Help with SENMM

[xMANIGHTx]

I don\'t like the effect that came up on Irix staff. It should be a SENMM effect but it\'s not very realistic...
Consider that this is a direct scan of the model, so it has a huge amount of light on it, in particular on the staff (with SENMM effect) wich is closer to the scanner glass.
With normal light the effect is much darker. But I guess there is some other mistake not just it\'s \"brightness\".. colors? disposition of the lines? fading directions?
Here is it: http://www.audiopro.it/userz/rackham/irixbeta3.jpg
Any suggestion?

 

[Chrispy]

Yeah, even if this was close to real light, that is a really dark sky unless it was close to night. I suggest using a light blue. As for the curved surface, I think it may be better to put the right side\'s lighter colors inward, like the one on the left. Note that this will be staring up at the sky, and so there will be no earth color.

I have a SENMM up now you may want to look at:
http://www.coolminiornot.com/go.php?go=articlephp&aid=191

good luck, the rest looks great!

 

[Rachel]

which bit of the staff?

Cos the *staff* looks unpainted, so I guess you mean the blade part of it?

I\'d like to be more specific with any help, but unfortunately with the angle of your scan I can\'t tell how the staff is angled to the ground. Unless the blade is completely vertical though, I don\'t think the lines would go like that.

It looks like you might need to paint pure sky on top and pure earth below, as it kinda looks like it might be fairly flat to the ground. In which case you\'re just going to have a regular gradient I think (not too sure about that particular situation).

The two main things to think about are it\'s orientation to the ground, and the surfaces themselves. Eg bits that only face up will only reflect sky, bit\'s that only face down will only reflect earth, and bits that are pretty much vertical will reflect them both with a nice horizontal (horizontal to the ground, not to the object) horizon (You know, the more I type that word the wierder it looks ).

I\'m gonna be the first to say it, but I probably won\'t be the last - go read Chrispy\'s article and look really hard at the diagrams, because they\'re extremely helpful.

What your Irix\'s weapon does look like, however, is glowy funky energy, which is a very cool effect in itself .

also, I think you may have the fade on one gradient incorrect - they should both go dark-light dark-light from the \'top\', it looks like your \'earth\' bit goes light-dark from the horizon.

Her skin looks very nice btw.

 

[Rachel]

Originally posted by Rachel
I\'m gonna be the first to say it, but I probably won\'t be the last - go read Chrispy\'s article and look really hard at the diagrams, because they\'re extremely helpful.

Curses! not the first... damn these fast typists who get stuff out while I\'m still composing my message

 

[xMANIGHTx]

Chrispy:
Thanks mand for your suggestion (I already read and printed out your great article.. )
By the way I guess you were right on many points. First of all the blade looks upwards so there should be no earth at all (LOL) but this is my first NMM model at all and I wanted to do some experiment.
Assuming there\'s earth too, colors are too much dark (the sky is too dark) and the earth is faded in the wrong direction as Rachel says (and it\'s too much dark either)... I hope next time I\'ll have better luck with it...
Now since after all this is a magic (FIRE/WATER) staff I improved the overall effect of the icy side of the staff (originally SENMM LOL) and keep it this way...
http://www.audiopro.it/userz/rackham/irixbeta6.jpg
I\'m adding some \"rune-like\" in the middle, what do you think about them? (the runes are still WIP too) Too crappy?
http://www.audiopro.it/userz/rackham/irixbeta5.jpg

Thanx Rachel for your suggestion too.. The same I said to Chrispy is for you.

 

[Vallan]

Go ahead,waist a mini...

Though I absolutly LOVED Chris\' articale to make sure I got everything right I used a chrome spray (from an auto store) that I had left over from another project and covered a mini and used a small plains pic from a magezine (to get scale) and a light to represent the sun. I used a paladin in plate mail to get all the angles I could. Not perfect by far but when I get a digital camera thats worth a dang, or a decent scanner to load my pics I\'ll show ya\'ll how It came out. :flip::bouncy::flip:

 

[xMANIGHTx]

This is a cool idea vallan!! Really... It would be useful to have the pics on!

About the \"runes\" on Irix staff.. I deleted them and started from scratch!! Yep! I don\'t want random symbols but a repetitive pattern wrapping himself all around the staff and it has to be GOLD!!! lol ...

 

[Vallan]

Little help please...

Okay, so SENMM is great and Chrispy tells it like it is in his article. But what do you do if you want to SENMM something gold? ??? AHA! :idea: Do you think it would work if you did it normally and used a yellow wash over the top? Or is there a better way? Hope you can help. :flip::bouncy::flip:

 

[xMANIGHTx]

I guess changing colors from the start would give the same effect (white-yellow/dark brown-light brown) for gold.
Washing all over the blended area (actually glazing) with yellow shouldn\'t give a nice result I guess...