office furniture and partition

[shura]

Hi all,

This is our new office. Much smaller than the one before, that's why I modeled it to see if the existing furniture fits into it at all. For the first time I have encountered a situation where a scale model would have given a much more realistic impression. We moved in yesterday, and I can tell you that regarding the amount of space the renders are feeling totally different from the real situation.

Anyway, I rendered these more or less for training only - maybe you can give me some hints on how to improve. The first Image cooked 10 hours on Easy 09, the second one is taken after 7 hrs, still waiting for it to clear up a little more. Just a little PP with ToyCamera.

I was struggling with the aluminium handles a lot, all templates were coming out blackish - this is Ffast_Aluminium_02 from the library, quite ok I think. The monitors are done with a generic template, "smooth" I think - is this the reason why they still have more grain than the rest of the image?

Outside I want some plants to improve the view, actually the plan is to put Pampas Grass, but my attempts to cut out the feathery heads failed miserably. Does anyone know of a resource where I can get realistic ornamental grass?

thanks in advance
alex

[WardNL]

Looks like you're doing a Droste effect!

[shura]

Yeah, but only one bounce - I was too lazy to fiddle the sceenshot into the scrennshot into the screenshot into.........

[Fletch]

furniture arrangement has always been the hardest thing for me.
It may indeed look 'good' in SketchUp or in a render, but nothing is more realistic than being there...

I imagine it's a better likeness than the old hand-drawn perspectives I did before starting 3D

nice renders!

[Boofredlay]

Nice work. The monitors however look like they have an infection
I would use a Flat Plastic template. Turn the lights on too, or is it after hours?

[shura]

Thanks for the replies, guys, much appreciated!

Yesterday my Vista crashed for the first time (just rendering and downloading from 3D Warehouse ), so that the second render didn't get finished.
Not too bad, because I found out that I used a noise bumpmap on the monitors what made them look like infected SpongeBob.

Now I am tinkering with the flourescent light fixtures, or better with the IES data. I've got to get my head around this, cause I never used IES of flourescent lights.
All I can find are IES files that are producing an output that is like the output of a spot, not the linear falloff I would expect from a flourescent tube.
(yes, they are announed as flourescent ies: http://www.daybrite.com/day-britefluor/ ... ry_ies.cfm )
Do I have to line up several spots, or do i have to link the ies-file to the emitter-material of the tube? Or is it simply not possible to design IES data with a linear "focal point" and there is yet another workaround?
(Show me to the school where the professors for photometrics are, please )

xxx

[Fletch]

Remember that IES represent the light output of a specific light fixture (a fixture is not a light bulb, but the entire thing... the bulb, and the housing)

1. If you are trying to represent a linear light fixture, be sure you have the IES of a fluorescent linear light fixture, and build the long fluorescent light bulb with a simple rectangle representing the light bulb.
2. apply a place-holder color of white or something to the face of the rectangle and change the name of that material to be something logical "IESFluorescent"
3. make that face's "Front" face the correct direction, if it is supposed to shine up or down.
4. apply the light emitter template to the material "IESFluorescent" on the light rectangle
5. load the IES file into the definition for that fixture's "IESFluorescent" material

Hope this helps.

IES spots render 2x longer than a normal spot.
rectangular light emitting surfaces render about 2.5 times longer than a normal spot.
Rectangular Surface Emitter + IES = some long render times.

[dspace]

Very nice work, and looking great!
I was thinking about the vast difference btw the exteriors & interiors.
Do you mind explaining how you did the exteriors to achieve the "finished" look?

[PRSS]

So nice!
With best regards
PRSS

[shura]

...and here is one with the lights switched on.

Man, I learned a lot about using IES yesterday - thank you Fletch!

dspace, you are asking an interesting question... I can say that I am kind of satisfied with how the exterior came out, even though it is not a copy of the real thing (the floor is originally cracked asphalt, and the walls are made of a different limestone with lots of "shells" in it, see photo) - while the interior is somehow looking unfinished (keyboards missing etcetera).
Very often it happens to me that I find aged materials look much more realistic.
In this case the background is a photo, set up like a billboard in the model to have better control on the perspective. The stone texture and bumpmap are from Arroway, no doubt they have some of the best quality in the market. Also the detailed 3d plants add to realism I think... but that is basically all I did to the outside.

by the way: the office is located inside the former Airport Tempelhof in Berlin. Without question an interesting piece of architectural history, but it is not easy for me to get used to the monotony of the facades. Hope the pampas grass will do the job, so I can concentrate on the massive potential that lies in the future utilization of the building