Practicing photorealism

So, Photorealism, A very hard thing to maser. I am hoping to showcase my attempts and everything on this thread.
To start:





Any critique, improvments
Thanks

penny of thought

First… Title your thread accordingly to the intent/goal you wish to achieve & share your scene, as is much easier to communicate via examples.

Secondly, devise a simple but efficient exercise workflow: start with taking or choosing a photo (exercise/reference), then plan out what is the purpose of practice. Strive to achieve in mimicking that with tools and skills at your disposal. Abilities will grow with experience.
i.e. Lighting Glass

Lastly learn to help yourself (search for answers). The process is not hard, just a very long one to even consider & take into account all the details that form a photo-real image rather than master it all. At least know the basics of photography and CGI.

OK then. Thanks, I will be sure to recreate actual photographs in the future.
That actually helps me

The glass looks a bit too thick for a drinking glass. And the depth of field is really shallow.
The materials look good to me.

Good start!

Right… long time no see.
So ive been quite distracted lately and my full efforts havent actually been on learning blender.
Until now.
I have entered an art competition (http://www.youngcreativeawards.org/themes/2017-nottingham-future-city/) and i would like to produce something photorealistic. I have the sketches and the plan, now i have to execute them.
enjoy my first steps
a road.


Also this
Made the grass and on the final render i will add a particle system. for now, for quick and easy renders i have just added a bump map.


Some new night renders (dont tell me about the street lamps, these are temorary and will be replaced)



and this one, with the lights on

and some day shots (with TEST architecture)



And another


And more testing on different lights



At the moment you seem to focus on lighting which is coming along quite nicely in #9, #10 and #11 together with the texturing. Kind of blue hour shots in the morning as photographers would say. A bit too much on the blue side, perhaps. #7 and #8 are way too green for a night shot.

I understood that the lamps are placeholders. Beside the fact that realistic models are a vital part of photo realistic renders I see some problems with the scaling. The ratio between the road and the sidewalks isn’t correct. Correct scale is also vital.

Keep up the good work and much luck in the competition.

Thanks for the critique
I see what you mean about the sidewalks and the lamps. But at the moment i am just planning the scene out so everything that is here is not final. Since the competioin ends in just under a month, i have time to plan out my scene and slowly add details.

and these renders:



some more renders
Improvements:
-Widened pavement
-improved night lihgting



SOme more renders
Please ignore the horrible texturing on the streetlamps and the bad car models.




And some more background details.


And another few additions, including the colour change of the backgroung cars


Ok i have decided to switch to ultrawide resolution for these renders for two reasons. firstly, so i can actually iclude more in the shot and secondly so that when i animate a camera through the city, it will look cinematic.


Ok some night scenes. I dindnt really want to sacrifice the time for the noise so i left it.