Mid 1700's - 1800's room
 

Im going to attempt to model a clean mid 1700's to early 1800's room. Ive started with a Lantern, Clock, and fountain pen in an ink thingy. Anyone have suggestions on what to create next on the table? Ill start making the surrounding objects after the tabletop objects are done. Or comments on how to make my current models better? Im not looking to make this photo realistic, just pretty dam cool. Help and comments are highly appreciated as always! The texture on the wood is just there to say that its wood, i haven't started the table texture yet. Heres a sample render of what I have so far.
http://img47.imageshack.us/img47/540...nscene1xx1.jpg

I know you had the lantern hanging earlier but now that you've got it sitting on a table, just don't forget to put the handle back down, hehe.

Couple of ideas: A partial letter as if it's half way written and a pair of spectacles (the tiny ones). Maybe instead of a pen you could try modeling a quill (feather like pen). Also, I know you havn't textured yet, but when you do, I think wood surfaces had more of a dull look than glossy back then.

Heres some updates with some of your suggestions. I added in an old letter, some ink splotches, confederate hat, glasses, and created the tabletop texture! I also put down the handle of the lantern :p Thanks for the help. I dont know how id go in making a feather for a quil pen though.
http://img529.imageshack.us/img529/7...nscene3gq3.jpg

You could try using paint effects to make a feather and just convert it to polygons and change the colors. Or, you could be professional about it and model the whole thing. Just duplicate each little one of the fletchings.

sparticus

Wow, nicely done. Wasn't expected updates like that so quickly. I think the hat was a great idea too. My wife is seeing it too and she also likes it.

As far as the quill, you could model the shape of it and then make an alpha map to use for the transparency. That way parts of the edges are transparent so it looks like feathers. I don't really know how to explain it any better and I don't have any experience with alpha maps. I just know how they work at this point. Perhaps someone else can explain it better if you've never done it before.

Thanks alot! That makes me feel good about what im making!
Ill attempt to make a feather, doesnt sound to hard, just time consuming (compared to its use) so ill add it in a little later on. Right now I just tweaked and added a couple things. I didnt do to much today, i was fairly busy. Ive just got to make a new leg for the wardrobe/borough thing. Tomorrow ill begin to model a musket to place on top of the wardrobe/borough thing. Do you have any suggestions on how to make this stand out as a 1700's room? Besides the quill pen that ill model soon.
http://img502.imageshack.us/img502/3320/17001co7.jpg

It would be sweet if you could make some smoke dynamics coming from the cigarette.
:beer:

Actually thats a pen, im going to be making a feather for it soon. In this new render I added a BlunderBust, an early form of the shotgun used at Civil war times. Ill be relighting the whole scene once im done too get a darker look, since the civil war time period wasnt exactly a joyous time.
http://img520.imageshack.us/img520/5...nscene3kz7.jpg

You have a real cartoon feel to this render... The edges of the desk and dresser are too beveled and not sharp enough..

The Blunderbuss needs to lie on its side, no weapon can sit on its side like that.

The glasses look like sunglasses and need to have raytracing enabled to allow the distosion of the papar under it.

The cap seems to be floating a little...

Good work, just some tweaking to be done. i suggest using Mental Ray as a render to minimise the toon look.

As I have just dabbled a little bit with alphas (doesn't make me any good at it yet) I can share what I've learned so far.

The basics is alphas are greyscale maps. 100% black is transparent, 100% white is opaque and you can get semi transparency with greys.

1) Learn from the pro's :p
Michael McKinley has done two tutorials on Alpha masks. One with how to set up image planes in the free video tutorials section or through his website (www.mtmckinley.net) I forgot which. I highly recommend this one as it explains technique. How maya works etc

The other video was through simplyphotoshop when that existed. This video is also good because it shows what alphas can do. Concepts.
Found it: http://www.simplymaya.com/movie_page...html?tut_id=93

2) Learn UV unwrapping. You will have total control where things go. Very controlled painting.

3) Images are complex yeah. I found it helpful to look at ref and convert ref images to black and white to remove some of the complexity. Colour is just distracting information. A black and white shows the outline and characteristics better. Find any feather image and B&W it and study before you paint your alpha mask.

4) Patience. They are finicky and tricky. Persistance is what will get the job done. I should have spent more time with the alpha maps. Feathers I believe can be tricky to paint. Both hard edges and the wispy qualities and overlaps.

Nice setting
 

But 2 remarks

The gun is lying/standing a bit weird.
The relection on the white of the clock should not be there imho.

Gr
M

Ok heres an update, i need to redo the clock texture though

http://img129.imageshack.us/img129/7...nscene4qg7.jpg

Great!
 

I had just a crazy thought.
Maybe you could put the clock on the cabinet, with the gun put upright against it.
on the table you leave the rest, with the candl lit?!!!!

Gr
M

I was thinking about doing that, but it would leave too much empty space on the cabinet thing, and a candle would be unnecessary since i already have a lantern in the scene :/
Heres an update, fixed some textures and illuminated better.

Nice update.
 

What I meant whas the lantern to be lit. Not an extra candle !!!
;)