As part of my on going goal of improving my lighting I've decided to retackle one of my usual strong areas, underwater.
I have to say I'm very pleased with my initial results. They are not perfect of course, but considering I 75% matched my reference in an hour I consider this a victory.
My main reference for your reference. This is a photo by Phillip Colla of Ocean Light that caught my eye on flickr. It has about the right scale and field of depth for a large Mosasaur to swim through. While this is my primary reference I do have some 30 other shots of kelp forests. There are a multitude of light types and murk depth.
Here is my beginning. I think I've nailed the overall water colour. One major difference is the depth of my murk, but this is mostly delibrate. I entend to stick some more bonus critters into the background so wanted to keep it (maybe) unbelievably clear.
The kelp is so far my one major problem. Both in that the models look like the plants you buy in an aquarium (in this form) OR when I try to fix that they crash my renderer. So going to have to fight with the kelp a lot more before I'm happy...
Initial thoughts or suggestions?
1 comment:
The tonal values as they are now imply that the tylosaur(?) is just in front of the kelp strands (they have comparable values). Is this the case?
I think it would be more dramatic if the T. were where he is in screen space but with more depth between him and the kelp - ie. more fall off in value. I'd also suggest some volumetric shadows. Would work well with particle-rich water lie this.
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