[scotb]

Hi,

Im new to Maxwell and need some help achieving a clean white background.
Any hints and tips would be appreciated greatly.

Im lighting product shots in a very basic studio.

Im running maxwell in OSX, 2X 3.2 Quad Core Xeon, 6GB RAM

Thanks in advance

Scotb

[deflix]

make your material rgb230 - and render with lights at 6500k.

[lebbeus]

----or render with an alpha channel and use the shadow switch for your "floor"

then use Tom's awesome photoshop action to combine the alpha channel and the render, then just fill the bottom layer with white

[KurtS]

have a look here

[scotb]

Thanks for the replies guys, this gives me plenty of info to get going, i'll let you know how I progress, or if I need any further help.

Thanks again

Scotb

[bjorn.syse]

Yes, show us some screenshots or renders when you start experimenting perhaps we might be able to give you some specific hints..

[JDHill]

Here is an example which uses Hyltom's maps:



This was done for a coming Maxwell for Rhino tutorial, and you can get the complete scene here if you want it. If you don't have Rhino, you can download their eval and the Maxwell for Rhino plugin to take a look. There is no post-work - the background depends on the environment map used, and the shape of the backdrop:



It takes a few test renders to get the geometry right, where there are not unwanted reflections from the light source, nor reflections of the dark part of the environment. The side-shadows would need to be removed manually, if so desired, though it may also be possible to prevent them with a couple of carefully-placed fill lights.

[caryjames]

Nice render JD!!! I am looking forward to the tutorial.... now a challenge

It could be just me but I think that rendering jewellery is one of the most challenging areas. Highly reflective metals, gemstones with dispersion etc.

I have been trying to render reflective metals (gold, platinum) and single diamonds (like a solitaire engagement ring) on a white background. It is very difficult because of the contrasting materials involved. I would be happy to send you a sample engagement ring to see what you would come up with

I know guys like Blitzor and IOOIOO (sp?) are rendering rings on white backgrounds with success, but the examples that have been posted generally all have many diamonds and many metal details- they have not generally been large simple surfaces with single diamonds.

Add in a white background and you then have your metals washed out by the white from the environment- I have had a difficult time with the white background for jewellery. If you light the scene so that the gold doesn't have crazy reflections from your emitters you end up making your diamond look dead. If you light so that your diamond looks great you get patchy reflections of the light from your emitters in your metal.

It would be fun to see if you can come up with a solution for all of us Maxwell jewellery folks !

[scotb]

Hi JD,

Thanks for the free btl file, i'll give it a go. I am using Rhino 4.0 to model my designs, but I have been exporting them to render in Maxwell to utilise the processors and extra RAM.

Im running MAC OS X 2X 3.2 Quad core Xeon with 6GB of RAM, im running windows on fusion.

Thanks again

Scotb

[JDHill]

Hi Cary,

I doubt this scene would be good for jewelry, but I am interested in building one that would be. I can't justify the time to put together a scene like this for just one person, but I could make a deal with you: I don't have alot of time to model stuff, so if you provide me with a sample piece to render, I will use it to try to create a jewelry-rendering tutorial model like this - the idea is that eventually there will be several different types of scenes like this available, each fully set up, so that newer users can download and open them up, hit render to see the result, and then go back and take them apart to see how they work. As with this example, they will have notes which go through the various different aspects of rendering with Maxwell which they are meant to demonstrate.

Cheers...

[scotb]

Hi JD,

On the render console it recommends that this render is left to run for 9999 min. Is this required to get the sharp results as posted above? Can this be reduced or will the quality of the render deteriorate?

Also - Do you know of any sample scenes like the one attached for standalone maxwell?

Many Thanks

Scotb

[caryjames]

Hi JD- I would be more than happy to send you Rhino files of ring(s) for rendering. I can provide the final filleted models or the milling version so that you can fillet yourself if you prefer. I can provide you with single stone examples- these are the ones that I find the most challenging, as well I can provide you with multi stone models. Just PM me to let me know how to get them to you and I will send them off right away.
Thanks

[JDHill]

Hi Scot,

The plugin just defaults to 9999 minutes render time - you can always set it lower or stop the render early. I could not say how long it should take to render - that depends on the machine, but it is not a 'quick' scene. Lots of white = lots of energy = lots of math. Using an alpha-compositing strategy may be better in a given scenario, this scene just shows how to do it with natural lighting. I do not know of any scenes like this in MXS format, but you can just export this one from Rhino using the plugin and open that in Maxwell Studio if you want to.

Cary - sounds good. I would always prefer something which represents a 'common' scenario to something which falls into a certain niche, to make it useful to as many people as possible. As far as filleting, etc., that's up to you, but I'm not a jewelry guy, so I might screw up your model if it's not 'finished'. I think the gmail address in my profile can take up to 20MB attachments, so just let me know if that isn't enough. Also, make sure to send me any other info you'd like to have included, as far as credits go.

[caryjames]

Thanks JD- message sent

[scotb]

Hi JD,

I imported the file into MXS but the render starts to come through bleached.

I haven't changed any of the settings knowingly. Do you have any suggestions to why I am getting different results in MXS compared to the rhino plugin?

Thanks

Scott