UPDATE: After receiving feedback on both here and Reddit I decided to rerender this scene with improved lighting, colour correction and DoF, and will now stop updating it because otherwise I'll be here forever.
"People often think in this city that crime is the easy way out, the path you take when you have no other options. Goddamn, how mistaken they are. If they knew the struggles I faced and the opportunities I declined to get this far, then they might begin to actually comprehend and fear the "organised" in "organised crime". They're right about one thing however; the only thing crime pays in, is blood..."
Guess writing lore about my renders is gonna be a thing now, huh? Sorry in advance. Haven't really uploaded anything in ages, but that's due to the previous class just being a massive sponge of my time. Looking forward to making those projects gallery-worthy but that'll be another day.
It's taken me six months to finally get around to doing my first fully fledged scene, and for my first attempt I don't think I did too bad. Forgot to apply DoF and after 19 hours of rendering decided to wing it and - as usual - the materials I made aren't as good as I'd like but overall I'm happy with what I've made. I also added a distortion effect but I can't decide which one I like more so I uploaded both (after the updated version however I only have a distorted version).
So now that this is done, I got a few goals for the forseeable future:
1. Actually remember that DoF exists and use it.
2. Get the guts to finally open Substance and git gud.
3. Fully partake in the upcoming class and being an asset whilst learning a few things.
4. Study anatomy and model characters.
Feedback and criticism - regardless of severity - is always welcome! I appreciate all of you who took the time to look at this and I wish you all the best of luck in your Blender journeys!
Uses textures from Poliigon, Textures.com and TextureHaven.
tbrbn Ta very much! Yeah you're definitely right about the focal point, my train of thought for this one was "I'll just make the focal point really, REALLY bright, that'll do," not the greatest decision haha. It's something I've kept in mind for all my other renders so seeing it being criticized here proves how important it is. Appreciate the feedback!
I missed the first version so can't compare, but impressive work!! I really like that you made an actual scene with a backstory, we tend to see less and less of these, now it's mostly assets and sculpts. Quite refreshing and brings some nostalgia!
I like the dirty tone you gave to the ambiance. My piece of advice for next time is to think about the rule of third: , then try to place your main element (the XXX sign? The hand holding the gun?) in one of the key spot (that is, at the intersection of the virtual gridlines): it catches the attention for quicker. Without it the viewer can be lost and don't really know what to look at first.
But splendid work, looking forward to your next one buddy!
jakeblended Why ta very much! Glad it was worth the effort, the reception I've recieved seems to be much better!
I think the relighting and color-correction is spot-on. Awesome work!
williamatics No Suzanne there I'm afraid, just a toilet and a plastic cup. Good idea though, maybe I'll hid her in my subsequent renders...
thecabbagedetective She's in the lower right corner next to a trash bag.
williamatics Wait you do? I never added her haha.
jakeblended Why ta very much, I think the main problem is that it's too dark, which the folks at Reddit pointed out. So decided I'll be rerendering it to fix this alongside a couple other issues I have.
I actually wanted to have the scene raining initially but yeah... too much work haha.
I spy Suzanne!
This is adequate.
:)
Really though, it's pretty darn good actually. I think the technical element of this scene that I like the most is the half-dry water puddles on the concrete. If I had any kind of criticism, it would be that it took me a little bit of time examining the image before I actually noticed your primary story elements - although I'm not practiced enough to be able to offer any idea how to go about correcting that (unless subtlety is what you were going for, in which case never mind).
When you've practiced enough with Substance I'll be curious to find out your opinion on whether Polligon or Substance is worth springing for first (limited budget).