I finally got the time to finish a little personal project of mine so I thought I would post it for your thoughts. All the trees and bushes are onyx, I recently purchased the program. Let me know what you think.
Tony
very classical. the plants are the only things i can comment on. you might need a better grass material
the house looks fantastic! the steps in the foreground however…
you have some GI artifacts in the shadows, I think you need a bit more contrast too.
Great modellign though!
Scale! A lot of people don’t pay attention to scale.
Check your details. Looks like you rushed to finish the railings and stairposts. Agree site is bad.
I too bought into the onyx tree system… wish I didn’t. Anybody want to buy my copy? We are having better luck with VUE exports.
looking nice. I too agree with Nik about the ‘stomps’ and I think you could throw in a bit more randomness to the bushes.
I agree that Vue exports look pretty good but Onyx is great for animations, how is Vue for that?
-Peter
Thanks for the comments guys. The onyx trees are still a bit rough. First time using the program. They are also all proxied in the scene. Any suggestions on using the program without getting very high poly counts?
As far as scale. Everthing is modeled to scale for this type of house, at least according to the manufacturer of the components, what about the handrails looks odd?
The grass was giving me hell on my machines. Displacement does not work well with DR on my farm. The grass has a two inch 2d displacement, but it still looks flat. If I tried to up the quality, crash and burn everytime. I used the materials from the sheep scene from here.
The foreground steps, oh well, what can I say. 
I’ll keep working at it! It may not look it, but this has been a lot of fun to work on.
Tony
Tony,
One strategy to reduce poly count in Onyx is to only show the level of detail necessary for the shot. I normally disable Branch 3, Twig, and Leaf stems. Also, you can reduce the polygons of the woody parts by reducing the curving and transversal faces, under the Adjust settings in the Tree rollout.
But the real trick is to learn the Broadleaf.exe tree modeler. Its a complex thing,and will take a while, but it is moderately worth the time. Start with a pre-made and modify it to suit your needs, particulary in relation to density of leaves, branches, etc.
Also, whether or not you use Vray proxy, at least use instances of the Onyx trees. It will take so long to model one or two anyway that you will want to re-use them in the scene. For variety in the instances use scale or rotation.
For the grass displacement map try a map generated from the Fiber filter in PS CS2. Make sure such directional “scratchy” maps are oriented towards the camera so the grass looks correct. Also displace the grass twice the length you think it should be.
Keep it real in H-Town.
Aaron
on top of all that been said i think that you may add some trees in the background , behind the house on the horizon line.
Well, here’s an update. I added quite a few more trees and such.
Tony
huge improvement
Wow, yep very nice improvement.
Maybe the bricks are a bit pale and could use some variation, the trees look much better now.
Thanks guys! Needed to spend a little time with onyx and figuring out how it works. I’m really starting to like it. Money well spent.
Tony, are you using linear color mapping? If so try to experiment with HSV.
lukx - I did use linear color mapping. I will give your suggestion a try. I think the trees need more interior light, if thats the correct term, they seem dark to me.
There is definetely an art to exterior scenes. I’m really enjoying experimenting with this scene and learning onyx.
Tony
Yes, it looks like you’re getting the hang of it. I wish I was given the time to make my garden sites this nice.
Oh, one thing that looks odd though, on the horizon you can see through to the sky under the trees. You might want to stick in some 2d foliage in there to block that…