The 15th of March is near and as mentioned before the final images submission forms for the GH House Challenge are now open. If you are one of the challengers please follow the links below to get to the upload and feedback forms. All others are invited to visit the challenge threads and check out the great work done by the artists participating.

• Final Images Upload Form.
• Extra Images Upload Form.
• Challenge Feedback Form.

The public voting, for the people choice award, will be posted after processing of all images submitted is complete. News about this will be posted on the blog.

GH House Challenge Final Submission is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

I love wood facade houses, and this refurbishment project by Jackson Clements Burrows Architects is a fine example. The textures mix of wood, grass & water is absolutely great – even more so in the night images, with the light propagation over the lawn.

 

original post The Trojan House / Jackson Clements Burrows Architects at archdaily

The Trojan House by Jackson Clements Burrows Architects is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

Following a great thread in the finished works section of the forums, pixela was very kind to send me a little ‘How-To’ about the the use of 3D Studio Max’s Hair & Fur modifier you can see on the chair in the image above. I hope you’ll enjoy this article, even though it is just a small taste of what could be achieved with this great modifier.

Author: Alfa Smyrna (pixela)
pixela is a freelance computer graphics artist living in the west coastal region of Turkey, formerly known as Ionia. Graduating architecture studies at METU School Of Architecture to discover the passion CG, pixela now specializes in 3D computer graphic arts production. check out pixela’s personal blog with more tutorials and great info at: www.pixela-3d.com

In my 3d interior visualization scene ‘Bedroom Concept’ I had one chair with fur which many people asked me to write a small tutorial about. Here I will try to explain the process of making it using 3D Studio Max internal Hair & Fur modifier.

I used poly modeling techniques for creating the chair, but I won’t elaborate on that any further since I’m focusing on the use of the Hair & Fur modifier I applied on the chair after I finished it’s modeling.

Adding the Hair & Fur modifier

So… While the chair is selected, from the modifiers panel, you add Hair & Fur modifier (under World Space Modifiers). You can see the parameters I used in the image below.

Initial look of fur

Initially, the fur will not look like it is in my image because you have to ‘Style’ it first. This step makes the fur look much more realistic as you comb it with a brush, setting the strands in place. When you click on the Style Hair button, you will see the hair guides. You will then shape these guides with the brush and the fur strands will follow your movements.

Fur guides

First you should start with adjusting the size of your brush. You can then select hair guides individually or in groups. The selection menu is very detailed.

The process of ‘Styling’

At first, I selected all guides and tried to give the general look I wanted. In the second step, I selected guides in groups and continued brushing. For fine-tuning, you can even select edges or roots of hair or single vertex like in sub-object mode.

Hair & Fur Styling Panel

Under the style roll-out, there are many tools as you see in the image above. You will use some of them to brush the fur.

Here I pasted some of the definitions for these tools from the 3dsMax help file

• Hair Cut – Lets you trim the guide hairs. To cut hair.
• Translate – Moves selected vertices in the direction that you drag the mouse.
• Stand – Pushes selected guides toward a perpendicular orientation to the surface
• Rotate – Rotate or swirls guide hair vertices around the cursor location (at the center of the brush).
• Attenuate Length – Scales selected guides according to the surface area of underlying polygons.
• Recomb – Makes a guide parallel to the surface, using the guide’s current direction as a hint.
• Clump – Forces selected guides to move towards each other (drag mouse leftward) or farther apart (drag mouse rightward).

Now you start combing your hair, cut it where you need. As you brush, you will see that the fur changes shape. You can move the strands in any direction you want, rotate them individually or in groups, clump them so they can move towards like a bunch. You can shape up your fur according to your imagination.

Hint: It is easier to understand when trying to make it. Here, it sounds more complicated than it is. Start brushing and play with the tools and you will see the results in the viewport preview.

Here is the result after I styled it:

After some fur styling

Don’t forget to turn on the Hair & Fur effect from the Environment and effects roll-out. You can disable this to save RAM when the fur object is not visible to the camera.

Environment and effects roll-out

The ‘Bedroom Concept’ Image Set

 

Original Finished Work Thread | Original Work In Progress Thread

You are welcome to comment on this article and ask questions using the comment box below!

Hair & Fur in 3D Studio Max is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

An amazing new timelapse film by Philp Bloom. Filmed in Dubai over 5 days and nights using a Canon 7D, 2×5DmkII and one Panasonic GF1.

Music is from “The Fountain” by Clint Mansell and you can find more information about this film here

Sky from Philip Bloom on Vimeo.

Amazing Timelapse Film, “Sky” by Philip Bloom is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

Great looking house by Debbas Architecture and photographs by Nic Lehoux & Cesar Rubio. I especially like the dusk images (what a surprise!) and the minimal profile towards the entrance street that hides the big sloping downward house. The choice of materials is very interesting and creates a very unique looking house – a great reference for the combination of metal cladding, concrete, wood and glass.

 

original post Gravitt 48 / Debbas Architecture at archdaily

Gravitt 48 / Debbas Architecture is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

You might have noticed I’m a little bit quiet this past two week… I took some time off and sail in the Mediterranean sea, along the shores of Israel. I stumbled upon a wonderful resort location the other day at contemporist – The Alila Villas Hadahaa at the Maldives by SCDA Architects. The upside down boat on the beach is both funny and brilliant idea! You can find some great reference for a seaside location project… what a great location, I wish I could have sailed those shores this week!

 

original post Alila Villas Hadahaa by SCDA Architects at contemporist

Alila Villas Hadahaa Resort / SCDA Architects is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

zwischendrin has released SnowFlow v1.6. It is a 3D Studio Max plugin that creates realistic snow with ease! Apeerantly all you need to do is pick an object and SnowFlow does the snow for you! This come very close to the snow discussion at the GH Challenge Forum – might be a good solution for all those winter scenes in the works.

SnowFlow Bench Scene How-To

SnowFlow v1.6 Features

• self-explaining user interface with integrated help.
• one-click-solution in most standard situations.
• multiple snow methods for different needs.
• advanced settings to get the best out of SnowFlow.
• different reality levels to control object interference.
• presets for auto-settings in common circumstances.
• full control over the calculated mesh.
• system unit check and conversion to achieve full snow details.
• autoTune options for better performance.
• caching system to prevent unnecessary recalculations.
• “SnowPlug” to stick objects into snow surfaces.

Check out SnowFlow v1.6 Website for more information

3d Studio Max Plugin, SnowFlow v1.6 is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

REDVERTEX - Marina Nessebar - HD720p/30fps from Dimitar Rashkov on Vimeo.

A wonderful animation of Marina Nessebar by REDVERTEX. I’m a big fun of their work and this animation is probably the best I’ve seen coming from them.

Even so, the excessive use of DOF shift becomes really boring midway into the spot. The 2d people treatment is really clever and far better then using 3d people, but should have been introduced earlier in the animation…

And you got to love that Italian song setting the mood for it all!

What do you think!

Marina Nessebar by REDVERTEX is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

Lovely Pavilion design by Carmody Groake. The dense metal column structure along with the special up lights at the pavement creates a very interesting patterns as you go around it. The dusk images are most impressive and are a good reference of how to incorporated such a lightning solution in this scenario.

 

original post Regent’s Place Pavilion by Carmody Groarke at contemporist

Regent’s Place Pavilion / Carmody Groarke is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog

Daniel J Hatton has posted part 2 of his tutorial on how to create realistic rocks using 3D Studio Max, VRay and the Advanced Painter Plugin this time. You should definitely check this and part 1 if you didn’t yet.

Here is the related video for this part video, but you should visit his post for additional information.

3dsmax and Vray Rocks Tutorial Part 2 from Daniel Hatton on Vimeo.

Realistic Rocks Tutorial by Daniel Hatton, Part 2 is a post from Ronen Bekerman's 3D Architectural Visualization Blog