[koji_maruyama]

Well, the circuit braker in my room is not really a problem, so don't worry and thanks.
It was just because I was using 2 computers and washing machine and electric pot and so on simultaneously. It's my fault.

And...well, I have to say in this scene I just used an already-modelled cherry blossom from one of xfrog libraries which are on sale. I didn't modeled them...
In the first post, I said "modeled by xfrog" and my saying was incorrect. I am sorry.

But it's true that I am a xfrog user and often model trees by myself as below (this time I used Onyx Tree and applied the settings of thinSSSS material you gave to me)
This time it's not cherry blossom but maple, late in the afternoon.

It is beautiful, isn't it? Thanks to your guidance.


And, the overillumination was due to the directional sunlight as you said. The rendered image of the close up was as below.


Yes, you are right.

And, as to the HDR image, please give me some more time for adjusting the direction of the sun.

[koji_maruyama]

(from Koji. after passing almost one week...)
I managed to try HDR map and the result is as below:


And yes, this time there is no bright surfaces of the blossom planes which are supposed to be reflecting sunlight directly.

And...honestly speaking, I am getting feeling a bit guilty of having imported the cherry blossom model which is directly available from xfrog library on sale.
Because this clearly means I have made little effort before asking for any help into this forum.

And so, well, it might be a strange idea but this time I have created a cherry blossom model by myself as below.

(I am using the same textures because I don't have any other nice textures of the trees.)

And I replaced the original cherry models in my scene with my newly created ones and rendered as below.


On the upper right part of the image, there is an unusually fat branch and my models of cherry trees have many branches going downward, but they might give a bit more of reality (just my idea).

Well, but I would like to keep using the original model (which is simply from xfrog library) because otherwise I am afraid that I can't make comparison between the original rendered images and ones with lots of improvement based on your advices.
And as one more reason, the scene with MY models really takes much time for rendering (the above image is after rendering 30 hrs).

By the way, I think there might be a bug in the "Offset U:" and "Offset V:" button in the Image Based Environment Section in the Render SetUp Box in 3ds max 2009.

Simply I cannot see any offset effect in the rendered image, no matter what value I put into these 2 buttons.
In MW studio, the Offset button does work without any trouble.

I am not so sure whether this is a bug or not. Simply there might be a mistake in my way of setting parameters...

[tom]

I think the tree with red leaves and both others with IBL looks nice

[tom]

Hi Koji, FYI the situation of bright intersections under sunlight should be improved with 2.01 patch in case you like to try again.

[koji_maruyama]

Well, thanks really.
Really.
I'll check it out soon.

Btw, it took a long time for me to find out the meaning of "FYI"
I thought it was something related with MW.

[koji_maruyama]

Well, let me try a bit more, with another model of cherry trees.
I still think in the previous model, the blossom texutures were densely crammed into tiny spaces between branches, as below:


And so I re-tried to make some modification for the blossom, and the first trial is as below (without thinSSSS):



In the above model, one tree has more than 500,000 polys and not for actual use, and so I will try to use displacement map and thinSSSS.

Well, probably this should be under new topic, because if I use thinSSSS from NL and keep using ISO100, the green color reflection from the ground is negligible.
But if my another trail comes out as success, let me please post the final result under this topic, because I think I am close to a goal.

[koji_maruyama]

This is my best, so far.


Much better, I think.



In this model, I failed to make use of displacement for blossom texture, because I only used 1 or 2 polygons for each blossom plane and so displacement effect could not come out.
(If I use more polys for each blossom plane, the total poly number of the tree will be doubled or tripled...)
But the model still look okay.

I also think I don't need a majority of light to penetrate the blossom, because in this model the model of blossom has become a bit sparse.
So probably I can make the thickness of thinSSSS setting of the blossom a bit more thick, thus making more light being captured inside the plane and making the plane more bright.

But this post is going to be the last post under this topic, because I am not talking about the reflection from ground.

For this topic I think I rendered more than 50 times. I thank you all for all suggestions for my topic.

[Richard]

Sorry to hear about the problem in you apartment and I hope it's fixed soon. Your modeling strategy is very good and there's no problem with it, don't worry. The overillumination is due to the directional sunlight so, I have a workaround for you. Navigate to the Environment Settings panel and find Save to HDR button where you can export the current physical sky as HDR. So, save a copy of your physical sky as HDR image with this option and use the image to illuminate your scene instead of Physical Sky. It will help getting rid of those bright parts and also speed up your render.

Tom, hoping not to hijack this thread!! But must say yet another GREAT tip!!

When one utilises this process does the HDRI locate to the exact location as it was authored?

[Fernando Tella]

In my experience (only once ) yes, it looks the same.

[Richard]

In my experience (only once ) yes, it looks the same.

Hey thanks Fernando - I couldn't contain my excitement and had to have a quick go right now and found out yes indeed it does!!!

Thats a rather big bonus! I wonder why that couldn't be automated on render, not that it takes more than a moment to set it up!