings to help you out :wink:

If its around the neon you may need to up the hsph subdivs.. try 100.. see if that helps.

Under the Irradiance Map, right? Would any of the incremental modes help speed the irradiance map calculations?

Also HIGH-Animation is probably overkill for your render.
Can you post all your settings so I can have a look. And also what resolution are you rendering at?

I’m rendering at NTSC D1, 720x486..

As for the balls being lite from beneath… move them up slightly so they are not touching the wood.. and make sure that blur GI isnt on.. i think it may be as part of the HIGH-Animation preset… yep it is..

Ahh, you are spot on about the balls going through the floor..

Here is my file I’m working with:

http://www.trinitifx.com/wip/chicken\_coop02.zip

Thanks so much, sorry for asking easy questions.. :?

-Matthew

yep… under IR map. Yes incremental would help.. but because of your large areas of blossy reflections on your tin if could cause issue.. i will do some test.

Also thanks for the file.. i will look at it when i get home tonight. At work now so cant use max… but should be able to get render times down significantly.
What computer you got?

So balls are ok now??

What computer you got?

I normally work on my notebook computer (3Ghz P4), but I put this on my desktop in hopes that it would render faster (dual 3Ghz Xeon)..

So balls are ok now??

Yup! :smile:

-Matthew

I’m curious, why aren’t you using lightcache for secondary? It would would speed things up considerably.