Improved swamp

Isegrim · Thu 11/03/2004 22:04:27

Hi!

please comment on my swamp. I hope, the atmosphere is gloomy enough.

[Edit]
New image on bottom. Old image here:

http://www.2dadventure.com/ags/sumpf2.jpg

[/Edit]
Thanks!

P.S. If you find the colors weird, please let me know, I'm a bit color blind... (really)

AndersM · Thu 11/03/2004 22:10:26

Actually, it's to dark for me to see...

Isegrim · Thu 11/03/2004 22:14:37

Er...

I suppose, I should have increased that gamma correction a bit... but on the other hand, the background of the site is very light. In the game it will be full screen and (I tried it) its better then.

broan496 · Thu 11/03/2004 22:32:43

I personally agree with MrMasse. Perhaps some ambient moonlight. Don't ask me how though.

deltamatrix · Thu 11/03/2004 22:33:59

I really had to pump the brightness to da MAX on my monitor to see this.

It's not bad but it doesn't seem very swamp like. It looks more to me like a dark field at night with a few trees. You should add brown patches to make the place look messer because right now, it looks.....clean. Are swamps meant to be clean? I think not

not bad though, good effect but it needs to be a little more complex I believe

Chicky · Thu 11/03/2004 22:42:53

Love the atmosphere, very nice. But i have a suggestion

I really think that like broan, you should add a moon, with photoshop or somthing, they to define the edges of the leaves a bit more you could lighten the edges. If this was done rite this could look absolutly amaing!

keep it up

-OSC

Isegrim · Thu 11/03/2004 22:46:28

Actually, there is quite a lot of muddy water (the patches that are more green than the rest), but I fear the low contrast and the fog quite kills the watery look, yes.
Hm... I think I'll have to redo the ground and background, because turning up gamma makes the image look quite crappy...
More light shouldn't be a problem, seems I mistook darkness for gloom $:-\$

What do you mean with "detail", deltamatrix? More trees? more fumes?

OSC, I blurred the edges manually, because I thought it would look more natural that way...

So far, thanks!

meowy · Fri 12/03/2004 09:29:59

All I see is a black square and my gamma is pretty high already.

Paper Carnival · Fri 12/03/2004 17:13:18

It looks kinda... strange... but nice as well. Is that 3d modeled or is it drawn? Oh, and change the sky because using gradients is bad

makri · Fri 12/03/2004 19:11:50

My monitor should be quite well calibrated at the moment and I find that way too dark, full screen or not.

Ben · Sat 13/03/2004 17:29:03

I can't see it wither, even with my monitor at its maximum brigtness. I had to increase the brigtness in PSP to look at it. If you want to give the impression of darkness, I'd suggest giving all the light a blue tint. That way it will still look dark even if you make it a lot brighter.

Isegrim · Tue 16/03/2004 08:26:03

Hi!

I redid the swamp, trying to follow all of your advice as good as possible...

Changes:
-You should now all be able to see it

-made the trees less blurry
-tried to break the gradiented sky with clouds, but I think I'll do my game in 32bit anyway...
-I hope the water looks more "watery" now...
-used more "crippled" tree models

Thanks a lot for your help!

P.S. For anyone interested: The ground was done in Terragen (pretty cool and most of all: free), the trees were done in Treemaker (not quite as cool, but still free), ground and trees were imported into Cinema4d (not free, but still cool

), fumes added and then rendered (rendering time 3h 47 min on a 3GHz machine...)

Takara · Tue 16/03/2004 09:27:39

Wow! That's much better

I'm not totally convinced by the shadowing on the clouds... but that could just be me. It might look better with the sun lower so that it looks closer to dawn/sunset? Just a thought

The fumes look a little bit odd... but then I haven't actually seen many swamps

Good work though

Tis a great improvement

Takara.

Chicky · Tue 16/03/2004 10:41:41

Bleddy hell, thats amazing.

one critique, i think the tree's need some work. The branches look really square and static, the ones at the back look ok tho $:-\$

I think its mainly the one at the front, branches look really sharp, need smothening up.

hope it helps

-OSC

Isegrim · Tue 16/03/2004 10:58:46

OSC, I wanted the tree to look skeletal. (and, I wanted TreeMaker to do all the work for me

) But maybe I'll blur it in PhotoPaint or so...

Takara, the clouds are a bit difficult in Terragen but what you see is what Terragen has rendered...
I must say, I quite like the sun that way. Putting it lower would make the shadows too large and would greatly reduce the contrast. And I think the water needs to reflect the sun, in order to be identified as water. With the sun lower, I'm not sure whether the reflection would be seen anymore.

The fumes are not really supposed to be fumes but rather erring lights (crazy lights?, Will-o'-the-wisps? ... different internet translators delivered these expressions for the german "Irrlicht") and will be animated. If you think they should be brighter or more dense, or whatever, please let me know... They do not give off light themselves right now. but I could try that if you think that would look better.

Edit: Just tried it in a 16bit game and it doesn't make too much difference to 32bit, so I guess the sky is ok now...

Phemar · Wed 17/03/2004 13:19:37

Quote from: Isegrim on Tue 16/03/2004 08:26:03
-I hope the water looks more "watery" now...

Oh, it's water.

Isegrim · Wed 17/03/2004 13:51:17

Quote from: Zor on Wed 17/03/2004 13:19:37
Oh, it's water.

I've never seen grass reflecting sunlight before before...8)
What did it look like to you?

SSH · Wed 17/03/2004 14:21:58

Do you get trees growing out of waterlogged ground like that? Unless its a wood that has just been flooded, the trees seem wrong somehow...

I didn't think it was water at first, because:

a) there's too much texture on the surface: this would probably disappear if it was animated
b) the trees growing out of it... I'm sure that they wouldnt grow like that... a seed needs to land on soil to germinate.

Ali · Wed 17/03/2004 16:09:00

Isegrim, the improved picture really is improved. The only thing I think it really needs is more mist. Swamps need mist say I. Also the shadows might look nicer is they were more soft.

I like the will o'the wisps.

Quote from: Isegrim on Wed 17/03/2004 13:51:17
Quote from: Zor on Wed 17/03/2004 13:19:37
Oh, it's water.

I've never seen grass reflecting sunlight before before...8)

I find that a little difficult to believe ... but I know what you mean.

Do0kie · Wed 17/03/2004 17:52:42

It's a great swamp!

The only thing that bugs me is that it looks a little too 'clean'. I'd add some bushes, vines and all that other 'dirty' vegetation to improve it.
And the water looks a little odd to me... It looks like somebody's dropped a ton of chocolate pudding on an orchard. This however could easily be improved with some water plants like mosses, maybe a rotting driftwood and some rocks.

Keep up the good work!

Improved swamp

broan496