Blender, I’ve noticed, goes through a specific process when rendering in parts. It renders darker, but once it completes a section it gets lighter. Well, I have no idea what’s going on under the hood, but I frequently seem to prefer the darker, more saturated/contrasty version better. Uhm, here, let me show you an example:
See? The darker portions are being rendered and the lighter portions are already done. And the portions that are already complete just look so… gray. Is there a setting I don’t know about that’s making it lighter? Gamma?
Soooo, I’m just wondering what’s actually happening here and if there’s any way to hold on to the darker renders. Of course I could get the same effect with the node editor, but uh, that would take more work.
Hey LotR junkie, play around with the Gamma setting in any 2D imaging software should revert the image to the darker look you are looking for. (although it’s probably not 100% accurate)
Ive looked at you’re site and know you’re even more familiar with After Effects than I am. The nodes compositor will allow you to use blending modes in the same way that AE does without going to an external app. The following screenshot uses a “Divide” blending mode followed by a “Mix” blending mode to show the extremes that this method can produce but it is perfectly suited for achieving the look you desire and I have been using it lately for almost EVERYTHING that I produce in Blender for the same reason you have outlined above. If you use a pre-rendered image layer colored slightly different than the render layer(which I have also done in the screen shot) you can achieve slightly to dramatically different results than when blending the same image or render or image layer back into itself, but I probably didn’t need to tell you that part. The node editor doesn’t really require that much more work. I don’t know how I ever got along without the nodes.
BTW, many thanx for the camera tracker tutes!
Edit: Multiply seems to work best for achieving the look you want.
Of course I could get the same effect with the node editor, but uh, that would take more work.