I thought it was an attainable goal. But considering how much I had to read and learn before I could get anywhere, I still made a lot of progress and I'm glad I took Monday off. I learned about area lights, something I didn't have in Maya 3, and I learned about Maya's shadow pass, which doesn't work very well with mental ray (despite many wasted hours trying to get it to work). I also learned about ambient occlusion passes, which I LOVE. And I did a lot of lighting and a lot more tweaking. And there is even more tweaking to come when I get the shading done but at least the basic lights are in.
My goal for today was to have a finished shot posted on my site, and revise the site design and get my promo materials laid out. I did redesign the home page but since I don't have a finished shot yet, the new home page isn't up. I can actually see the shading and light tweaking taking me the rest of the week just on this shot. That's annoying, but if that's really the case then I'll be doing the night shot in addition to this and leaving it at those two. The night shot has a lot of lighting challenges and if I can pull it off, it will really show off my skills. There's really not much to the shot with the toilet, and the one that has him on the sink is another early morning scene, which I have covered here. I'll save the toilet shot for last in case I have the time but I'm not betting on it at this point.
There's one thing that's annoying me about this shot. He's standing in front of a window. I feel like that should be more apparent, and at the same time, it's very early morning just as the sun is coming up so there's not a lot of light coming in yet anyway. I don't know. I probably need to stop looking at it for a while. Makes me glad I have a job to go to tomorrow.
Despite my three day weekend (which I will make up for over the next few days at work), I still stayed up until 7:30 this morning, then took a 6-hour nap, so it feels like it's too early to go to bed right now (at almost 2:30). But I guess I should. I should be proud of this. I think I am, I've just stared at it so long that all I can see when I close my eyes is a white chalky potato under colored lights.
My goal for today was to have a finished shot posted on my site, and revise the site design and get my promo materials laid out. I did redesign the home page but since I don't have a finished shot yet, the new home page isn't up. I can actually see the shading and light tweaking taking me the rest of the week just on this shot. That's annoying, but if that's really the case then I'll be doing the night shot in addition to this and leaving it at those two. The night shot has a lot of lighting challenges and if I can pull it off, it will really show off my skills. There's really not much to the shot with the toilet, and the one that has him on the sink is another early morning scene, which I have covered here. I'll save the toilet shot for last in case I have the time but I'm not betting on it at this point.There's one thing that's annoying me about this shot. He's standing in front of a window. I feel like that should be more apparent, and at the same time, it's very early morning just as the sun is coming up so there's not a lot of light coming in yet anyway. I don't know. I probably need to stop looking at it for a while. Makes me glad I have a job to go to tomorrow.
Despite my three day weekend (which I will make up for over the next few days at work), I still stayed up until 7:30 this morning, then took a 6-hour nap, so it feels like it's too early to go to bed right now (at almost 2:30). But I guess I should. I should be proud of this. I think I am, I've just stared at it so long that all I can see when I close my eyes is a white chalky potato under colored lights.
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