May_e

ISSUE 04 MAY 2006

CGArena

Get Attention in Computer Graphics Community

Gallery

Showcase of latest 3d inspiring art

Photoshop

Free Style Painting Reticulum Effect

After Effects Old Film Look

Interview

Steven Stahlberg

3ds Max

Gone with the wind

3d Challenge Autumn

contents

05 Interview

12 3d Challenge

18 Composition

20 Photoshop

23 Photoshop

25 After Effects

Steven Stahlberg

Active Space

Reticulum Effect

Autumn

Free Style Painting

Old Film Look

30 3ds Max

Gone with the wind

34 Gallery

Showcase of latest 3d inspiring art

Magazine Designed & Edited: Ashish Rastogi, India Magazine Cover Image: Jiri Adamec, Czech Republic Challenge Sponsors: Vertus, Duber Studio, GPU-Tech, Realviz, ambientLight, Redway3d

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Issue 04 May 2006

industry news Video Games impact on US economy

Formula to convert Black & White into color It may have taken a long time to add colour to the decades old super hit movie Mughal-e-Azam, but a man in India has claimed to have devised a methodology that can convert black and white movies into colour print at minimal cost with the help of a computer software.

With his innovative idea, the twenty-eight year old Jyotin Rajpara claims to do wonders in changing melodies of yesteryears’ into find colour prints without costing too much.

Presently, he is working on indian black and white films like--Shree 420, Madhumati, Dosti and even Mughale-Azam.

Jyotin has already sent copies of his work to different companies. He claims that he has received feedback from some American companies and hopes for a good offer from them in the future.

Source: www.newkerela.com

The video game industry has an impact on the US economy well beyond its sales of consoles and software, according to a new report for the Entertainment Software Association.

Doug Lowenstein, ESA president, said at the E3 trade show in Los Angeles that while sales of video games and hardware totalled $10.3bn in 2004, the industry generated another $7.7bn in economic impact.

As well as calculating a total impact of $18bn on the US economy in 2004, they forecast the industry would support 265,000 jobs by 2009, up from 144,000 in 2004. “Clearly, the entertainment software industry is not just about fun and games,” their report concludes. “It is a serious business that improves training, efficiency, and productivity in a variety of industries.”

Source: www.news.ft.com

Buzzword of the Month Armature - An armature is the skeleton of a stop-motion model

or puppet or of an animatronic figure. Early stop-motion armatures were made of wire, later ones of steel, and since the 1930s most have included ball – and – socket joints to allow for more realistic poses.

Armatures for animatronic figures have advanced mechanism that provide realistic live-action movements, and they are covered not by clay but by simulated musculature made of foams, elastics, spandex or other fabrics overlaid with a foam latex skin.

These days, unique modeling system allows you to create just about anything you can imagine because every piece of your armature is fully interchangeable (right armature) with full range of motion for an infinite variety of poses and movements to give your completed character attitude and personality with realistic movement.

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interview

AN INTERVIEW WITH Steven Stahlberg Please tell something about yourself, family and your background in the CG. I’m Swedish/Australian, I’m married with 2 boys and we live in Malaysia now. I’m completely self-taught in CG, but I had a few years of traditional art school before getting into that.

Your art always include sexiest women and mostly nude. So, your wife doesn’t have any objection on this and how you show your art to the children?

No. We’re both mature and from a culture open about the human body. The kids? They don’t care, they’re bored by my work.

Once you said, Americans often prefer bigger breasts, while Brazilians prefer bigger butts. So you are with Americans or Brazilians? And don’t you think ‘bigger is better’ don’t work here.

I don’t really like bigger than average breasts that much, so I guess I’m with the Brazilians on this one.

Which software you used for modeling and why?

Maya only, so far. Not Zbrush yet, mostly due to lack of time and the difficulties I have of getting used to the navigational hotkeys.

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interview

AN INTERVIEW WITH Steven Stahlberg

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interview

AN INTERVIEW WITH Steven Stahlberg Which are your preferred method of modeling Poly, Nurbs or splines and what’s the reason of that?

Polygons, definitely. I started out learning NURBS but polygons are better for organic branching surfaces.

You have never thought of creating a Training DVD on creating a sexiest women modeling and texturing?

A book, maybe. A DVD would be pirated. I already have run 3 sold-out workshops online (through CGTalk) on this very subject, so in fact a book would be the next logical step. If I ever get time.

Tell us about Optidigit and Androidblues, and you are always in Malaysia or roaming everywhere.

Me and my partner tried to start a company here in Malaysia. We called it Optidigit. Our business idea was to be a teaching center and production center at the same time; this part of our business we named Android Blues, after my screenplay. We knew from the start it was going to be difficult, because the market inside Malaysia is tiny, but there are many advantages here too. We were counting on help from the government, who were promising stuff left and right. But we got no help. We then found a local partner who promised money but they ran out of it after a few months. We then found an international client who promised a big contract, but he was jailed for fraud less than a year later… in short, Optidigit closed after three years of agonizing. Now, I freelance from my home, and everything is much better. I also do some traveling to give seminars and workshops.

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interview

AN INTERVIEW WITH Steven Stahlberg Tell us something about your recent or upcoming projects.

Recently I lectured in Copenhagen for two weeks, before that three days in Taiwan. Both wonderful visits to exotic places.

Please tell us about your favourite work and in brief about making too.

I guess my favorite would still be ‘One Last Time’, the girl with the dragon-snake thing… no particular reason, I just think it turned out better than my other stuff that’s all. Making it? I started with a 2d image, which I finished perhaps a little too much. That took about 1 week. Then I used that as reference and made a 3d version, which took about 2 weeks.

What are your hobbies and where do you see yourself in 5 years?

I love to collect and watch good movies. In 5 years? I have no idea.

I’d like to be more involved somehow with movie making.

Please describe your free time, if you have any.

Watching TV, jogging, finding and trying new restaurants, playing with the kids…

Would you like to give any message to the readers?

Never trust a government promise. Never trust a promise from a big corporation either; in fact, never put your trust in anyone’s promise, the money is NOT yours until it’s in your hands.

Thanks a lot Steven for taking out sometime for us from your busy schedule.

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Issue 04 May 2006

interview

AN INTERVIEW WITH Steven Stahlberg

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Issue 04 May 2006

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challenge CGArena is proud to present “Autumn” Challenge (3D Challenge), 22 May - 21 June 2006, sponsored by GPU Tech, Vertus, Realviz, Ambient Light, Duber Studio and Redway3d. We want different ideas and approaches in a more creative way.

Your Mission Create an image which shows Autumn. This Challenge is a Work-In-Progress Challenge -- all contestants are required to post their work-in-progress images for community to critique/comment in order to qualify.

How the Challenge will be Run This challenge will be a WIP (Work in Progress) Challenge. Each challenger is required to submit Work In Progress (WIP) images, from the initial concept sketch to the final render. The purpose is that everyone can learn from each other, offer feedback and critiques.

1. Enter the Challenge by registering yourself on CGArena forum.

2. Submit your work in progress images in forum on a regular basis.

3. Participate in the community by critiquing other challengers works in the respective forums.

4. Submit your final entry till 21st June 2006, midnight 12:00 GMT. 5. There will be 3 winners in this 3D Challenge and CGArena, Sponsers and Judges decision will be final.

First Prize Redway3d Redviewer- $1260USD

Redviewer is a 3D interactive module for Autodesk® 3ds Max® / VIZ (Autodesk® Maya® release available in Q4-06). Fully integrated to the Autodesk® 3ds Max® / VIZ User Interface, it enables interactive ray tracing previews at all stages of the 3D production workflow. It supports all kinds of shadows: point lights, area lights, shadow maps, colored and opacity map shadows and even true reflections, transparencies and advanced materials displays!

Realviz MMTrack for Max or Maya- $560USD

MMTrack for 3ds Max® & MMTrack for Maya are two brand new tracking products, which draw on the power and speed of MatchMover Pro 4 “powered by SMART”.

The plug-ins, fit seamlessly into the workflow of the 3ds Max®/ Maya® user, and combine new-generation automatic tracking technology with an unbeatable range of features, enabling users to access this world-class product at the simple click of button.

* * GPU-Tech RTSquare - $560USD

RTSquare is a 3D rendering software designed with a new architecture to accelerate rendering. It takes advantage of the programmability, performance, and quality of your GPU to render imagery of uncompromising quality at unheard-of speeds. It enables users to browse and render a 3D scene in real time with all common rendering features. A tree that describes the current scene allows the user to edit all rendering parameters in Real Time.

Vertus Fluid Mask 2.0 - $199USD

The Fluid Mask is a highly advanced software tool designed to make life easier for everyone who creates cut outs. Built as a plug-in to Adobe Photoshop, Fluid Mask is the new next-generation cut-out tool. Behind the product is breakthrough technology that mimics the way the eye, optic-nerve and brain perform visual processing. It offers an intuitive, accurate and fast approach to cut outs.

ambietLight Multibay Texture Bundle - $130USD

Multibuy Offer includes our entire range of Texture Packs. All of our packs are at a minimum of 1024 pixels square and are hand edited so that they tile perfectly, whatever application you use them in!

challenge Second Prize * * GPU-Tech RTSquare - $560USD

RTSquare is a 3D rendering software designed with a new architecture to accelerate rendering. It takes advantage of the programmability, performance, and quality of your GPU to render imagery of uncompromising quality at unheardof speeds.

Realviz VTour - $580 USD

Starting directly from digital photographs, or from full 360 degree panoramas (created using Stitcher, for example), VTour facilitates the creation of 3D scenes such as interiors (rooms, buildings…etc) or urban zones (places, streets… etc), using polygonal photo-textured primitives. The results can be exported/published as either a 3D movie, or as an interactive application using 3D viewers such as Spi-V3D viewer (based on Shockwave®) or Virtools Web Player.

Duber Studio Training DVD (3DVD’s) - $88USD

Duber Training DVD’s by Loocas Duber, contains over 18 hours worth of tutorials covering topics such as organic modeling, pelt mapping, classic mapping, painting maps (color map, bump map, specular map, reflection map) in English and Czech language.

* * ambientLight Plants and Trees Bundle - $70

This Bundle includes our range of plant and tree products. Currently five different texture packs.

Third Prize * * GPU-Tech RTSquare - $560USD

RTSquare is a 3D rendering software designed with a new architecture to accelerate rendering. It takes advantage of the programmability, performance, and quality of your GPU to render imagery of uncompromising quality at unheard-of speeds.

** ambientLight Road and Car Park Bundle - $47USD

This bundle include both the Road and Car Park Photoshop texture generators. These multilayered files enable you to add and remove different elements to the texture tile so that you will always get a seamless result whatever combinations you choose.

Consolation Prize (Every Qualified Entry will receive) * * Duber Head Rigging Modeling Video Tutorial - $5USD

The entire process needed in order to create a fairly flexible, usable and fast head/face rig, that you can either further enhance or build on, or actually use as is in your character workflow. This one hour, fully narrated, videotutorial covers the head/neck rigging, operational jaw bone rigging and a bit more complex eyes and eye lids rigging.

All titles marked with this sign ( * * ) available as downloadable from the sponser website.

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composition

Active Space When you’re render or capture a picture of a moving subject, you’ll normally find your most successful shots come when you leave space in the frame for your subject to ‘move into’. This area can be called ‘active space’, as it’s where your subject’s actively moving into.

The space behind a moving subject is generally dead space which is why many images tend to lose their dynamism if there’s proportionally more of it.

Even artistic motion-blurred shots work best when there’s some room for your creation to escape into..

Where’s your subject looking?

The idea of ‘active space’ can also be applied to stationary subjects and the direction in which they’re looking. If your subject’s on the right of the frame looking left, give them more space to look into on the left of the frame, and vice versa. But if you want to create a sense of mystery or place emphasis on your subject’s environment, experiment with putting them closer to the edge of the frame they’re looking towards.

Even the direction your subject is looking or moving towards can make a subtle difference to your picture’s message. Images where the movement is from left to right will feel as if they ‘flow’ more smoothly.

If you want to provide a more arresting viewing experience, try capturing action moving from the right of the frame to the left.

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composition

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photoshop

Free Style Painting

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photoshop This tutorial utilise the History Brush to turn any picture or photo into an free style painting.

Step One To start off, open an image you want to turn into an “artistic” piece of art.

Step Two First thing you need to do is create a new layer, so simply go to Layer>New->Layer. Click OK on the dialog box and you should have a new layer.

Set your foreground color to white (press D to reset the color palletes, then press X to set foreground to white) Now use the Paint Bucket tool or Ctrl + Backspace to fill the new layer with white.

Step Three Now open your “History” pallete. If its not open, go to Windows ->History If you followed the tutorial correctly, you should now have the same history as mine.

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photoshop Step Four Next, click on the empty box to the left of the “Open” item on the history pallete to mark the history brush.

Then in the Toolbox, select and hold down the History Brush, then select “Art History Brush”.

Step Five At the top you will see a toolbar for the history brush. This is where you can set different variables for the brush, so select the brush size and style you want to use (experiment is the key here).

Six Step Then simply use the brush and paint on top of the white layer. You will see that the brush will start painting the image of the original layer, in an artistic style.

Final Step After you’ve painted the whole image, go to Filter->Sharpen->Unsharp Mask, and enter the following settings: Amount: 200%, Radius: 1px, Threshold: 0

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photoshop

An effect that is getting more and more popularity eash day is the reticulum background in texts, turning in a good and different way to call attentionto any subject.

Three easy Steps to...

Reticulum Effect

1) Open your image and ctrl click on the image for selection. Expand your selection 10 pixels by using the menu Select > Modify > Expand.

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2) Activate the Quick Mask mode by pressing “ Q “ key and apply Filter > Pixelate > Color Halftone. Repeat this filter 2-3 times on the image according to requirement by pressing key Ctrl + F. Deactivate the Quick mask mode by pressing the “Q” key again.

3) Create a new layer using the layers palette and apply a black color in the selection. Let’s built black contour around the image by Ctrl click on the name for selection and expand selection 5 pixels.

Fill the selection with black color.

Issue 04 May 2006

3D Objects, Textures, E-books, Free digital Art Magazines, you will always find a way to be inspired in the : IT’S ART STORE

Gizelle for Miki by ExpressImage

Buy, sell, affiliate, there are so many ways to earn money with our Store

http://www.itsartmag.com

after effects

Shatter Source Animation: Jamba

Old Film Look !!!

Film scratches come in two shades; black or white. Black scratches are created during the shoot (perhaps by a dirty gate) and appear on the negative as white lines. When the positive print is made (the one you see in the theatre), the white becomes black. White scratches are created on the print of the film after it has been run through too many dirty projectors and the emulsion is scratched off.

Step 1: Create a New Composition and Import your video clip. Place the clip in your Timeline Step 2: Create a New Solid (Control+Y). Make the solid the same size as the composition. Name the layer scratches.

Step 3: To the Scratches layer, apply the Fractal Noise effect and choose following settings.

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after effects Step 4: Decreasing the amount of noise is done by changing the Contrast and Brightness settings. Increasing the Contrast value to 250 and lowering the Brightness value to -100 is a great place to start.

If you want to increase the number of scratches, begin by increasing the Brightness value. To make some scratches more pronounced than others, increase the Contrast value.

Step 5: For moving the scratches, Create an initial keyframe for Offset Turbulence by clicking on the Stopwatch icon.

Move to the end of the Timeline by pressing the End key on your keyboard. Change the Offset Turbulence Y-axis value to a really large negative number (like -10000). The reason we are using a negative number is so the scratches move from the bottom of the screen to the top.

Step 6: When you are satisfied with your scratches, change the Transfer Mode of the Scratches layer to Add.

Now that we have completed the scratches for our old film, let’s create some crud. The crud build up I am talking about usually comes from improper storage of the film. This can lead to stains, mildew, mold and the like to damage the film.

Step 7: Create a New Layer. Make this layer the same size as your composition, change the color to black. Apply the Fractal Noise effect to this layer. Change the Contrast value to 350 and lower the Brightness value to -100. Reduce the opacity to 50% (according to footage).

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after effects Step 8: With the Timeline Indicator at the beginning of the Timeline, create an initial keyframe for the Evolution control in the Effect Controls Panel. Move the Timeline Indicator to the end of the Timeline and crank the Evolution amount to a high number. In this example I used a value of 2000 rotations and change the Transfer Mode to Silhouette Luma.

Step 9: To create a Sepia look for your movie, create an Adjustment layer, and place it just above your video layer in the Timeline. To the Adjustment layer, apply the Tint effect. Change the Map White To color to the Sepia tone of your choice.

Final Step: Make the solid the same size as the composition, change the color to black. You will need to apply a round mask to the layer. An easy way to do this is to change the Mask Tool to an Oval and then double click on the tool icon.

This will create an oval mask the size of the layer. Invert the mask and change the Feather Amount to 200. If you want to go for even greater realism, create another Adjustment layer in your Timeline and adjust the Brightness/Contrast of the video layer over time.

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Issue 04 May 2006

your mission In March, your mission was to create a image on “Home and Fire” theme.

Here is the winning image... ...........................................................................................................................

Name: Marco Antonio Delgado Mayordomo (with prizes) Country: Madrid, Spain Email: webmaster@pixeltale.com Software Used: Softimage XSI Website: www.pixeltale.com CGArena Id: madelgado Making of Home and Fire Scene: READ HERE

3ds max

Gone with the Wind Step 1: Open your object in 3dsmax which you want to blow and drag a PF Source in the viewport.

Step 2: Press “6” for open a particle view window. And delete the following four operators from the event.

Or without creating a PFsource in the viewport you can press a shorcut key “6”. Right click in the window and select New > Particle System > Empty Flow. Its on you whichever method you choose.

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3ds max Step 3: Drag a Position Object operator from below depot and add a object in the Emitter objects panel.

Step 5: Add Sdeflector in the scene and animate from top to bottom of the object. Now add Collison operator in the particle view window and add deflector in the deflectors list.

Step 6: Now if you play the scene then particles will go down after collision with the deflector because in particle view collisions settings - Collides speed set as Bounce. Change this to Continue, after this you will not see any motion in the scene.

Step 4: Change the Birth “Emit Start” & “Emit Stop“ to 0 and amount value in thousands.

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3ds max Step 7: Your effect is almost complete, just add a wind in the scene and set the settings according to the requirement and scene scale. Add a force operator in a new event and connect to the collision. Add the wind space warp in the force Space Warps list.

Add more wind and drag space warp for more realistic effect.

Apply material and motion blur on the particles for better result.

Source: Allan Mckay Video

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www.cgarena.com CGArena brings you latest news and happenings 24 hours a day.

Plus, join in our interactive forums to showcase your work, and get attention in the computer graphics community

Email: contact@cgarena.com

gallery

Dowager Jiri Adamec, Czech Republic astil@a-stil.com 3dsmax, Photoshop

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gallery

Death of Innocence Mahir Celik, Turkiye mahircelik@gmail.com 3dsmax, Vray, CAT, Photoshop

Incercarecu Olga Ciob, Romania olgaciob@yahoo.com Photoshop Page 35

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gallery

Orc Warrior Sven Rabe, Germany d-e-a-n@gmx.de Softimage XSI, Photoshop, Zbrush

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gallery

Self Illumination Andre Kutscherauer, Germany info@ak3d.de 3dsmax, Rhino 3D

Venus Anselm v. Seherr - Thoß, Germany mail@3Delicious.de 3dsmax 7, Photoshop CS2, AE 6

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gallery

House Dhanish Gajjar, India dhanish1@gmail.com 3dsmax 7

Old Alley Gary Smith, USA viper680@hotmail.com 3dsmax, Vray

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gallery

Guards Ziv Qual, Israel ziv@zivcg.com 3dsmax, Mentalray, Photoshop

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gallery

College Paco Morales, Mexico paco_morales01@yahoo.com 3dsmax, Vray, Photoshop

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gallery

Nebula Denes Istvan, Romania denes_isti@yahoo.com 3dsmax 6, Photoshop

Home and Day Marco Delgado, Spain webmaster@pixeltale.com Softimage XSI

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submission

How to send in your images...

We showcase the cream of reader images in E-Zine and on website - here’s how to get yours noticed

BY EMAIL

This is by far the quickest and easiest way to send your images to us. Send the images on ezine@cgarena.com and include the following details in the email. a) Your Name, Image Title, Software Used, Your Country b) JPEG format at 300 dpi (if possible) and any other detail you like to add.

Upload Images through Website Follow this link http://www.cgarena.com/submit.php

To Advertise: contact@cgarena.com