Well, I’ve been having a dry spot business-wise these past few weeks, so I decided to really focus on a city I started years ago. I was putting this in my Spaceship Movie WIP thread, but this kind of became a project by itself, so I decided to open another thread and show this off. =)
The buildings look rather good, but several things caught my eye.
First off the texture for the skyway signs look stretched, if not, they seem to be lacking, maybe a supporting font of a second size? Or maybe the letters/arrows themselves could give off light.
The lamps for the signs are also visibly low poly in the high-res render.
The water caused a double take on my end. On the right of the image, it looks like the area closer to the viewer is sand, and beyond that is water. However when you are close to the city, it is obviously water with cruise-liners, and that second horizon is, well, I don’t really know what it is…
The glass on the buildings have way too wavy reflections.
Finally the three guys at the bottom are all in very similar poses ;).
I did this as an answer to some problems with Z values where some faces were starting to occlude others. But perhaps I should soften the curve instead of having it simply a sharp crease.
The lamps are low res right now. I’m still working on them. =)
Sign letters giving off light! Awesome idea! =D
Building windows too wavy, yes.
As I said, right on all counts. Some of the things I stopped noticing, others are just the result of the pic being a WIP. =)
P.S., I suppose you wouldn’t be interested in building a bridge for this picture?
I would suppress the statue that IMHO doesn’t match the city’s style, it seems out of place. I would add some inner lights on the buildings.
Great pic anyway.
It’s a great image. I love that I can look at it for several minutes and still find new details. Detail is always good.
I am moderatley confused by the statue. It is fine to see relics from the past in the middle of a high tech metorpolis, but it doesn’t look entirely like a relic from the past. For one, it is too large to have been made very long ago. The average cruise ship is around 300m long. Assuming that that is an average cruise ship in front of the statue, the statue is 800 or 900m tall. The Great Pyramid is only about 150m tall, and I think the Colossus of Rhodes was about 30m tall. Plus it is built on a modern looking stand in the middle of the water. Is it a recently-constructed religious symbol? In that case it just doens’t seem to fit right. Perhaps you could down-size it and move it closer to the camera to make it more believable and keep the awe-inspiring ability.
Also, the water doesn’t look right. Costal waters are not that smooth unless there are barrier islands just offshore. You can also see the curvature of the Earth on a real coast (or it seems that way at the coast where I live). Water tends to make reflections of the sun look kind of wavy and jittery instead of crystal clear. And finally the horizon over the water seems to have a slight haze.
The statue is a bit of a story. There’s a lot of story about this city. Suffice it to say, it’s a semi-religious symbol for a guy they pretty much worship that ended a war for them all those years ago. The statue is huge, and is not archaic, though it’s designed to look that way. What I’m not thrilled with is the pose. I think if the pose were a bit more alien-ish, it could work.
But if you notice in Star Wars, it’s a highly mechanized and advanced society, yet they still build statues of the emperor, which is being pulled down at the end of RoTJ. The statue looks like it could be from the Middle Ages. I think the pose is what makes the statue look more archaic than it really is. =)
As for the water, the horizon seems curved because of the curvature of your eye. To actually see the curvature of the earth, you have to almost go into orbit. I could add a bit of a curve to fool the eye, I suppose, though. =D
Here is an update, using some of Otto’s recommendations!
Well, did some more work on the thing today. =) I fixed the row of similar buildings. Added more variety there. Did some tweaking on the water. Fixed the traffic signs (they were pointing the wrong direction :o) and added some little traffic markers, although I’m not thrilled with them at all. I might just make them big traffic lights. That might be better! Yeah! :eyebrowlift2:
Still to do:
Fix that stinking statue… oi… I don’t want to have to do all the cloth sim and stuff again. But a little extra work never killed anyone… well, it did… but I think the odds are in my favor.
I agree with what everyone has said so far - especially the statue. I understand that the statue needs to be there for the story, But i think its the pose of the statue that is the problem - yeah, the Cloth simulator is a pain, but it does need changing a little. Its the back of the statue (I think…my eyes might be bad), so it doesn’t seem to quite fit - maybe turning the statue, to the side, or moving it so that you can see more of it might help? I don’t know, its all down to your feelings really
Also an observation, the alien writing from the 2nd highest Skyscraper is backwards on one side? (Probably from being mirrored?) Not that it matters, it could be just different letters
Can’t wait for this to be finished (as well as your Spaceship Movie!)
Well, I finally got some time to work on the project a little more.
I wasn’t happy at all with how mashed up the city looked. This was because I was using a 55 mm lens (why, I don’t know :no:). So I brought it down to 35 mm, moved the camera forward a little, and now the city looks like… well, it’s got more… goodiness… What do you think?
I also updated the statue. That was a day’s effort right there, but now it’s looking much more futuristic and alien-y!
I fixed the text on the tall building in the background, which Phoenix492 kindly pointed out. It was mirrored and I can’t believe I didn’t see it. =\
The purple reflection on the water far away… the only reason that I can think of that could be causing it is the atmosphere simulation for the sun lamp, which is fading out the background… I’m trying to think of a way to fix it. Probably adding a few more nodes and setting the ocean to a separate render layer…but that’ll affect the reflection of the city model…hmm.
I’m much more happy with the building placement in this scene.
EDIT: Here is a color corrected version, which I threw together in Gimp. Gimp’s color correction is a great deal more precise, because Gimp has those nifty magic wand select tools to pinpoint specific parts of the picture.
But a little extra work never killed anyone… well, it did… but I think the odds are in my favor. 
