制作“蒸汽朋克科學(xué)家”

Martin Punchev帶我們通過(guò)他的色彩和照明過(guò)程制作他的渲染圖像的蒸汽朋克的科學(xué)家

Martin Punchev takes us through the color and lighting processes involved in making his rendered image of Steampunk Scientist

Introduction

My Steampunk Scientist was part of a small games marathon I did together with a fellow artist. The purpose of the project was to test the unity engine and prototype a lightning-fast mockup for a cute action-adventure game. The whole aim of this image was to create promotional art with whatever means I could use, since everything on the project had to be done within hours rather than days.

The final image took several hours of playing. I deliberately didn't use the word 'work' because, although in this making of I will share with you how I come to the end result, my main aim was to elaborate on the concept of playing, experimenting and working on the fly ? without having the luxury of time for planning. It is definitely a risky strategy, but worth trying, especially when working on a team project with super-tight deadlines. In this scenario, the big picture is far more important than the individual piece of work and simply there is not enough time to worry over the small things and making everything perfect.

介紹

我的蒸汽朋克科學(xué)家是我與一位同學(xué)一起做的小型比賽的一部分。該項(xiàng)目的目的是測(cè)試團(tuán)結(jié)引擎和原型一個(gè)可愛(ài)的動(dòng)作冒險(xiǎn)游戲的閃電般快速的模型。這個(gè)形象的整個(gè)目的是用任何我可以使用的方式來(lái)制作促銷藝術(shù)品，因?yàn)轫?xiàng)目中的所有內(nèi)容必須在數(shù)小時(shí)甚至數(shù)天之內(nèi)完成。

最終的形象花了幾個(gè)小時(shí)的時(shí)間。我故意沒(méi)有使用“工作”這個(gè)詞，因?yàn)殡m然在這件事情中，我會(huì)和你分享一下我最終的結(jié)果，我的主要目的是要詳細(xì)說(shuō)明過(guò)程，試驗(yàn)和工作的概念，沒(méi)有時(shí)間的豪華計(jì)劃。這絕對(duì)是一個(gè)有風(fēng)險(xiǎn)的策略，但值得嘗試，特別是在超緊的期限內(nèi)開(kāi)展團(tuán)隊(duì)項(xiàng)目時(shí)。在這種情況下，大局比個(gè)別工作要重要得多，只是沒(méi)有足夠的時(shí)間來(lái)?yè)?dān)心小事情，使一切都完美。

Quick start

With a tight deadline, the important thing is to not over-think too much and just quickly start with something. I started with a default render of the low-poly model which was used in the game.

快速開(kāi)始

截止日期緊迫，重要的是不要過(guò)分思考，只是快點(diǎn)開(kāi)始。 我開(kāi)始使用游戲中使用的低聚模型的默認(rèn)渲染。

Generating render passes

Although this model was far from polished (as it was originally meant to be seen very small on the screen), the render served as a good base to start with? or at least better than starting from scratch.

At that point it wasn't a bad idea to generate some additional render passes, since you never know how or when they will eventually help you.

生成渲染通道

雖然這個(gè)模式遠(yuǎn)沒(méi)有拋光（因?yàn)樗�原本是在屏幕上看起�?lái)很小），渲染作為開(kāi)始的良好基礎(chǔ)， 或至少比從頭開(kāi)始更好。

在這一點(diǎn)上，生成一些額外的渲染通道并不是一個(gè)壞主意，因?yàn)槟阌肋h(yuǎn)不知道他們最終將如何或何時(shí)幫助你。

Start now, think later

Staring at the simple render you might feel scared and indecisive ? so silence the voices of uncertainty and just throw something on the canvas as early as possible!

The best way to start in this case was to throw a background onto the canvas, so I quickly added a ground plane to establish the perspective and depth. Then without losing too much time, I threw various elements in, re-using the low-poly assets from the game prototype just to remove the flat space around the character.

從現(xiàn)在開(kāi)始，認(rèn)真思考

盯著簡(jiǎn)單的渲染你可能會(huì)感到害怕和猶豫不決。 所以沉默不確定的聲音，盡早把東西放在畫(huà)布上！

在這種情況下，最好的方法就是將背景放在畫(huà)布上，所以我很快添加了一個(gè)地平面來(lái)建立透視和深度。 然后，我不會(huì)失去太多的時(shí)間，我投入了各種各樣的元素，從游戲原型中重新使用低聚物資產(chǎn)，只是為了消除角色周圍的平面空間。

Inspiration

And then a magical thing happened! My eyes locked on some of the messy 'pixel puke' on the canvas, and decisions about how to carry on spontaneously came to me. I visualized a steamy/dusty indoor space. The 'throw then think' methodology was starting to pay dividends.

靈感

然后一件神奇的事情發(fā)生了！ 我的眼睛鎖在畫(huà)布上的一些凌亂的“像素膿”，關(guān)于如何自發(fā)進(jìn)行的決定來(lái)到我身邊。 我看到一個(gè)蒸氣/多塵的室內(nèi)空間。 

Light it up

The next step is to define the light sources. Because I knew that I wanted a steamy environment, I actually indicated them like volumetric lights.

點(diǎn)亮它

下一步是定義光源。 因?yàn)槲抑�道我想要一個(gè)蒸汽的環(huán)境，我實(shí)際上指出他們像容積的燈光。

Shadows

Once I knew what my lighting would be, I then cast the shadow of the character on the floor. To avoid painting it, I rendered something approximate in 3ds Max and added it as a pass in Photoshop.

Also, since we touched on the topic about shadows, something you should not forget would be to paint contact shadows on important areas, such as where the character is sitting on the ground plane. Without them you risk making the character seem as though it is floating instead of sitting firmly on the ground. I would have painted an entire AO pass if the time allowed it.

陰影

一旦我知道我的照明將是什么，我然后把角色的陰影放在地板上。 為了避免畫(huà)畫(huà)，我在3ds Max中渲染了一些近似的東西，并將其作為Photoshop中的一個(gè)通配符添加。

另外，既然我們涉及到陰影的話題，你不應(yīng)該忘記的東西就是在重要的地方繪制接觸陰影，比如角色坐在地面上。 沒(méi)有他們，你會(huì)冒險(xiǎn)使角色看起來(lái)像是漂浮，而不是堅(jiān)定地坐在地上。 如果時(shí)間允許，我會(huì)畫(huà)一個(gè)整個(gè)AO通行證。

Throw in colors!

Experimentation is important in this stage too. I generated several eye-pleasing color variations of the image and blended and mixed them together to achieve something better. I'm using custom Photoshop actions that give me various looks, but there are lots of tools available that can give you the same results; some are free, others are paid for and there's even web-based ones like www.fotor.com.

The important thing is to play with them and experiment with different blending modes. Once you like the particular look, you can mask the rest of the layer out, so only parts of the image are affected by your color variations.

投入顏色！

在這個(gè)階段，實(shí)驗(yàn)也很重要。 我產(chǎn)生了幾個(gè)令人眼花繚亂的顏色變化的圖像，并混合在一起，以達(dá)到更好的東西。 我使用自定義的Photoshop動(dòng)作，給我各種各樣的外觀，但有很多可用的工具可以給你相同的結(jié)果; 有些是免費(fèi)的，其他的是付費(fèi)的，甚至有網(wǎng)絡(luò)的，如www.fotor.com。

重要的是要調(diào)整，并嘗試不同的混合模式。 一旦你喜歡特定的外觀，你可以掩蓋層的其余部分，所以只有部分的圖像受到你的顏色變化的影響。

Blending colors

When doing characters, I found myself generally creating a few types of color passes. I tend to create a reddish pass that I blend with the original image to achieve a more sub-surface scattering feel to the organic surfaces and, most importantly, to get rid of the black shadows. Also a cool-bluish color can help to simulate ambient sky lighting and reflections (even for scenes like this one that are indoor!) in which I place the following Fresnel principle.

I use a lot of the advanced blending modes available in the layer properties to help me speed up things and avoid spending time on masking out areas by hand. Right-click on a layer and choose Blending Options ? this will open the Layer Styles dialogue, and on the bottom you can see 2 identical looking sliders, one called This Layer, the other called Underlying Layer. These are the Blend If options.

Moving the black-and-white sliders for the bar on top will cause areas of the currently selected layer to disappear from view. Moving the sliders for the bar on the bottom will cause areas of the layer(s) below the currently selected layer to show through the selected layer, as if it's punching holes through it. The effect will be harsh until you drag the sliders by holding the Alt key. This will add transition to the effect and will give you more control over the blending.

In the image below you can see how the colored layer is showing only in the dark tones of the layers below.

混合顏色

在做角色的時(shí)候，我發(fā)現(xiàn)自己通常會(huì)創(chuàng)造幾種顏色通行證。我傾向于創(chuàng)建一個(gè)紅色的通行證，我與原始圖像混合，以達(dá)到有機(jī)表面更多的亞表面散射感，最重要的是擺脫黑色陰影。另外，一種淡藍(lán)色的顏色可以幫助模擬周圍的天空照明和反射（即使是像室內(nèi)這樣的場(chǎng)景一樣），我放置以下菲涅爾原理。

我在圖層屬性中使用了很多先進(jìn)的混合模式，以幫助我加快事情，避免花費(fèi)時(shí)間來(lái)手工掩蓋區(qū)域。右鍵單擊圖層，然后選擇混合選項(xiàng)？這將打開(kāi)“圖層樣式”對(duì)話框，底部可以看到2個(gè)相同的滑塊，一個(gè)稱為“圖層”，另一個(gè)稱為“底層”。這些是混合選項(xiàng)。

移動(dòng)頂部的酒吧的黑白滑塊會(huì)導(dǎo)致當(dāng)前所選圖層的區(qū)域從視圖中消失。移動(dòng)底部欄中的滑塊將導(dǎo)致當(dāng)前所選圖層下方的圖層的區(qū)域顯示出所選圖層，就好像它穿過(guò)孔一樣。通過(guò)按住Alt鍵拖動(dòng)滑塊，效果將變得很苛刻。這將增加對(duì)效果的轉(zhuǎn)換，并將為您提供更多的混合控制。

在下面的圖片中，您可以看到彩色圖層僅在下面的圖層的深色調(diào)中顯示。

Time to polish

Time was running out and although I wasn't quite satisfied with lots of things, I had to move on. The previous stage of incorporating elements, throwing colors and relying on happy accidents helped a lot and now I could run the last few meters to the finish-line by just fixing whatever my eye was not agreeing with: for instance, the harsh plane-breaks of the face and the fact that the character was missing eyebrows. Lighting artifacts were removed and some subtle details like wrinkles on the forehead were added.

And as you can imagine, since I've started with cheap and dirty renders of the low-poly, lots of things cried out for attention. At this point it is extremely useful to know where to delete and start over, and where to deform. Most of the time you can tweak and deform certain aspects and not waste time by deleting and starting from scratch. In places where I didn't like the pose, or the symmetry of something, I used the magical tool called Liquify. The other tool for deforming that I tend to use a lot is the Puppet Warp.

拋光時(shí)間

時(shí)間不多了，雖然我對(duì)很多事情不太滿意，但我不得不繼續(xù)前進(jìn)。以前的階段，結(jié)合元素，現(xiàn)在我可以運(yùn)行最后幾米到終點(diǎn)線，例如，嚴(yán)酷的飛機(jī)斷裂的臉和事實(shí)，字符缺少眉毛。去除了照明工件，并添加了一些細(xì)微的細(xì)節(jié)，如額頭上的皺紋。

而且你可以想像，因?yàn)槲乙呀?jīng)開(kāi)始用低廉的低價(jià)廉的低價(jià)格渲染。在這一點(diǎn)上，知道從哪里刪除和重新開(kāi)始以及在哪里變形是非常有用的。大多數(shù)時(shí)候，您可以通過(guò)刪除并從頭開(kāi)始，調(diào)整和改變某些方面，而不浪費(fèi)時(shí)間。我不喜歡這樣的姿勢(shì)，或是對(duì)稱的，我用神奇的工具叫做液化。另一種變形工具，我傾向于使用很多是木偶扭曲。

Finalization

This is the final stage and the chance to add a few quick bells-and-whistles to the image in the last seconds.

The additional emitting containers on the ground were added to help establish the scale and depth of the environment.

Fog was added in the lower portion of the image in order to refine the contrast so that it doesn't steal the attention from the upper portion of the character, which is the main focus point. I also added subtle reflections in the glasses and darkened the borders of the image to focus the viewer to the center.

定稿

這是最后一個(gè)階段，并有機(jī)會(huì)在最后幾秒內(nèi)為圖像添加幾個(gè)快速響鈴。

增加了地面附加的排放容器，以幫助確定環(huán)境的規(guī)模和深度。

在圖像的下部添加霧以便細(xì)化對(duì)比度，使得它不會(huì)從作為主要焦點(diǎn)的角色的上部分竊取注意力。 我還在眼鏡中添加了微妙的思考，使圖像的邊框變暗，將觀眾聚焦到中心。

Conclusion

In the last minutes, in the middle of adding some particles in the atmosphere, the time ran out and I had to call it done. However although very far (faaar far away) from perfect, I was happy that I didn't waste time on the smaller imperfections and I actually had something that looked decent for the purpose it was created and it was done on time.

Working under pressure definitely plays its role and helps to reduce wasted time for irrelevant things; but the quick start, figuring out as you go and happy accidents method helps tremendously to forget the pressure and turn the work into play and have fun while creating your artwork.

結(jié)論

在最后幾分鐘，在大氣中添加一些顆粒的時(shí)候，時(shí)間已經(jīng)過(guò)去了，我不得不說(shuō)。 然而，盡管距離完美非常遠(yuǎn)（faaar far away），我很高興我沒(méi)有浪費(fèi)時(shí)間在較小的缺陷上，我實(shí)際上有一些看起來(lái)體面的目的是為了創(chuàng)造的目的，它是按時(shí)完成的。

在壓力下絕對(duì)發(fā)揮作用，有助于減少浪費(fèi)時(shí)間的無(wú)關(guān)緊要的事情; 但是快速的開(kāi)始，隨著你的到來(lái)，找出快樂(lè)的做事方法，可以大大地忘記壓力，把工作變成戲劇，并在創(chuàng)作藝術(shù)品的時(shí)候開(kāi)心。